Wednesday, March 4, 2009

An inch at a time...


I suspect if you're a tapestry weaver and you're reading this, you understand what I mean by "an inch at a time." Thats how it feels some days.  Today I wove all day on this piece, and I think at the end of the day I had woven quite a bit more than an inch, but not more than two.  This piece is 48 inches long (and 48 inches wide)...  I'm hoping things'll pick up a bit as I go along.  I've tried whistling as I work, ignoring the other people in the studio (that is often impossible actually as fun things are happening and I like to be involved--how can you ignore the glee of the woman next to you who just figured out how to do a smooth interlock?), and deep breathing as I work because I find that when I get anxious about my progress I mess up and going one inch back after several hours going forward is not fun and leads to much swearing and an occasional plea to various saints (and sinners--I'm not Catholic.)

This is the first piece I've done at 10 e.p.i.  Before this all tapestry I've done has been at 8 e.p.i.  That also is screwing me up.  Who knew that going from 8 epi to 10 would be such a huge switch?  But it is.  I worked for a whole day putting in waste at the beginning of this piece to get the bubbling correct so the warp was covered.  Now I'm having trouble with too much weft.  Eventually I'll get it right I suppose.  At least I hope so!

When I go back on Sunday to work on that piece, I am considering wearing these 
mardi gras beads that a co-worker gave me last week as a good luck charm.  What do you think?  I heard plenty of stories from Kelly who is from New Orleans about women taking their tops off for a good set of beads, but I didn't hear anything specifically about good luck.  Perhaps I should look forward to St. Patty's day instead.  It is likely I'd get the beads caught in the millions of weft bundles and more swearing will ensue anyway.  I'm pretty sure these beads aren't good enough to get women to take their clothes off... so they're probably not lucky either.  Perhaps I should just stick to using the beads to test visual skills in babies.  Seems safer.

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4 comments:

  1. More than an inch in a day is terrific progress on a piece that width! I often set a goal of an inch a day, and spend as many as 10 hours getting it done. You must be a speed-weaver! Or I am an easily distracted slow poke.... that I know is true.

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  2. Hmmm, maybe you should try finding a patron saint of weaving to appeal to. I'm not religious, but I love the Hispanic tradition of keeping specific saints around or in mind in case you need one for a certain problem. There seem to be a number of them for weavers, like this guy I found on Wikipedia--

    "Saint Maurice is the patron saint of soldiers, swordsmiths, and armies. He is also inexplicably the patron saint of weavers, dyers and invoked against menstrual cramps."

    Sounds like he could be pretty useful :)

    Lyn

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  3. Lyn, I love the Saint Maurice idea. And thank goodness for Wikipedia! I think the guy could be pretty useful myself and will invoke him along with my plastic mardi gras beads frequently while weaving the inches. I'm averaging almost 2 inches a day now! Just rolling right along. I'll need the saints help soon though lest I take a sword to the weaving when it gets really dicey.
    Rebecca

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