Weaving the Days

I am really excited about weaving the Tapestry Diary that I described in the last post.  Every day I can’t wait to get into the studio and do my shape of the day, but I try to wait until I have a few hours free.

That’s because after I’m done with the daily entry, which only takes 5 or 10 minutes, I always feel like weaving some more. In this photo you can see an area where I wove 3 days simultaneously, because they have to be interconnected. I wove that section over 3 days, but the middle day (red and white stripes) is formed by hatching the red with the white.

On January 10 I sat down and casually wove a plain, solid colored parallelogram without thinking of the date.

The next day I realized that January 10 is my daughter’s birthday, but since she was far away on vacation, we were not celebrating until the next week.

So I unwove (Penelope-ed) it, and rewove it with her name. I am experimenting with fun ways of weaving text so I hope it’s readable.

On January 20 I had the first meeting of my new tapestry class. This is also the first time I have held a class in my own studio, so after class I did a “loom tour,” and when I explained the Tapestry Diary, one student asked what I intended to include to remember them, my new students! So I wove the letter T for tapestry, and the number 1.

Here’s what it looks like after 3 weeks. January 1st is on the bottom left. Then right above it is January 8. Each row is a week. I have a different color scheme for each month, and February will be pretty dismal looking, in keeping with the month itself.

Meanwhile I’m trying to finish up a bunch of UFOs…UnFinished Objects. Maybe this time I’ll actually make some progress……?

Happy Tapestry New Year

It’s been very snowy the past week, and since our daughter Zoe, and her husband Jason were visiting from California, I’ve hardly been out of the house. 

There were cookies of course, including the Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies featured on Zoe and Jason’s “Milk and Cookies” blog. YUM! Also muffins.

Also, our traditional Canasta tournaments but this time, alas, I was NOT the Master of the Universe.

Inspired by Tommye Scanlin, I had decided to begin a Tapestry Diary for 2010.

The loom I wanted to use was occupied by a less than half finished tapestry, the 4th in the Chaotic Fragments series. So I knew I would have to finish it and put a new warp on the loom by January 1.

Chaotic Fragments Part 4 is about 9x9”. For some reason I decided not to include my signature (a triangle representing a capital A) in the tapestry, because there didn’t seem to be a good place for it. So instead, I wove it into the border, upside down so it will be right side up after it’s hemmed. As long as I was at it, I thought, why not weave the year too? Brilliant idea, except now I realize I should have waited until the end. Kind of embarrassing to have 08 on it, when I didn’t finish it until  2010!

What with all my Canasta responsibilities I didn’t finish the tapestry until January 1. I hate showing a tapestry before it’s been in an exhibit, but I’m so happy it’s done that I can’t resist. Here it is, but not hemmed yet. 

I actually got the new warp mostly onto the loom the same day.

On January 2 we drove to Cape Cod for my Mom’s Memorial Service. Mom passed away in September and we had planned this so that her grandkids and other far flung family could attend. It was a beautiful ceremony and so very healing. I loved one thing that the minister said, that the loss is never more important than the gift. So true. We realized today that yesterday’s date was a palindrome! 01 02 2010! Mom would have loved that.

So today, January 3, was the first time I had a chance to finish preparing the new warp and start weaving the tapestry diary.  

My plan is to weave a parallelogram every day, about 2 inches wide and 1 inch high. I got into weaving this shape years ago, because it’s essentially a lazy line with color changes. I have woven a couple of tapestry exercises like this.

There will be 7 across, so every inch will be a week. Every month will have a color theme. On the first day of the month I will weave a stylized letter to indicate the month, for example J for January, seen here on the left side of the tapestry.

If I miss a day, I’ll just weave it the next day. I had not intended to include any imagery, but then I decided I had to include something special in the January 2nd entry, to note my Mom’s Memorial Service. So I wove the letter M for her name, Marian. 

For January 3, I wove a silver wing because both of my daughters were flying away on airplanes; one home to California, and the other to Florida for a vacation.

Since most days are uneventful, then most entries will be much simpler, and all will be woven from my large bag of left-over wefts.

Knowing me, I could spend a lot of time agonizing over the exact colors! I’m really excited about this project.  Happy New Year!