Backstrap Weaving with Laverne - Sacramento

Backstrap Weaving with Laverne Waddington

Sacramento Weavers and Spinners Guild arranged an
extra program in April featuring Laverne Waddington, Backstrap Weaver
and Teacher. She has been traveling the world sharing the skills of
weaving on the backstrap loom, one of the earliest and most versatile looms in the world. We have a lecture scheduled and a
two day weekend workshop scheduled.

April 4, 7 - 9 PM Lecture - Open to the public
Title: Weaving on Simple Looms in South America
Location: Generations Church, 2418 O Street, Sacramento, Calif.

Near 24th and O, free parking across the street.

Apr 6/7 (Sat/Sun), 9 AM - 4:30 PM
Workshop: Backstrap Weaving with Laverne Waddington
Location: West Sacramento, Calif - Directions will be given to workshop attendees.
Bring your lunch.
Workshop cost: $85 Guild Members/$95 Non-Guild Members *reduced fee! Hurry!

for two days plus $10 Materials Fee payable to instructor.

We have openings so contact Franco Rios by phone: 916-247-3678 (leave voicemail)
 or by email: francorios2000@yahoo.com

We are limited to 8 people in the workshop so act fast.

Be prepared for intensive training by one of the world's best teachers.

Have a good day!

SWSG Sat 9Mar13

SWSG Members sharing their spinning skills, questions, and challenges.

On Saturday March 9, 2013 was the meeting of the Sacramento Weavers & Spinners Saturday group at Arcade Library. Our topic was Spinning. So we had a Show and Tell session where everyone told about their current spinning projects and challenges. Above is Cathy, Sue, Stephanie and Cindy.

Sara bought a Kromski and we helped her fine tune it. It's her first wheel. Yay!

Sara found a Kromski Sonata wheel for sale at a good price. She needed some help fine tuning the setup and between the lot of us we were able to contribute some help. Her wheel was working better than when she came in.

Wheels and drop spindles are demonstrated.

Wheels and spindles are demonstrated.

Vonnie demonstrates a support spindle she
made with a cabinet door knob and dowel.

Linda shows off a Navajo spindle she bought.

Vonnie demonstrated a pretty little support spindle she made from a cabinet door knob and a dowel. She said it had a hole in the middle so the rest was easy. Linda S is showing a Navajo spindle she bought, which is another kind of support spindle.

Linda kept pulling pulling support spindles out of her little bag.

Linda S showed us a number of support spindles in different shapes and styles.

A beautiful support spindle and bowl a member brought so we could show her how to start it.

One of our newest returning  members showed off a beautiful spindle and bowl turned from laminated wood. She brought it so we could show her how to start it. With her, Linda S and Vonnie sitting together they made their own "support" group.

Before the library opens, CJ shows off a spindle made from pencil, screw eye and deli container top.

While we waited for the library to open CJ showed me her homemade spindle made from a pencil, screw eye and deli container top. Very clever.

CJ bought some sweaters at the thrift store and frogged (unraveled) them for the yarn to use in other projects. CJ wanted some suggestions for plying the yarn.

Recycled yarn is 3 plied for a new project.

Inside the meeting she borrowed a CD spindle from Linda Y and used it to ply the yarns into a new yarn for a project. CJ liked the look of the plied line.

Supplies: Crochet hook, compass, tape, cardboard.

For my own DIY demonstration, before the meeting I bought some supplies to make a drop spindle. I used a crochet hook previously bought at thrift for 10 cents. Other items bought at grocery store. 

Cut open the box and use compass to draw circles.

I cut open the box with my pocket knife. Granola bars are saved for a snack later. I drew circles with the compass. I could use a soup can for circles but it is easier to mark the center spot with a compass. That's important for the last step.

Cut the circles out with scissors.

 Cut out the circles with a pair of scissors.

Poke holes in center to insert crochet hook.

Poke holes in the center of the circles so you can push the crochet hook into it.

Push crochet hook into center and secure with tape.

The crochet hook is secured with tape. The two discs are taped together at the edges. The spindle spins well by itself until you start putting fiber on it. It stops fast. Too fast. It needs more weight on the outer edges, maybe by taping some coins to the outer edge of the discs? The other thing was that the hook slips off the fiber too easily. I couldn't get a smooth yarn going until I put a half hitch in the yarn.

The little tool on my key ring is a Leatherman Micra, very handy pocket tool.
http://www.leatherman.com/product/Micra

You can find our schedule at the Guild website
http://www.sacweavespin.org/saturday

It was a good day!

Online SWSG Groups

Here is some more links for SWSG groups

Sacramento Weavers & Spinners Guild Yahoogroup
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sacspinweave/

Sacramento Weavers & Spinners Guild Facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/groups/124902324243589/

Have a good day!

SWSG Open House Part 2

 More pictures from Sacramento Weavers & Spinners Guild Open House 2013
(click pictures for bigger image)

Lots of wheels on display at the Open House

Results from dyeing demonstrations

Results drying after dyeing demonstrations

Close up of reversal jacket detail reveals weaving pieces quilted together with other cloth

One side of a reversible jacket

This scarf was woven, then pulled in bunches with extra threads woven into it. Then it was dyed shibori style and the pull threads were removed so scarf could flatten.

