Latvian weaving – Backstrap Loom Weaving

Backstrap Weaving – The Boomerang Effect

I am supposed to be in Miami airport right now awaiting my flight back to Bolivia. I have had a wonderful month in Australia and it is time to go to my home (the real home in Bolivia).

Off I went to Sydney airport yesterday to get my flight to the US. I put on a brave face after sad goodbyes to family. But here I sit today back in my brother’s Sydney home…it’s a long story!!

Orange banksia give a warm glow to the bush in mid-winter.

The Boomerang Effect! It is common in Australia when lending someone something, to hand the item over while emphasising that it is “a boomerang”. That is to say, it is expected that the item will return to its owner in the same way that a properly thrown boomerang will.

Well, I am feeling rather boomerang-ish today having bounced from home to airport and back again.

Looking on the bright side, this unexpected turn of events means that I can spend more time with my nephew as well as write a blog post today.

It also means that I can go back to the Blue Mountains tomorrow for the gathering of weavers at Helen’s place in Springwood. Yay! All her floor loom weaving friends will be there in the morning for Show and Tell.. I wasn’t expecting to see any of these weavers again on his trip, yet here I am boomerang-ing back there!

I love the Blue Mountains! I got to spend even more time up there this last week exploring 4wd back roads and doing a bit of hiking through the beautiful Australian bush.

The banksias that we saw that day make me think of the little ridged baubles that I learned to make with a Guild friend the last time I was here in Sydney…

We walked to lookouts with lovely over Lake Burragorang.

Perched on the end of that rock, I felt like I was sitting in the tree tops…

The real winter suddenly set in and it was cold!

Last weekend it was still warm enough to take things outside for a bit of warping. I had a group over to my brother’s home for two days of Andean Pebble Weave. We enjoyed the chance to stretch our legs in the fresh air while winding some more warps for sampling and designing.

Kelcie gets a new band started with palin pebble weave. — Kelcie gets a new band started with plain pebble weave.

The group comprised Kelcie and Jen, who had woven with me last November, Pam, whom I have known online for years and who had come over from southern New Zealand (Sydney weather was relatively balmy for her!) and father Kyriakos who came up from the monastery in Bombala.

We wove together for two days.

Father Kyriakos, as you may know from having seen his work in previous blog posts, had more than just dabbled in Andean Pebble Weave and has been designing and weaving his own pebble weave patterns. I am so glad he came. We have been corresponding for some time and I really wanted to meet him as well as see his projects “in person”. He said that…While your videos have always been a big help and enabled me to do as much as I have so far, having personal demonstrations and answers to my own questions has already helped me to be more efficient and have more understanding of what this weaving is about.

Above,you can see his partly woven backstrap from a photo that he sent me some time ago. The design is one that Julia had created and father Kyriakos added his own elements to it at start and finish. He brought the finished piece along to Sydney to show along with narrower and samples and examples of his own “sotis” work of East Timor that he had studied on floor looms with Australian weaver Kay Faulkner.

Kelcie had brought examples of East Timorese weaving when we had woven together last year…

Father Kyriakos also brought a Latvian belt, woven using a supplemental-warp technique, that a friend had bought in Latvia and brought back for him. I have seen plenty of pictures of these but never one “in person”…

Jen brought in pieces that she had bought on a trip to Peru where she had studied tapestry techniques with Maximo Laura. This is a striking embroidered belt that had been made for the tourist market in Arequipa…

I love the color ideas that these pieces give…I would never think to combine those colors!

Father Kyriakos has been working on and refining a kangaroo motif using the Andean Pebble Weave structure for some time. He also brought along his progress with that to share and I thought that it would make a nice project as a souvenir of my Australian vsit.
One of the tasks that I had set myself for this trip was to investigate the kind of cotton that is available in Sydney stores that would be suitable for warp-faced weaving on backstrap looms. I bought what is labeled as “4-ply” thread at Lincraft. I was told that the name 4-ply in Australia actually refers to the size of the thread rather than to the number of plied strands. In the USA any weight of yarn could comprise four plied strands. It’s a little confusing! I also bought 8-ply versions of this cotton thread at Spotlight and I will give report on this and other available thread in future blog posts.
So, here is the “Kyriakos Kangaroo” woven by me using the Lincraft 4-ply…

Father Kyriakos says that he still has some refinements in mind. I played around a bit with the mountains under the kangaroo. They made me think of the southern highlands…the “Australian Alps”…where I had lived and worked for many years.Kangaroos could be spotted now and then on the drive up to the ski fields.

The Lincraft thread is not mercerized but is fairly tightly twisted. It will pill if the heddles are wrenched about and needs to be handled with care. I really like the way it feels. Lincraft has a pretty good range of colors on its shelves.

I set this band up in a very “barefoot” manner.I had already packed all my backstrap weaving gear away and did not feel like fishing out my warping stakes and loom bars.

I warped around my index finger and big toe as my Bolivan weaving teacher, Maxima, does. This is probably the widest thing I have warped this way and, as the threads piled up around my finger, I figured that I was bound to have some tension issues. As it turns out, I didn’t!

