Cinco de May, yo!

Hola!

Don't worry--that's about the limit of my Spanish-speaking, other than a few menu items and counting up to 49.  I only had six weeks' worth of Spanish in middle school, followed by a semester of German and a semester of French.  I had the choice of the three in high school, but decided to take French--which seemed more useful since my parents were able to mumble their way through a bit of French, and we lived a lot closer to Quebec than Mexico.  Little did I know that I would find few uses for any of these foreign languages aside from translating the odd phrase in a film (leaning over to hubby, "He said, 'Where is your brother?' and the other guy said, 'I don't know.'")

I finished the Black Diamond weave.  It took friggin' forever...some of these Saxon weaves take twice as long because you have to stop about five times to untwist all the strings when the twist gets too tight.  Then the weave gets so short that you have to thread the work on the loom differently to get tension on it.  Ugh!  The result is, of course, this gorgeous piece of period weaving that is the same on the front and the back.  I'm really happy with this one...the colors are so striking.  I'll have to think about what I'd price it at--with all the time, it would be a shame to let it go for less than $100.  I'll check Etsy and see what the going rate is.  The other weaves go for about $15 a yard, but most people can't weave more than 3 yards on their looms.  Mine is a custom loom that was designed to do four...although it needs a more significant tensioning system to allow for more shrinkage. I have a couple of ideas, but I don't know if I can do anything with this loom or if I'd have to build a new one.  My friend, Norman, says he's going to build one that will hold a lot more yardage and asked if I would weave something on it if he builds it.  It would have to be a pattern I really like, because 10 yards in, I'm gonna be really sick of looking at that sucker.  Even though I was getting really tired of working on this piece, the end result is so pretty to look at!

I've received a few more sewing and weaving commissions lately:  my midwestern SCA friend would like a couple of dresses for his new amazing girlfriend.  They have been dating for a bit more than six months (or maybe closing in on a year?) and are just over the moon for each other.  It's really funny seeing how twitter-pated he is...just adorable for a guy in his early 40s.  He wants me to make her 2 or 3 apron dresses--like the ones I'm making for myself--by the first week of August.  He's going to order the fabrics and have them drop-shipped to my house...hopefully soon...and then send me her measurements.

The other commissions are for a local friend who needs a baby quilt (I have yet to receive the materials for this) and 8 yards of trim for her SCA clothes.  I warped up the first half of the trim in this pattern. Since my loom only does 4 yards at a time, it will be in two 4-yard pieces, which she said she's fine with.  She really needs about 6 yards, but is willing to get a little more to make sure there's enough and she can use the rest to decorate a bag, a tablecloth, her dog's collar...or maybe use as a leash, if there's enough length.  This was just the first few passes and I have about two feet done so far.

The little guys participated in their belt test and achieved the next level:  purple!  Now they can wear their black gi (I'm going to have to buy them...) as well as get them all sparring kits.  Technically, they could have gotten sparring kits at the orange level, but I forgot to ask Santa about that at Christmas.

I started sewing some seam embellishments onto the apron dress.  This should hopefully preserve the dress during wearing--preventing the seams from unraveling and holding together should it get snagged on something--and also add a decorative element to the garment.  I probably should have used a wool thread, but I didn't know where I'd find such an animal outside of using some sock yarn, which I might have to dye myself.  I got this really pretty perl cotton floss instead.  Ooooo....shiny!  Looks and feels like silk.  I'll have to remember that line when (and if) I present it for a costume competition.  Maybe July...?

Well, this is where my notes run out, so I'm off to bed.  I'm going on a publishing house tour tomorrow...for fun!  I should probably look up where this place is, hey?