What We Want

Today I am preparing for the inkle weaving class I’ll be teaching at Midwest Weavers Conference in Omaha next week. I know spaces are still available, so if you’re a spur-of-the-moment type check it out for next weekend (June 22-24). In getting my materials ready, I uncovered a treasure-trove of inkle samples willed to me by Carol Strickler before her death in 1992. This, and the recent mention of Carol in the May/June 2007 issue of Handwoven regarding to her development of the Pourrey Cross Cataloging System for the Pourrey Cross Textile Library housed at Interweave Press, made me reflect on Carol and the generous weaving community we are a part of. Carol was my technical editor at Handwoven when I was editor (1985-1992). I always appreciated that Carol knew exactly what a weave structure was doing by just looking at the draft; she could see instantly when something was amiss. Carol could wrap her mind around instructions, keeping all the details intact to know if everything really added up in the end. Handwoven’s readers are fortunate to have had her behind-the-scenes contributions.

Because of Carol we have A Weaver’s Book of 8-Shaft Patterns. What most of the weaving world doesn’t know is that as she created her book, she was also fighting ovarian cancer, which she succumbed to shortly after her book was published. As managing editor of this project, I visited Carol ofttimes daily. Her strength and desire to leave this legacy were remarkable, and I felt privileged to be a part of this work. Also, I know that the book would never have been possible without hundreds of swatches submitted by Handwoven readers. In addition, many of Carol’s weaving friends and members of the Handweavers Guild of Boulder wove samples per Carol’s specific request to fill in any gaps in the material. Guild members also volunteered countless hours, because they wanted to come to Carol’s aid — from threading looms, to toting boxes, to helping Carol sift through scores of samples, to making meals, and even doing yard work. From this experience I learned how caring our Guild and the community of weavers could be. Seeing Carol’s inkle samples reminded me of her and how lucky I feel to be part of the community of weavers. The above, as it turns out, is a rather lengthy preamble to what I want to say, and that is what I think we all want and hope for: community (a place to be) and creativity (a desire to create with our hands). Weaving is this and more for me.

Below is a little treasure I found in Carol’s stash. It’s a tiny bag made out of a short piece of inkle band. The handle is another tiny woven strip. I think it’s a great idea for Christmas tree ornaments—never too early to start weaving for Christmas! Plus, it’s quick and fun to weave, too.

TNNA Travel Report

I just returned from TNNA (The National Needlework Association), held in Columbus, Ohio. TNNA is a trade organization primarily for the needlearts: embroidery, counted cross stitch, knitting and crochet.

Debbie Becker weaves her scarf.

The gathering in Columbus offered shop owners, designers and teachers classes and a trade show. I went to teach two weaving classes: "Weave a Scarf in a Day” on the rigid heddle loom and “Knit One, Weave Too”, a class designed to help yarn shops introduce weaving to their customers.

A proud Amy Swenson shows off her scarf. Amy is a partner in Make 1
Yarn Store located in Calgary,
Alberta Canada. She is also author
of two recently published books
“Not Your Mama’s Crochet” and
“Not your Mama’s Felting”.

Schacht also had a booth where we showed our smaller looms and spinning wheels, including our new Ladybug Spinning Wheel. Terribly exciting for me was the high interest we found in weaving and especially spinning. People seemed to want to learn to weave and spin. Also interesting was how many people had woven in the past and wanted to take it up again. The main catch for shop owners was finding someone who could teach weaving. My pitch of the day is if you are a weaving teacher, offer to teach a class for a yarn store, guild, school, city rec center. It is only through teaching that we can invigorate our craft.

Here’s some news from my days in Columbus:

• Stora Vavboken,a wonderful comprehensive Swedish weaving book, is going to be distributed in the US in English. Favorite Rag Rugs, another Swedish book, will be available in English. Look for both within the year.
  


A rare quiet moment in the Schacht booth.
• Preliminary results from the TNNA survey indicates that spinning is at the top of needleworkers’ lists of what they’d like to learn.
  
• The offerings of natural fibers—soy silk, bamboo, hemp and organic cotton—are developing and promising to be exciting.

Columbus Restaurant review:
Trying out local eateries is one of my great traveling pleasures. Barry and I had a delicious meal with warm hospitality at Barcelona, on the edge of German Town district in Columbus.