Teaching Schedule update frustrations

I've tried multipel times over the past months to update my teaching Schedule, I and this editing system are not friends. I do have contracts for this year, 2014: Weavers Guild of Miami Valley, Ohio, Guild Program For Love of Lithuanian Linen April 11th, 2014, Beavercreek Fire Station, Lustrous Linens Workshop April 11,12, 13, same location. Wasoon 2014, Something Superior, May 2nd,3rd,4th, Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, Keynote Speaker Friday eve, Saturday all-day workshop on Tartans: Designing, Weaving & Wearing. 2015: Weavers Guild of Rochester, NY Ode to Linen guild program April 8, 2015, Lustrous Linens; Weaving Linen with Success, April 7,8,9,10. I hope that my ineptness at keeping this information updated has not hurt anyone's feelings. I wish I were more 'ept' at all this blogging stuff. I will attempt to add an illustration from the TBAC Gallery exhibit that I could not manage to make part of my posting this morning. NOPE! Off i go to the studio where I get along better with my toys. Kati

Long Winter

Weaving challenges are so much more fun to work on than writing and updating my blog.  It is hard to believe that my writing about my weaving is of much interest to anyone else....so why did I write two books and am (reluctantly) working on a third?  I could blame old age, but I don't feel old.  Though for the first time ever, I did not 'do' Christmas cards/letter, though I love getting them from friends and family.

John and I (in our at-home finery) celebrate our 51st anniversary by the fireplace, sitting on handwoven deck chairs on a handwoven rug with  handwoven tartan upholstery on the stool and a handwoven Lithuanian display towel on the wall.  The January winds were so powerful we taped over the chimney cracks, the door cracks, the outlets.... Some of the tape has been replaced with real insulation. The rest will wait until it is warmer.

Sculpted snow from one our daily walks.  Guess my photographer-father's influence prompts me to look at the workd through the camera lens.

A winter sunset over Alpena.



We called this 'Moby Drift'. In our 16 years on Thunder Bay we never had so much drifting in the driveway as this season. We shoveled and blew around this lovely curve for a couple weeks.



Weak winter light over the frozen bay. How are we so blessed to have such beauty in our every-day lives?

We have covered the paint brushes with a portrait of  shuttles on this announcement at the Thunder Bay Arts Council Gallery in downtown Alpena.  Arts Council president, Tim Kuehnlein, a PolySci/History instructor at Alpena Community College is the visionary energy behind the gallery. He does everything from organizing exhibits to hanging shows to cleaning the windows!  What a treasure.

A small piece in the exhibit that I call Juliet's Cell Phone Holster.  The real wonder of this is the one-piece-multi sectioned tablet-woven (in linen) trim and shoulder strap.  It was an interesting engineering problem that took weeks to solve successfully.  The body of the piece is draw-loom woven. Silk, embroidered lining and bead trim.

Local Rock Group a linen/ramie triptych transparency sees the light-of-day for the first time in a few years, thanks to the generosity of wall-space at the gallery.  This is based on LaFarge Cement Plant's most interesting geometry.  Reminds me of a childhood marble game. At 10 feet by 3 feet it needs more space than I have in my studio so I am especially grateful for the opportunity to display it.



A wall of variations on the (now official) state of Michigan tartan.  The colors and design are based on the geography of this beautiful place I'm privileged to live and have grown up in. I enjoy weaving this tartan and I enjoy finding ways to 'play' with the pattern on the loom.  Included techniques are clasped weft, felting, stone-encasement, embroidery,  and dowble-weave.

 Maybe I'll make the time to post again after the openhouse Sunday March 16th where I'll talk of the joy I take in being a maker of cloth, demonstrate tartan weaving, and answer questions about the work on display.  Such scary fun!  Till next time, Treadle with Joy, Kati