Almost finished weaving the second panel for the kimono.  The sleeves are next and I feel much more in control now that a lot is done.  Found a gorgeous red silk fabric to line it with.  I am so tired.  Weaving is physical labor!  I have a 16 harness loom and because I want to see the front side of the fabric and am weaving an 8 harness satin structure, I have to lift 14 of the harness everytime I throw the shuttle back and forth.  Do that for yards of 60 times per inch of woven fabric and I’m ready for wine and nap.

Ok, so winding on a very fine silk sett at 64 ends per inch, in the winter time, makes a lot of static.  These threads had a mind of their own and floated into a half bubble.  I had to keep spraying it to keep it down!

But I got it on.  The weaving is taking a little longer than I thought it would.  It’s those fine, fine threads.  Need to throw the shuttle a bunch of times to get anywhere.  I am using an 8 harness satin weave to showcase the hand-dyed warp and to let as much light reflect off the silk as possible.  It is buttery soft and I love the feel of it.  I’ll be weaving a little extra to put a sample near it so people can touch that and see what it feels like.  I have a few more panels to weave and then will decide what I want to line it with.  Saw a really beautiful silk shantung in a fantastic red-orange that I loved. 

Well I really am a bad blogger.  I just don’t get on here as much as I should.  I have been procrastinating.  I know what type of person I am.  I over think what I’m going to do until I have to make a decision and then I go for it.  That’s pretty much what I’ve done here.  I finally wound the 6 separate warps that will be dyed.   There will  be 4 panels to be woven, each having 870 threads to be sett at 60 ends per inch.  Yikes! What was I thinking.  Actually I love the feel of this silk when it’s woven.  It is like butter in your hands.

Then I laid them out where I thought the shoulder would be, and measured out sections to dye.  I was really hung up on using teals, caymen, saphires, violets with flashing hot colors.

Color in picture doesn’t do it justice.  It is hanging on a wooden door.  Now it’s time to get to the loom and put it on.  Well, I guess I’ll be spending a lot of time at the loom.  I’m ready.  Threading the loom will take me hours longer than weaving the panels off.  I’ll have to make sure I have my ipod filled with lots of good music and a few good books on tape.

We’re very excited about the exhibit.  My co-curator, Glenn, and I have been meeting a lot to get all the aspects of this show together and a lot of great things are coming together.  Lots of events are planned to go along with this so when we firm up all the dates, I’ll post it.  The show will be hung by April 4th and the opening will probably be April 10.  The venue is the Brush Art Gallery in Lowell, MA.

Found some beautifully hand-dyed silk that has a soft hand and texture.  I used it with some amazingly soft bamboo to weave this Mobius Wrap.  I wove a texture down the left hand side with a shiny lurex and added a lattice fringe in the back.  I love it when I find gorgeous yarn that tells me what it wants to be.

This is new work I will be exhibiting at the “Going Green” show starting June 27th at the Brush Art Gallery and Studios located at the National Park Visitor’s Center in Lowell.  I did weave a few in green colors but my focus was 0n using renewable eco-friendly fibers to weave my piece.

Glenn and I went to visit a group of women taking a class in Japanese embroidery.  They were so nice and were happy to share with us the beautiful work they are doing.  This is extremely time consuming and it is obvious the love they have for creating their pieces.  Go and check out the web site for information on taking classes or just to see what it is all about - http://www.newenglandregionega.org/japanese_embroidery.html.  We are very lucky to have the classes held in this area (Bedford) as some of the women have flown in from all over to take part in it.

Glenn has his kimono design that he shared with the group and was hoping to find some that would be willing to collaborate on the piece he plans to dye with embroidery.  Three of the women will be working on this piece and it will be amazing when it is done.  I am also excited that the group is willing to demonstrate at our Kimono Exhibition.  The title of the exhibition is “Art of the Kimono” timeless form/contemporary vision.

OK, no pressure on me for my kimono!  Actually, being around this group who is excited about creating something that is so close to their hearts and really is a piece of their souls pumps me up to want to do my best as well.  Let’s see where it takes me.

Ready to boot 2008 out the door.  It’s been a rough year.  My dad passing away was tough.  He always made the holidays so much fun.  On Christmas Eve day, we would go to the cheese shop in Concord and pick out a few favorite cheeses, yummy salty olives and grab some french bread, come back to my house and munch on our goodies with a glass of wine or two.  We’d just hang out and talk until everyone started to gather and let the holidays begin!  This year my mom went to see my brother in New Mexico – a good place to be as my nephew is 7 years old and we know little ones remind us what Christmas is all about.  My family went to the inlaws in upstate New York.  They are such wonderful people and it made the holidays fun.  Paul’s sister has 5 grandkids so seeing the little ones run around in such happiness was delightful.   Kristine and her grandmother baked lots of goodies which is one of their favorite things to do.  Of course it made the rest of us happy to munch on the results.  A colorful angel food cake and an apple crumb pie were enjoyed by all.  Lynne and Gracie had a friend over and had a nice low key day.  We celebrated when we got back.  Kudos to Grace for picking out such awesome gifts.  She really put thought into each person and we had lots of fun opening our presents.

