Thursday, September 17, 2009

New geekery in progress

Somehow I ended up starting a new group on Ravelry: Textile Texts, for discussions, reviews, and lists of books having to do with the technical aspects or history of textiles.

So far we've just started up by setting up topics for book lists, but we'll also be discussing a book a month (like a book club) and I hope people will post reviews of random books or journal articles as they find them.

If it gets off the ground, I think it's going to be pretty nifty. Not to mention geeky.

And it's led to me finding this nifty website: On-Line Digital Archive of Documents on Weaving and Related Topics ...just going there to get the link got me started browsing. What a resource it is! Most of the texts are not in copyright anymore; some of them have been posted by permission of the author or the publisher. Amazing stuff.

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

That's my boy.

T just turned five. We'd done some minor weaving stuff together (and a bit of spinning and knitting) before, so I got him a pot holder loom made by Harrisville Designs (our local toy shop carried it). In one day, we have finished one potholder and done all the weaving on the second (we still need to finish the edges). There's two loops left over, so we clearly need to get more--in bulk. He doesn't want to weave by himself, but he clearly understands the over-under-over-under aspect and the process for finishing the edge.

Also, my Spin Off magazine arrived today, and he insisted on sitting on my lap while I browsed through to see what was in it. At one point he asked me to go back several pages so he could "look at the cute drum carder again".

Hee!

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Persephone deconstruction

I spent a while yesterday taking Persephone apart. T got to help take some of the screws out after some of the trickier bits got done. (That is, things weren't in imminent danger of falling on him.) All the small bits (screws, pulleys, still-functional cords) went into a bin, and everything else got stacked in the library.

After T went to bed, I started wiping the boards down with diluted Murphy's Oil Soap. I got about a third done. I rinsed them with a damp rag, and then dried with a soft cloth. We clamped the piece with the worst crack in it in hopes of keeping the crack from getting worse before I get a chance to glue it--after all, the worst damage to the loom was water damage.

I expect to finish washing the wood bits today. While the boards are drying I'm going to dig out our sandpaper (I'm looking for 100 and 150 grits, at S's recommendation) and see if I can find our sanding block. I am seriously wondering how much time the previous owner spent on the sanding the manual recommends. I don't mean to impugn her. Well, I do a little, I suppose. After all, Persephone did get left upside down on a dirt floor!

I have some plans for some detail work which I hope work out. It's nice to have S around as a resource: his grandfather was a professional carpenter, and S spent a lot of time hanging out in his workshop.

I'm glad that I've gotten moving on this project. The way I work, I need to get the refinishing done as soon as possible or else it won't happen for another five or ten years. And if I'm not going to do it, then someone else should get the loom. No sense having her go to waste.

I also spent a little time yesterday staring at some crochet edging that was passed down in my family to figure out how it was made. It's one of the nice kind that doesn't require a horribly long chain for a foundation. You start at one end and keep repeating the whole pattern until it's the length you want.

In the process, I might have come up with a crocheted scarf pattern based on the edging. Which, really! I need to jot a few notes and finish the patterns I'm supposed to be writing.