The Blue Brick

A Random Collection of iPhone Photos

June 18, 2014

Apparently we had a twister touchdown briefly not far from Barrie. I took this photo on my way into karate, learning along the way that you if must stop to instagram how cool the sky looks, you will get wet.

It was one of those beautiful storms where the sky opens up all at once and it’s as heavy as a good shower head. Everything went dark, and the streets were under water in minutes.

That light up the street is from a film shoot happening just outside the dojo. I love the ambience it lent to the scene!

… And to this scene.

And by the time I got out of class, nothing. I had to walk home in my gi–my jeans were soaked right through. The St. James park was lovely afterwards.

Nothing beats the smell of a garden after the rain.

Here’s where it gets random ;) I wound up the new handspun – 93g of goodness that has been commissioned by Tito for a Romney Kerchief. I love that he wants to actually wear my handspun!

Random thing 2 – these earrings have tiny little daisies inside, and are mounted to antique copper, overlong earring posts.

And random thing 3: These are my favourite thing ever. I may just have to make a few more to ensure that I get to have a pair for myself as well! These, of course, are destined for this weekends show.
288 Yards of Peggy

June 17, 2014

A few months ago, Rayna picked up a massive stash of fiber from someone who had opted to get rid of, literally, a garbage bag full of the stuff. She was going through it and held up a braid and declared that she would likely never spin it up. I said ‘I would!’ and Rayna said ‘It’s yours then’ because Rayna is like that.

At the time, I’m not even sure why I piped up. Given that I only owned a drop spindle and a dysfunctional wheel, the odds that I would ever spin it up seemed slim to none.

But after my beautiful wheel acquisition I went through my fiber ‘stash’ (it consisted of 4 braids, all of which have now been spun, dearth of fiber to be remedied this Friday) and pulled it out.

It’s 4oz. of merino top called ‘Peggy’. I’m not sure if this is a characteristic of the fiber, or if it had felted slightly, because it was very hard to draft. I felt like I was manhandling it, and shamefully pre-drafted nigh to pencil roving thickness in order to get a consistent thread from it.

Drafting difficulty notwithstanding, I can definitely see some progress in the finished piece. There are fewer slubby bits and more yarn-y bits and it almost looks as though checking my wraps per inch could be a meaningful exercise instead of a mildly ~~depressing~~ amusing one. If Rayna’s niddy-noddy math is correct, there are about 288 yards of a passable DK weight yarn here–enough for a cowl!

After washing it, the fiber relaxed and became even more uniform in thickness. It is such a dramatic change, that I felt the need to wash, reshoot and re-blog my first skein as well because it looks so much better now.

Working on my last braid now; a 100% alpaca so soft it feels like spinning air compared to my last braid. Though I’ve been pouring at least a case of resin a day, and weaving up some scarves for sale at the show this weekend, I’m still finding time for my addictive new hobby :)
Art in the Vineyard 2014 – June 21st & 22nd at Frog Pond Farm Organic Winery

June 13, 2014

1.25″ x 1.25″ square pendant with Blue Iris

Tito and I have been madly resining away in the evenings, preparing for our first art show as a couple. Last year, Tito participated in Frog Pond Farm’s ‘Art in the Vineyard’ with his paintings. We had an amazing time and were invited back this year.

25mm sphere pendant, Pink Columbine

This year, because we’ve been doing so much jewellery and resin work together, we’ve decided to enter the show as a team; Tito preparing the bezels and helping with drilling and sanding and me looking after the preservation of the flowers and the resining of the work. The photos here are a sneak peek of our ‘pinks & purples’.

20mm x 20mm cubic pendant, Purple Cresses

We’ll have special pricing for this show only, all of our pieces will be on sale for 25%-50% of what they would normally retail for online. There’ll be a wide selection, all of which will be created from beautiful Ontario wildflowers.

1.25″ diameter handmade copper bezel with Purple Cresses

If you’re in the area, come down for a glass of the best (I’m biased, but really, it’s the best) wine in the Niagara Region, amazing artists, food and music! Find out more here.
Game of Thrones… as expressed in fluff.

June 12, 2014

Almost a year ago Rayna gifted me a braid of fluff in a really soft superwash blend of merino/bamboo/nylon (called, I have just learned, ‘Panda’) by Dripping Fiber Studios. The colour way was called ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’ and, being that I was into the books, she thought of me :) I’m sure GRRM would approve.

Fast forward to my finally having a wheel, and some fledgeling skills to go with it! I divided the braid into 5 more or less equal parts; 2 parts were all blue, 2 parts were all brown and the final one was a blend of the two.

I spun the blended one first, here is my single:

And here it is, navajo plied (clumsily) so you can see the colour groupings have stayed together.