My friend Carol’s mom passed away a few days before Christmas.  Even though her mom was 92, it is still very difficult.  Carol spent so much time making sure her mom was getting everything she needed and took such great care of her.  Then we had a call that one of Paul’s former roommates from Cambridge, age 53, has terminal cancer.  Next a card comes in the mail and a friend our age had his stomach removed from cancer.  I am so overwhelmed at all this sad news.  I’m just starting to process it all.

So I have to be hopeful for 2009.  Hopeful that things will turn around and positive will come from such hardships for the people I care about.  I am going to do my best to put the negative aside and find the positive to move ahead with.

I am sad to be giving up my studio space at the Brush Art Gallery.  My fellow artists’ there are such great friends but I am finding the effort needed to put into being there takes so much away from creating art and right now, I need to create art.  So I am moving everything over to the Western Avenue Studios and will be totally set up by the end of February.   It’s bittersweet but feel that I don’t want to put any more energy into meetings, justifying my existance of being an artist to a higher authority that constantly wants to fix things by fixing the artists, having to serve on committees or giving up any more time to things other than art.  I guess after being at the Brush for 12 years, it would be best if I moved on.  That way, a new artist could come in and would accept things as they are instead of seeing all that we have lost.  I do feel hopeful for my fellow artists who have chosen to stay as I really want the best for them.   I have my good friend Betsy sitting on my shoulder telling me it’s time to move my cheese.  I am so excited about the things I want to weave.  Sometimes making a change can make us move forward and I feel I really need to do that.

So come visit me at Western Avenue.  I hope to have things set up and running very soon.

I am so excited.  Glenn Szgedy and I have signed the contract.  We are finally going to be putting on an invitational Kimono exhibition at the Brush Gallery and Studios in April -June of 2008.  We have talked and dreamed about this for a while.  Our goal is to invite textile artists whose work we admire to create the kimono of their dreams.  We will also be creating the kimonos of our dreams and my problem is that I have too many options running around in my head right now that I have to narrow it down to at least a few options.  Glenn is a fabulous sculpter and silk painter.  He’s been busy trying out new techniques and has his sketch designed.  I, of course, want to weave my piece.  I actually think I am even more excited about creating the obi as that is the exquisite final touch of a kimono.

We want to have a lot of educational components to our exhibit.  We have so many ideas that if we get to do half of them, it will be amazing.  We are at the stage now where we will be looking for the artists whose work we love and who want to participate.  We feel we need to give everyone a long time period in which to create their piece as these works of art are complicated.

So far, I have picked out a 60/2 silk that I will dye and do some sampling on to see if any of these ideas running around in my head jumps out and says “this is the one – now take it to the next level”.

Glenn is an amazing and talented artist who has great vision.  We both have a similar approach and that is to make sure this is done right – no short changing anyone as our names are on this one.  We want every little detail to be right.  They may not be noticed but anything not done so will be.  A lot of work ahead and this is the right time to do it.  I’ve stepped back in the shows I’ve been doing and what I’ve been weaving.  I’m not producing what people might buy, I’m weaving what sings to my heart.

I plan to blog my process so if you happen to stumble onto this page, check back every once in a while and you will see my mistakes which I will draw upon so you can see my successes.  I’m so excited!

Gay, Penny (Artists at the Brush) and Lynne (Western Ave. studio A306) at the opening.  It was a fun event with lots of good people, good food, and the show looks fantastic.  It was great to see some folks that I hadn’t seen in a long time.  Betsy, thanks for coming down and we miss you.  And I found out Drew and Emily will be neighbors soon!  It was cute to see Carol’s grandson walking down the hall in his snow boots.  He’s not ready to give them up yet.  Below is a picture of Jerry Beck (Revolving Museum), Bill and Will (Artists at the Brush).

Next event is folk festival at the end of July which his always fun.  The show will still be up so stop by if you haven’t seen it yet.  Gay and I will be on duty at the Brush on Friday night (July 25th) and there will be a stage in the National Park parking lot.  Hope to see you there.

I took a very cool class yesterday that adds to the Basic RAD classes that I teach. It’s how to use keychain defense to fight off an attacher. I think this is an extremely effective way to do just that. It can be taught separately or as an add on to the basic RAD class. I will definitely use this as an add-on to my classes. The techniques are fun to do and you can really see that this would work very well as an option to get away from “the bad guy”. I think every female who is in college or going off to college should be required to take these classes.

My daughter is done with high school. Just a few more fun events. Today marching in the memorial day parade in her last official drum major position for the high school band. Next week, senior week events and prom, finishing off with the graduation ceremony. It’s a very exciting time for her as she now looks towards college. Her next big adventure is 2 1/2 days at college for orientation, which will get them ready to step on campus and be ready to go on day 1 in September. She needs to decide where she wants to live and pick a room mate. She’s ready for this next step and as much as I will miss her, I am very excited for her and very proud of her.