Category: tea towels
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Mistakes
One of my mentors always used to say “If you aren’t making mistakes, you aren’t learning anything.” And would then share her latest ‘mistakes’ and the lessons she’d learned from them. So very early in my career I learned that displeasing results were not terminal, just a stepping stone on the journey of learning. This…
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Tricks We Play on Ourselves
These three cones are part of the inheritance I received a few years ago. Lynn had an eye for a bargain and would routinely buy yarns on deep discount, not necessarily with any project in mind, just because it was ‘cheap’ and too good a deal to pass on. When I sorted through her literally…
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Stocking Up
This is warp #8 in the series of towel warps I’ve been winding. I’m struggling to finish the warp on the AVL – but need to get it off soon so I can weave other things. I’m struggling to use up stash. But that means buying more yarn to use up the yarn that…
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On a Roll
Progress comes slowly, but come it does. I’m down to about 30 yards left on the AVL, and in between weaving on it, I’ve been winding more tea towel warps. Because Stash Reduction! I still have yarn left from Lynn that is really only suitable for weft, but as such, makes nice towels. So, more…
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Bumps and Hiccoughs
So, here I was, all set to have my usual ‘birthday’ sale (generally July 1-9 each year) when a news release announced that the union and Canada Post are about to start job action and if the union begins rotating job action, Canada Post will simply shut down service entirely. Not much point doing a…
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Waste Not
Waste not, want not. One man’s waste is another man’s treasure. Both good pithy quotes, but…how do we define ‘waste’? What happens when we ‘waste’ one thing in order to ‘save’ something else? In my studio, my life, my most valuable commodity is my time. I will therefore ‘waste’ yarn when salvaging yarn will…
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Happy Place
I can hardly believe that in just over two years I have used up the majority of Lynn’s fine linen. But today I finished off the very fine three ply and started using an even finer singles cotton/hemp blend. Since it was just a tad finer and more supple than the linen I ‘cheated’…
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Bad Hostess
Word of warning…since my work is also my play, I assume my visitors like to ‘play’ with me. Mary and I have made a significant dent in the hemming pile. We are a little over half way through the 50 towels Doug pressed last week. Of course there will be 20 more to do soon.…
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Creative Decisions
Since I’m running low on colours I want to use for this series of towels, I wound up with a value difference that was greater than my eye liked. I knew the weft for the towel body would make the difference less, but I wasn’t happy with either of the solids in the warp for…
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Almost
It has taken a large number of warps but I am almost finished the cotton slub/linen yarn. I have just finished filling the humidor with bobbins for the next warp and once that is done, one more warp will finish this cone plus the bits of some tubes of the same yarn. If there is…