AIR 2016 Week Seven Lemons and Lemonade

Here's the setup for AIR Week Seven, including beaded knitting which uses a crochet hook, stitching on net, and designing ideas.

We were up against a beautiful Spring day, which kept people away in droves, so, since few people got the benefit of this setup, I plan to repeat it next week.  That's the lemon part.

However, the lemonade part is that for the first time, I got to work during the session, not needing to stop and explain and show. So here's the lemonade, a finished phone purse, started as a demo. 

In fact it wasn't wasted, since I showed a couple of stitchers the crochet hook beading idea the evening before, at our meeting, and then a couple of neighbors who dropped in at home the evening after.


You will see that I now have three beaded phone purses.  They seem to fall in seasons, the latest one, in string and blue glass beads, being a summer idea, the white with the blue wooden beads and gold strap a winter one, and the dark rust with I think agates, or some such precious stone, and silver strap, a fall one.  This was not planned, but it occurred to me just now that it's what I seem to have done.

Since I plan to learn a bit of Ukrainian embroidery, and have a kit and instructions ready to go, and Ukrainian embroidery features flowers, perhaps I can stitch a Spring phone purse..all a bit quirky, but if some people, who shall remain nameless, create pillow covers for the season, well, I can do phone purses.  Neener!

And tomorrow I plan to shop for the piping and connectors to build myself a standing embroidery frame. The original wonderful plans, found on Magpie's blog, go here , are for a freestanding or tabletop frame. 

This link takes you to a nice post on Magpie's blog, always fun to read, and you will see the joke in the previous para as well as a link to the plans for the frame, created by Kathy Shaw, so you get a twofer.  Or a threefer, really.  I think Kathy deserves some sort of citation for this idea, and you will too, once you take a look at the plans.

I plan to adapt them to make a floor frame, and my stitching buds are eager to see how it comes out, after they saw the pvc niddy noddy in action!  They asked me for the link to the original ideas, which I sent, but I will show them my finished product, with any luck, soon.

And while I was musing about this, and thinking, what a pity, I seem to be weaving rather than stitching more than anything at the moment, that it struck me with a blow like a meteor to the head, that this can also be a weaving loom!  And it would be easy to remove the weaving at the end by sliding the members aside rather than cutting and tying the warp ends. Exactly like removing yarn from the niddy noddy.  And it's at an angle all the better to save my stiff neck.  Now I really can't wait to get on with this.

I can use up the rest of the piping left over from the niddy noddy, plus buy more piping (I guess it will be like the hot dogs and rolls, never coming out exactly even, there will always be leftover pipe), and various connectors.And I'll report back in due course.

Why the Artist in Residence notion is labor intensive!

The AIR 2016 is labor intensive partly because as gallery manager and general art director of the libe Donna rightly said, I decided to do it big, how typical of me, too true, and partly because I only include fiber arts in which I already have experience and have either exhibited or taught.

However, that's a range, and it means every week I usually have to refresh my knowledge and skill!  can't claim to show  something if I can't remember exactly how it goes, after all...

So this week, among other things, for Week Seven of nine, this is all your doing, Quinn, I'm refreshing my old skills with beaded knitting where you use a crochet hook to insert the beads.  It's mesmeric and you just don't want to stop once under way. 

I decided to embark on a new small piece, a phone purse, similar to a couple of others I'm bringing, just to demo the concept and to encourage visitors to try a small item for themselves at home.  I find new knitters tend to think in terms of large things like scarves and sweaters and can get a bit daunted when the finish line recedes like mountains in the distance.

And I'm using fine string and glass beads, a nice and unusual combo of materials. Another reminder that you can use anything you want as a yarn.

Anyway, now I have to hold back from finishing the thing too soon!  I need to have some left to show.  The pic here I took this morning, right after I got under way, but the item's nearly done now, oh dear. Note the extreme fineness of the hook -- the hook end is barely visible.  This is because you need a hook small enough to thread the bead onto it over the hook, and to draw it back out with two thicknesses of your yarn on it.  Which means you have to have beads with a bore (the hole in the middle) large enough to allow this.

In addition to this technique, I'll be showing books and ideas about doing your own designing, too, to encourage that, and will be showing a stitching on net still on the hoop, the design taken from my own drawing. 

The technique of using Vilene and net, which I might have invented, at least I never saw it anywhere,  is part of this, too.  A lot of textile arts are really not difficult, at least to embark on, but they seem mysterious until you see them happening.

Varied and interesting session, at least that's always the hope.