When it came time to weave, you can see, I only got out my sword and used pencils for cross sticks and loom bars. A piece of string is my backstrap. The front beam is a pen onto which I attached rubber bands so that the “backstrap” would not slip off. It was pretty comfortable!

Normally, I would use heddles spread along a stick for a piece of this width but I chose to just tie them in a bunch rather than to search for more pencils.

Someone else who is getting into barefoot weaving is my student, Emerald. You may remember that I stayed with Emerald in her home in Ultimo a couple of weeks ago and wove with her. One of the things we did was the intermesh technique and, although she has a nice set up for backstrap weaving in her living room, she decided to try to include her entire body in the loom…

There are chopsticks and a pencil in her set-up. She also finished off a short and narrow pebble weave band barefoot. This was an exercise in weaving without a chart.

In the meantime, in other parts of the world, Diane, one of the ladies who wove with me when I visited Yale university, was inspired enough to apply for a grant to go and weave in Guatemala during her summer break. My friend Barbara, who is in contact with her, sent me this picture of something Diane wove with her Guatemalan teachers…

Cheryl, who wove with me last spring, is sampling for a camera strap project…

And now… a wee favor to ask of all of you. You may have noticed that I have sometimes mentioned my nephew here in past blog posts and the fact that he is a triathlete. I am staying with him now in Sydney and get to watch his rigorous training schedule. He is up and out and swimming laps or biking and then getting home before I can even get out of bed.

During the Ravellenic Games that ran alongside the Winter Olympics this year, I wove one of his favorite inspirational sports quotes into a silk bookmark for him..

I guess that I haven’t had much of a chance to be a big part of his life. After seeing him a few times in his very early months and years, I headed off to live in South America. I returned for a visit when he was 3 during which I watched Jurassic Park with him and he offered to sit by me in case I got scared. I didn’t see him again until he was 12. He wrote to me when he was 8 to ask me if I lived in a hut in the jungle. Fortunately, I visited Australia more often when he was in his teens and the internet kept us in good touch. He taught me to juggle and we did a great trip, just the two of us, to Ayers Rock in 2006.

Now he is a traithlete studying to be a teacher (like me!) and will be representing Australia in the ITU World Championships in Weihai, China in September. He took part in ITU World Championships in the USA and Spain winning the silver medal in his age group in both. It was quite a blow when he was injured for the championships in France last year. So…he is going for gold this time…his last amateur event before turning pro.

His trip to China, as with all the other trips to the World Championships, must be self- funded and he is looking for sponsors. What I would ask you to do for me, as a big favor, please…. is simply to go over to Facebook and “like” his page. More “likes” will show potential sponsors that he has the loyalty of a good-sized audience and could make all the difference.

I haven’t told him I am doing this and would love to surprise him with a small boost to his fan page tomorrow. I hope that you can take a moment to help out.

And now to see if I can make it on a flight out soon….wish me luck!

Backstrap Weaving – Show and Tell

Show and Tell and tell and tell…get the word out, spread the obsession. It is exciting to be all the way over here in Australia and run across this…

The Center for Traditonal Textiles in Cusco (CTTC) reaches across the world, showing and telling, promoting and sustaining the work of weavers on simple looms in remote communities of highland Peru. This piece was bought from founder Nilda Callañaupa herself when she visited Bothwell, Tasmania in 2007. One of the people who came to weave with me a few weeks ago here in Sydney had been to Peru and came with bags and pieces still on the loom with those distinctive Chinchero patterns woven with handspun naturally dyed yarn. One of the other ladies immediately picked up her smartphone and started searching for the site from which she could buy these items. Show and Tell…spread the word!

From the CTTC's Facebook page — From the CTTC’s Facebook page

One of the greatest Show and Tell events in my world of weaving was held last month in Cusco. The CTTC hosted its second Tinkuy de Tejedores, a gathering of weavers from across the Americas and even from as far away as Asia.

I couldn’t go this time but have heard a few reports from friends.

Dorinda, who works with weavers in Cochabamba, Bolivia went with one of my weaving teachers, Maxima. Maxima took workshops and learned three new figures in a backstrap weaving class as well as the ñawi awapa edging. It was something she had been wanting to learn for years. Her sister knew how to do it but I guess she hasn’t been nearby to teach it to Maxima. Finally, the curiosity has been satisfied and I look forward to seeing Maxima put it to use.

Maxima and a group of Bolivian weavers at Tinkuy 2010

Dorinda’s PAZA website is currently down but she tells me that she has four blog posts prepared with details of the trip ready to go up once the problem is fixed.

Who doesn’t like Show and Tell? In the guild meetings that I have attended so far in the US and Australia, this has always been my favorite part. I am a member of several online weaving groups and we do our share of show and tell on a daily basis. Some of the larger groups, like Warped Weavers on Ravelry, can have dozens of projects presented in a single day. There is always something to learn. But, of course there is nothing like being able to actually handle the fabrics and yarns and listen to the weavers and spinners’ enthusiastic descriptions and explanations.

