Craftacular

 This Sunday I'll be at  Craftacular in Madison.  I've been working my tail off trying to get my inventory up.  Weaving is so time intensive that it is very hard to put together enough merchandise for a booth.  Everytime I sell a piece on Etsy I'm like "WOO-HOO!" and "Oh NO!  Another empty space".  I'm feeling a little bi-polar.

I've set aside all my other projects to focus solely on weaving.  It seems to be what most people are interested in.  A few weeks ago I had a couple fails that had me down.  Some wool that I had warped on a loom started breaking as I was weaving.  There was no fixing it and I had to cut it off and throw it away.  That was a lose of 2 days work.  Another runner that I was weaving didn't turn out as nice as I hoped and a new technique that I was learning turned into a nightmare.  But I started the next week energized and hopeful.  This week went wonderfully.  2 runners and 1 rug (the blue check one from the previous post) complete and another rug should be finished this evening. 

These are the rags for the rug I'll be working on this evening.  Usually I use torn up sheets that I find at thrift stores but I couldn't find the bright colors I was looking for this time and I don't have the space to dye white ones.  Some day I hope to have a studio with a large sink.  Someday.  Sigh.  Anyway, I went to Joann Fabrics and bought this broadcloth for $1.79 a yard.  What a great deal!  They had so many wonderful colors.

This is one of the runners I finished this week.  I'm really on a yellow kick right now.  Probably because it's such a hot color.  It's a diamond twill pattern with an off white, yellow, and grey/blue warp.  The weft is primarily off white with just 2 yellow stripes.  It's 100% cotton.  It says "hello, I'm summer." Well, not literally but.. you know.  It's really pretty and I'm a little in love with it so I'll probably put a higher price on it.

This is one of the fails I was talking about earlier.  It's a rep weave runner.  Rep weave is a technique that I've never done.  My friend Susan weaves rep weave and I admire her work so I wanted to try it.  Yeah, well, I can say I tried it.  I made some mistakes but that's bound to happen when you're learning something new.  The runner turned out OK and I will try to sell it but the pattern is not balanced and it bothers me.  I pushed it to the bottom of a pile so I don't have to look at it.  It mocks me. 

Well, this is my last post until after Craftacular.  The Husband and I will be there all day Sunday.  A big shout out to my lovely in-laws for taking the kids.  They are the BEST!  Whatever doesn't sell on Sunday will be posted on my etsy site starting next week.  Wish me luck!