Earth Loom

If I wasn't a quilter I would be a weaver, I've played with it off and on throughout the years but always stayed with quilting, my first love.  Nothing better than curling up in a chair with a quilt in your lap and my hands stitching away.

While on Pinterest I saw a cute idea of small looms made for kids with them weaving flowers and grasses through. The idea kept rolling over and over in my mind until I came up with the idea to build a large loom and through out the Spring, Summer, Fall season I will weave in wool fabric strips followed by different dye plants and twigs that are in bloom at the time. By the end of Fall we'll see what we have, will the wool be moldy? will the plants have dyed the wool? will it be beautiful or a mess? It doesn't matter I think it will be fun!
So with the idea in mind I grabbed my husband and up goes the loom.

For the structure he had some old tee pee poles no longer use able for him.
He cemented them in,

a tee pee pole for the bottom cross bar and a curvy maple stick for the top beam.
 

I choose a spot where I could see it from my kitchen and studio windows, where it was sheltered a little from the sun, (there's a red bud tree growing in front), and last but not least where it isn't too close to trees with birds sitting in them.

Tonight I'm mordanting the wool, cutting in into 2" strips and this weekend the weaving will start.
A strip of wool and then dandelion flowers.


 

Back in Oct. 2007 my husband and I went to Shiprock, New Mexico for a week long weaving/natural dyeing class with a Navajo weaver. We camped on her property and were fully immersed in the Navajo way. Before we went my husband built us 2 looms, mine a traditional Navajo loom where you sit on the floor to weave,

and my husbands where you sit in a chair and weave. The better choice by far.
Before we went, starting with daffodils I natural dyed all our yarn to take with us.
The looms now hang and set in my studio, a reminder of wonderful times.
I posted about this experience Sept. and Oct. 2007 if your interested.

In the rafters of my studio I have an 8 harness table loom that my daughter and I wove on when she was young.

This past weekend I also started planting a few seeds, I'm way behind, there should be seedlings coming up already. A few I started, white sage, very hard to start, not native to our area but I'm giving it a try.

Lady's Bedstraw, a red dye plant.

Mormon tea, a orange dye plant. We learned about it at our class in New Mexico where it grows wild. there they call it Navajo tea. Made into tea it taste like chamomile tea.

 

I also planted calendula, a yellow dye plant but I really planted it to use for lotions and creams. A herb used for healing.

My hubby and I planted 12 raspberry bushes.

6 rhubarb plants, just starting to break ground.

My madder root plants are finally getting going, everything is so late this year.

Our youngest grandson made his First Communion this past Sunday. We had a nice family gathering to celebrate his day.