Another Twilight Panel Bites the Dust

Since the 4 original panels don't fill enough of the wall, I created Pre-Dawn to go with Sunrise, Noon, Sunset and Midnight. Wanting another panel, I began Twilight using some handspun yarn in a mix of blues with a touch of purple, a busy yarn with lots of texture and variation in thickness. I added some beautiful brown/blue ribbon and then worked in some Lamb's Pride using box stitches. At that horizon, I began the sky with a smoother look, ending at the top with a dark grey-blue. A little bit of single crochet metallic thread added interest.

However, when I photographed the panel, I hated it. The handspun is too busy, the bottom is too heavy, the sky area has no interest, the metallic addition are haphazard.

So, I frogged the piece and saved some of the sky as strips and all of the rest of the yarn. I put the handspun aside for a different project.

I began anew with lighter weight yarns and a smoother look for the water.

Since I work on this a bit every day, I kept adding another color, another texture - one section on top of another without a break. I wove in the metallic strips. And, I decided the sky area needed some fluffiness, but I couldn't find a yarn that was the right color and texture.

I  cut several yards of Lamb's Pride Bulky in that heathery Peacock color into 5 inch strips. Using my dog slicker brushes, I created a big pile of fuzz, which I spun into some really funky thick/thin/lumpy yarn. This is the fluffy wedge on the right side. Looks great. I thought the panel looked a little narrow, but I figured I could block it out a bit to be wider.

I kept ignoring the fact that it was too narrow. I measured the length, and I kept adding rows.

IT'S TOO NARROW, and it will not block out to being two inches wider. I am not going to take this one apart, but I will begin another Twilight panel soon.

2015 International Freeform Fiberarts Guild Challenge: Ocean

Ocean Hours

A six-panel wall hanging inspired by time lapse photography and by the ocean at Pine Knoll Shores, North Carolina, USA. This was created for the 2015 Challenge: Ocean of the International Freeform Fiberarts Guild, and the entire show is on their website blog.

The First Four Panels

Sunrise

Noon

Sunset

Midnight

Pre-Dawn

Twilight - Taken Apart

Handspun yarn in rocks

Midnight in process

Original Noon - Taken Apart

Too small for the wall

Beginning of sunrise

Scrap from originial Noon

Stiches South April 2015

Stitches South in Nashville was marvelous even though the crochet classes were very basic. The Gaylord Opryland Hotel is an arena sized building with two atriums (atria), one of which has several multi-story buildings inside it. A small river (albeit only a foot deep) encircles an island, and a boat ride gives you a view of the plants and fish. The Cascades entrance has a Chihuly glass sculpture and some beautiful stained glass.

Here's the river and Joyce on her scooter. The hotel was so big that we could not have walked to all the places we needed to be. This was our regular morning ride down past the end of the white building and into the convention center.

This is one corner of a marvelous booth, one of about 400.

This is a silk batt for spinning. Swan Hollow had a 3-booth display of spinning fibers, felt (you can see the bolt of red on the left), and yarns. After I bought the wheel, I went down the row saying, "I'll have 4 ounces of that, 8 ounces of this, 4 of all three of those, etc." It's a good thing I was driving. Yes, I did buy some of the red/yellow top at the back of the booth; the purple, too.

Laura Bryant taught an extraordinary class on color using Josef Albers color theory. None of us will ever think of color that way again.


Jenny King, crochet artist from Australia, taught several classes: Bavarian crochet, Solomon's Knot and another class which I skipped because I was busy buying a spinning wheel.

I also took a marvelous spinning class from Merike Saarniit. At the intro luncheon she told us that even beginning spinners would leave her class with a fully balanced yarn. And, we did!!! I was too busy spinning to get any photos of the class.

In fact, I've been so busy spinning since I bought the wheel that I haven't even made any photos of it.

Stitches South at the Gaylord Opryland was marvelously fun, especially because my friend, Joyce was with me, but it was very expensive, and crochet classes were too few and very basic. I do prefer the CGOA events.

IFFA Guild Challenge 2015

Within the next week or two, the International Freeform Fiberarts Guild will post the works of art for Challenge 2015 - Oceans: The Color of Water. More than 50 artists from around the world participate each year in the Challenge. I have been a participating member for the past few years.

Until the Challenge is published (book and website), I can't reveal my offering for this year, but I can show you parts of the process. When I first learned to spin, I bought some pale blue thick and thin handspun yarn and some same color bulky yarn from MamaJude in Pine Lake, Georgia. So, I picked it up and squeezed it a bit, visualizing this as sky reflecting the color of the ocean in the early morning. It called to be knitted; so I pulled out some very large knitting needles and began making sky. Here's the beginning of the sky in a herringbone pattern.

After a bit I decided that every ocean place needed sand and rocks. I just recently began spinning in earnest; so I had that marvelously overspun alpaca in a chocolate brown. It kinked and curled and twisted - perfect for gnarly rocks.

I finished a panel, looked at it, decided that this spiral sitting in the middle of it was detracting from the flow; so I unstitched the top. The bottom was all crocheted together; so I reluctantly picked up the scissors and began snipping - hoping to save much of the piece. 

That did not happen. Because this is freeform, I had crocheted round and over and under and forwards and backwards without regard to possible changes. This great junk pile is the result.

Suddenly four panels (16" x 20") were finished. I sewed them to latch hook rug backing and then stapled that to foam core and hung them over the sofa in my living room. That wall is BIG, and they were lost on it. More panels were needed.

In two days, I created a Pre-Dawn panel that lacks a few finishing touches.

Several parts have my hand-spun yarn: the top of the sky, the white clouds, the sun rays, and the rocks. I have spun some balanced yarn, but I didn't like it very much. I can buy balanced yarn. I can't buy the irregular yarns that give interest to my wall hangings.

The white clouds are tail-spun Border Leicester, firm and scrunchy and white. At the edge, unseen in this picture, is some hand-spun cream Suri alpaca. I've spun a bit more of the yarn like the sky to use as sun rays becoming gradually darker towards the edges. The top needs to be squared, and this piece will be ready to hang.

Tomorrow I'll begin another panel - maybe a twilight ocean panel?