Fall Weekends
Fall is my favorite time of the year. We've had warm weather here in the SLC valley for the last couple of weeks, although today is one of those days where you can feel the summer and winter air fighting over supremacy. We've got high clouds this morning, with a cool breeze, and forecast for rain and storms tonight and tomorrow. A perfect day for some fiber things!
Yesterday, we took the horses up into one of the canyons for an end-of-summer ride. Alas, I forgot to take my camera, because the leaves are definitely at peak right now at those elevations, but will be gone with this incoming storm, I suspect. Utah doesn't have the same mix of trees that New England does, but with the yellow and oranges of the oaks against the rocky gray of the mountains, it is still a very nice mix of colors. On our ride we saw two white tail deer, both does, who were looking for acorns amongst the fallen leaves and were definitely fattening up for fall.
This week, with some of my new-found time, I put a set of navy blue/white towels on the loom. These will be slated for Xmas gifts, and I put a long enough warp on for plenty to gift and maybe a few extras. The navy blue forms little tesselating stars on this side, and the same stars appear in white on the reverse.
I also worked up a little baby-sized tam out of alpaca to send to Terry as a sample. She had sent me a lot of "ends" on cones and I hated not to use all these odds and ends for something, since the alpaca yarn is so very very soft. Here's the first prototype.
I've got an odd jog at one portion, so I'm reworking the patterns/numbers to make things more nicely even.
Sydney and I have a quiet morning on tap as D and Rowan have gone off to do an outdoor day with some guy friends in the mountains, so after I make another cuppa (now that I've caught up on my blog reading), she and I will settle in to the loom room. After lunch, I've got an actual outing (yes, I do leave my house occasionally!) with some of the SLC knitting gals to trek up to Ogden for some knitting time. Should be fun!
All for now......
Oooo....Ogden! The Needlepoint Joint, perchance? LOVE that place! Also love your weaving...wish I could get motivated to warp my loom, or try the new inkle loom, or the weft-faced loom I "had" to have Terry make for me!
Posted by: Marcia | October 01, 2006 at 10:42 AM
The tam is adorable - any chance of a pattern for a big kid?! Guess how long it took me to work out what "SLC" stood for - DOH!
Posted by: AmyP | October 01, 2006 at 11:50 AM
Love that tam! Glad to see you're weaving again. I can almost feel you relaxing - good for you!!
Posted by: Chris | October 01, 2006 at 12:52 PM
Oh I love that herringbon-ish weave... they will be beautiful beautiful towels... and the tam is beautiful too, love all those natural tones in the alpaca...
Posted by: Liz | October 01, 2006 at 04:44 PM
Love the towels! Does that take long? The tam is beautiful & looks really soft and warm.
Posted by: Carol | October 01, 2006 at 05:18 PM
the "loom room"....! How nice to be able to say such a thing.
Posted by: Judy | October 01, 2006 at 05:29 PM
I love the star towels! Where did you get the draft?
Posted by: Charleen | October 01, 2006 at 07:53 PM
i'm jealous, it was 90 here today, and i spent my afternoon shucking, silking, and blanching corn, then cooking supper for the crew that helped. wheeeee!
Posted by: minnie | October 01, 2006 at 08:57 PM
You're making good use of your new found 'time' and enjoying it, too!
Posted by: margene | October 02, 2006 at 06:11 AM
What great projects! The tam reminds me so much of the South American alpaca textiles.
Posted by: Birdsong | October 04, 2006 at 07:53 AM
What great projects you have made in your spare time!!! Tell me more about the towels :-))
Posted by: Kim | October 14, 2006 at 05:13 PM