I don’t have photos of everything I do during the day. Standing at the computer for hours doesn’t make for very exciting photos.

Now that the only ewe lambs left are those that I’m keeping, I wanted to halter break them. I don’t expect them to lead like a horse, but I like to be able to tie them to a fence without them panicking. Also, a couple of these will be going to the Lambtown sheep show at the beginning of October. It will make it easier for my Farm Club crew if the lambs are at least somewhat halter broke.

There is a bit too much giant zucchini. Too bad zucchini isn’t a dye plant. But at least I can feed the extra to someone.

I have a couple of articles scheduled for Handwoven Magazine for next spring. The deadlines are approaching and I need to finish some more weaving so that I have photos for one article and the project to send for another. This is Clasped Warp, a technique usually done on a rigid heddle loom. I am adapting it to use on a multi-shaft loom.

I have some custom projects in progress on the AVL loom in the shop. I have woven two Year to Remember blankets on this warp. Now I need to finish the warp with other blankets. The yarn above is all naturally dyed and I want to use that for a blanket that I can post on the new Fibershed Market site (not available yet). The yarn is dyed with mushroom (dark gray), hollyhock (blue-green), indigo (blue), weld, (yellow), cosmos (orange), and madder (rose).

Here is how it looks on the loom.

A friend dropped off more plant material to use for ecoprinting scarves and I wanted to get to it right away while the leaves were fresh. I have learned something about working with cannabis leaves–they start to fold up quickly. It’s tedious to arrange them the way I want them to look. They have a property of differential friction–the little hairs on the leaves allow them to slide one way on the fabric, but not the other. There is a second scarf that goes on top of these and it’s important to have the leaves spread out as the second scarf is spread across the first. Each scarf is wet with different solutions and they begin to react quickly upon contact.

I am trying out some square scarves as well. This one is printed with cosmos flowers and leaves.

These scarves use maple and madder leaves (left) and cannabis and indigo leaves (right). I rolled all of these up on PVC pipes and they steamed for 90 minutes. They are cooling in the pot and taturhe unveiling will happen tomorrow.