Spinolution Hopper

Spinolution Hopper because it looks a little like a frog.

Lisette with Spinolution Mach III plying machine

Plying art yarn is easy with this wheel, Lisette can add pods, cloth strips, artificial flowers and more.

More pictures later.
Have a good day!

Rigid Heddle Online Tutorials

Recent discussions on Braids and Bands on yahoogroups

http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/braids_and_bands

Recent discussions have focused on rigid heddle band weaving, including two hole rigid heddles and an on-line tutorial by Susan Foulkes.

If you are not a member of the Braids and Bands yahoogroup, you'll need to join the group (free) by going to the link above and requesting to join.

When signing up I recommend you select the "Daily Digest" mode to receive messages. The messages will be gathered in one group of messages each day or each 25 messages what ever happens first, and sent to your email. Or you can elect to read online only.

When you are approved for group you can then access the files area to get to the online tutorial files
From the group homepage,
Go to Files
Go to Online Tutorials folder
Go to Swedish Woven Bands

There are the files created by Susan Foulkes which are free for downloading.

When printing these PDF be sure the "Scaling" option of printing is set for "Fit to Printable Area" so that each page will print without top or bottom being cutoff. The PDF are formatted for UK sized paper so this adjustment makes it work on USA sized paper.(ignore if you use UK size paper)

Braids and Bands on yahoogroups is a service of The Braid Society UK (www.braidsociety.com)

This group is one finest and most informative on all of the yahoogroups I am subscribed to and I recommend it wholeheartedly.

Have a good day!
Franco Rios

Open House Pic part 1

Some pictures from Open House

Sharon Mitchell's Angora rabbit wool hat & sweater made from handspun yarn.

We don't know what this is. It's like a wooden nut cracker? Very detailed embellishment carvings.

I take pictures of bags that I like the pattern of. Owner says this was bought in Santa Clara Calif.

Bag hunt. Owner says this was bought in Ecuador

Here I am demonstrating my cardboard spinning wheel.

Shawls, scarves, and doll clothes

Shawl, hat and dye color wheel

display of hand dyed yarns

Project Linus - Woven blankets donated to charity.

Raffle - Pakistan bag detail

Hands on paper weaving table

Pedal power plying flyer

Visitor with poncho bought in Peru at a second hand booth

Snacks for the volunteers

Sharon Mitchell demonstrates stick weaving

Structo Artcraft Loom

Raffle - Navajo Tapestry

SWSG Open House

Sacramento Weavers’ & Spinners’ Guild Open House

“WEAVERS GONE WILD!” is the theme for the Sacramento Weavers’ and Spinners’ Guild Open House which will be held on Saturday and Sunday, February 9 and 10, 2013, from 10am to 4pm each day at the Shepard Garden and Arts Center, 3330 McKinley Blvd, Sacramento, CA. The show is free to the public.

A couple of pictures from the Open House:
This lizard looks so good I want to feed it a bug. Made from woven wire and beads.

In the raffle at Open House - Document inside bag says:
Article: Woman's handbag

Technique(name and description if possible): Skip plain weave in pattern area (see p.122-124 in Peter Collingwood, The Techniques of Rugweaving), plain weave in white area at bottom

Location Article Comes From:
Country:West Pakistan (name in 1965)
Republic or area: desert area north of Karachi
Region: Sind
City or village: Ali Mohammed Maheris Village, 35 miles from town of Hyderabad

Pertinent information: Ali M. Maheris village has about 50 families. This bag was made by the women of the village and was purchased by an American woman in Karachi. She was a short woman and cut the handle and tied the ends together in order to make the bag easier to carry. Even with the change she didn't want the bag and sold it to Jeannette Lund on 25 May 1965 in Karachi for Pak Rupees 15.-- (approx US $3.15)

The women of this village make rugs in the skip plain weave technique on a simple upright loom in their straw huts; no shuttles are used. The white yarn in the bag both warp & weft is 6-ply cotton yarn; other yarns are apparently wool. Yarn for the side seam stitching appears to have goat hair in it; camel hair would be brownish and softer.

Some rugs have white cotton for warp; others have warp of camel hair and weft bands of the camel hair or both. Is is said that 2 women will work on one rug for 6 months in their spare time after work in the fields.

Demonstrating my cardboard spinning wheel at Sacramento Weavers & Spinners Guild. I built this spinning wheel for under $5. I made a web page so you can see pictures and build your own. http://www.rabbitgeek.com/charka.html

 I dug this out of storage. I forgot how much fun it is to play with this thing. In this picture the front pin is the spindle and I'm spinning romney wool roving on it. The back pin is the "bobbin" for storing yarn. When the spindle gets too full to spin efficiently, I will splice the yarn from the bobbin to the yarn on the spindle, then I wind off the spindle to the bobbin. One of the Guild's spinning instructors was showing me how to improve my drafting to do the one handed long draw. I *almost* can do it. Some more practice and I'll have it mastered.



More later - Have a good day!