I spent a nice Saturday in the lower Blue Mountains last Saturday at the home of weaver Helen (author of the electronic newsletter, Weavers Forum). Helen has a nice group of about fifteen mountain weavers and spinners who regularly meet at her home for fiber talk, lots of laughter, occasional workshops and, of course, show and tell. That’s yet another reason for me to consider settling in the mountains should I ever come back to Australia to live permanently….the aromas and colors of the bush, the bird song, the cicadas, the coolness,….and a lovely community of weavers!

Lorette brought along a backstrap loom that she and a few friends had put together some years ago with its unfinished project. Just when I am taking home tools for knotted pile weaving and wondering if I am mad to be thinking about doing it on a backstrap loom, along comes Lorette with her Show and Tell. She showed me that yes, it is do-able and that she was able to produce nice firm and well beaten rows of cut pile. I wonder if she has found the inspiration to finish this project now.

I was happy to receive the most beautiful gift from Helen as I left after a fun day spent with her weaving friends…

My camera has somewhat softened the pretty tones of green in this scarf but I hope that it gives you an idea of its wonderful flowing liquid silkiness. This was made by Helen in an advancing twill structure. This was Show and Tell and I got to keep it! It is just the kind of light weight scarf that I can really use. Beautiful!

Yesterday I went out to Dace’s home. Dace had invited me to her home for a morning of dyeing.

The Mission: take home cotton yarn that had been dyed with native Australian plants.

I would like to weave something that represents my trip and this seemed like a good way to start. Fortunately, I had taught myself from an experience many years ago that cotton and wool take color very differently. I had been wooed by the sight of the most amazing shade of orange that Dace had achieved when dyeing wool with leaves from a certain kind of eucalyptus (see left). I knew not to expect anything like this kind of intensity from cotton.

Two of the ladies at the gathering at Helen’s house advised me to mordant my thread with diluted soy milk which I did. Dace’s home filled with the gorgeous aroma of eucalyptus as the pots boiled on the stove. It drove her husband and cat away for the day! You can see the tree from which Dace took leaves and bark below right. She told me that it is one of the “box” varieties of eucalypt.

As the pots, one with bark and the other with leaves boiled away, we did a lot of Show and Tell. Dace showed me some yarn that she dyed with the same variety of eucalypt…

Again, that gorgeous orange! And again I reminded myself that I was not expect anything like that result. Still, I couldn’t help hoping…

This was another fascinating piece of Show and Tell. Dace had taken the NSW guild’s summer school class lat January on buttons and produced all these over the course of four days. I was especially interested in the ball-like buttons upper left which so resembled the little coil stitch pom-poms that Bolivian weavers sometimes have dangling form their ch’uspas, coca leaf bags. Dace gave me enough information to be able to come home and make one…fun! The Bolivian pom poms can be made in multiple colors whereas these ball-like buttons cannot.

There you can see my button (made with wool) nestled between my dyed skeins. The skens on the left came from the leaf pot and the other from the bark. Okay, so they are not the most brilliant tones in the world but…mission accomplished. I have cotton dyed with native Australian plant material. And I will take home the happy smells of the Austraian bush which have not faded after rinsing. Dace told me to use vinegar with the rinse but I didn’t, not wanting to lose the eucalyptus smell.

Those buttons! I am on a road trip to Canberra tomorrow to watch my nephew compete in a triathlon. Guess what I’ll be doing in the car and probably during the race!

Dace is Latvian and, while talking about both our backgrounds, she came out with some Latvian bands that she had bought on a trip to her homeland in 2011. These are all woven with supplemental warps (and now I realize that we are probably not looking at the “good” face of the one on the left).

I love the simple border on the third band from the left…so simple and so very effective.

Dace showed me pictures of Latvian mittens and I loved this one with its hook design…a hook and its reflection…so like a classic Andean weaving motif which I am sure that many of you will recognize.

Speaking of Latvian bands, I made contact online with Sanita who very recently started a blog on Latvian band weaving. She is slowly constructing it and it promises to be very informative. So far, she has included pictures of bands with pick-up patterns using supplemental warps as well as (and this make me very excited) those which have used what I call the Andean Pebble Weave structure.

Sanita confirmed the stucture by sending me charts of some of the patterns. I think I am edging a little closer to finding an answer to my questions about the use of this structure in the belts of the Russian Old Believers.

Keep an eye on Sanita’s site.

Well, I am off to make some more button/pom poms and can’t wait to have some dangling from my next woven pouch. I miss my loom and my big weaving…this is the next best thing until I get back to Bolivia.

Speaking of pom poms, I will leave you with one last picture. I uncovered a relic from my past while going through boxes of “stuff” here in Australia. This is possibly the only surviving piece from the little knitting machine endeavor I had in my early 20s. I used to make hats and headbands by the dozens for skiers. It seems like I might have been trying to use up odds and ends of left over colors in this one! The thing that I like is the little South American-like bird motif that I chose to include. I have no idea about the origin of that motif but I think it is fun to see that many many years before South America and weaving became a part of my life, I had a definite interest in these kinds of patterns.

See you next week! (possibly from Bolivia)