What inspires you to choose the colours in your project? This guild project of the North Peace Spinners' and Weavers' Guild in Fort St. John, is an acrylic warp to make blankets 34"x 48" with 4 " fringes. The warp will make 5 blankets. Participants use their own weft. They either pay $20 as a donation to the Women's Resource Centre or give the blanket to the Women's Resource Centre. Kathy B. gave us the yarn and this is the 4th project using Kathy's yarn that we have done in Pottery Twill from A Handweaver's Pattern Book by Marguerite Davison. We tie on each new warp, onto a dummy warp.
We started with three shades of red and what to do with them? We chose the two shades that are very similar in colour and randomly warped them as the main colour of the blankets. The edge stripes are a random selection including a fourth red that is a bit shiny. Four of us designed the stripes and selected the colours, Rhya, Norma, Debbie and Faye. It is a bit of a challenge with four opinions to merge into a collective design but we worked together very well and the process was a lot of fun. We were using what we had in stock. We wanted a little orange, some yellow, a little green and navy blue. We worked on this over a period of about 3 weeks, every Thursday morning.
It occurred to us that our colour scheme was the same as the flowers in the planter at the front door of Artspost, our studio location. This actually helped us to decided to put a little white with the yellow as we were running out of yellow. The petunias are white with a little yellow. It is fun to remember the flowers of a warmer season.
We decided to make the pattern slightly unbalanced. The edge stripes and the yellow stripes are not even in width. It is a very bright and lively blanket and much prettier than my picture shows. Faye used the brighter red in one of the smaller weft stripes. It is very bright red and slightly courser yarn and perfect in very small amounts in this design. Faye wove three 4" stripes of red, separated by smaller stripes of 2 shots each of three colours- yellow, orange, navy blue or navy blue, green, bright red. The centre of the blanket is red with a repeat of the three 4" stripes at the other end. The 5 blankets will all be different and we look forward to taking them off the loom.
Mitts made from hand made and hand dyed felt with acrylic arctic cloth lining by Faye.
Mitts made from recycled felted wool sweaters.
Lined with wool or acrylic felt with silk interlining for warmth.
This pair has beading that was part of the original sweater. Other mitts were hand beaded to add some glitz.
Sachets made by Faye from handwoven samples for Women's Institute fund raiser.
Spinning and weaving activities:
- December 5, 2015 North Peace Spinners' and Weavers' Christmas sale with the Potters' Guild and Arts Council Recycled Christmas Decoration Sale, at Artspost, 10320 94th Ave., Fort St. John.
- January 3, 2016. 2:00 opening Beaverlodge Fibre Arts Show until January 28 4:00 closing. Requesting handwoven or handspun items for display, can be for sale or not, properly labelled with name, sale price, (which includes the 30% commission), fibre content, name of work if applicable and hanger. The emphasis is on Fibre Arts. Articles are to display artistic qualities. (No plain toques or socks, please.) Display is being hung on January 2 at 10:00. Contact Cathrine Gabriel 780-354-8758. A few PCSW brochures and postcards would be a nice touch at this venue.
- April 16, 2016 Hines Creek, one day Peace Country Spinners' and Weavers' conference.
- September 10, 11, 12, 2016 Lake Saskatoon, Peace Country Spinners' and Weavers' workshop, Saori Weaving. www.saltspringweaving.com
- Remember to find Peace Country Spinners and Weavers on Face Book and become a friend.
- For more information contact 1358@telus.net
Merry Christmas, Season's Greetings, Happy New Year, Merry Merry, Happy Solstice, Happy Spinning and Weaving.