The other 2 were spun as solid colours. Here are my singles:

Creating the 2-ply (looks very yarny!)

My final product. It felt so good to take it off the bobbin. Actual yarn. Made by my hands. I now understand the joy and the wonder of spinning.

I’m going to give it a wash, check my wraps per inch (though I think the bulk of it is a convincing worsted) and, just possibly, knit something from it.

Here are the 2 skeins side by side – you can really see the difference between the navajo plied yarn and the 2-ply blue/brown blended yarn. Amazing how you can get such different results from the same braid.

Progress.
TFA Palindrome Scarf

June 11, 2014

When I got my loom, one of the first things I did was beg a skein of Tanis’s discontinued colourway ‘Harvest’ off of Rayna’s stash. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with it, but since I got the loom, wildly variegated colours that I would not have found appealing to knit with have been calling my name.

Weaving is a completely different way of blending beautiful colours into a larger composition, without the striping that comes with stockinette.

I wound it into a cake and there it stayed. I knew it was hard to get another one, so I was waiting for just the right idea to come to me.

Then I saw this article on weaving a palindrome skein. Here was my first attempt at doing this. The warp was offset slightly, so the colours shifted across the piece, but it wasn’t what I wanted.

To make this one work I had to be willing to throw away a certain amount of yarn. I measured my warp as carefully as I could, and then tried to make sure that it was always navy blue at the loom end, and bright yellow at the warping peg end.

Whenever the colour shifted away from that, I would cut the yarn, move to the next navy blue bit, tie on and start again. It was heartbreaking to watch the waste yarn pile up, but the slight tension changes, and the distance to the peg make the shifting inevitable, and it was the only way to make sure it worked.

The weft is black, lace weight, Malabrigo silkpaca. I didn’t do anything fancy with the weaving, just a straight weave with hem-stitched edges.

I’m thrilled with the results, so much so that I’ve gone onto the Tanis Fiber Arts destash/ISO thread to see if anyone else is willing to part with a skein, and a lovely lady has offered to sell me her skein of ‘Prism’. Stay tuned for another one of these!
Looks like the cat coughed it up

June 10, 2014

I’ve had my wheel for a week, and it’s already got a space in my heart right text to my loom and my Sock Rockets. It started out feeling like a battle between the wheel and I, but I learned to relax, to move my feet slowly and my hands faster, to keep the wheel oiled and the brake on the bobbin at the sweet spot and things are coming along quite decently. Leslie told me one day I would just be spinning, and it would be amazing, and that day was this morning. I’ve got a great teacher <3

But before I post this morning’s pic, here’s my first triumphant skein. It looks like a cross between something my cat might cough up and Tito’s bedhead. I finished spinning it at Rayna’s place on Friday night, then I plied it. Then Rayna asked me if I wanted to check my wraps per inch and we laughed and laughed.

That there on the right? That’s Rayna. I aspire to spin like her.

My, uh, ‘singles’.

My plied singles… there are bits in there that almost look like yarn!

It feels like progress – that thing on the right definitely has hairball qualities.

On Saturday I opened up a merino silk blend that Rayna gifted to me almost a year ago. It’s called ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’. I’m sure GRRM would approve of his story made manifest in dyed fluff.

‘A Song of Ice and Fire’

So far I’d say things are going rather well – this one may even be knittable!

From here:

… To here!
TFA Dove Wrap

June 9, 2014
Yesterday, our friend Ben encouraged us to get our bikes cleaned up for the summer and go for a ride (we’re a little late getting on this particular train). We rode for about 3 hours, had an amazing lunch and took lots of photos. Of course I took the opportunity to get shots of my latest weave while I was at it ;)

Warp and Weft: Tanis Fiber Arts
- Green Label Charcoal
- Red Label OOAK Smoke
- Blue Label Grape
- Pink Label Dove
Reader Question – Preserved Dandelions

June 5, 2014

A few weeks ago I received this email from one of my readers:

“Hi Shireen. I made some lovely spheres with your instructions but would really like to make a full dandelion seed head with the sphere . How is this done so it stays intact please.”

I offered to try it out myself, and share any tips I might discover along the way.

If you’d like to try this yourself, check out my book Resin Jewellery. It’s available both online and in print, and covers all the skills you need to reproduce what I’ve done here, what materials you need and where you can buy them all :)

The square one was easy. I am using a cubic silicone mold and simply scattered a few loose bits of fluff into the mold before pouring.

The spherical one was trickier. The first step was to find a dandelion head that was small enough to fit in the mold, as symmetrical as possible, and still intact. When I gathered it up, I brought a mason jar, so once the piece was plucked I would be able to protect it from the wind on the walk home.

When I inserted it into the mold, I did so stem and all. Leaving the stem attached allowed me to place the head in the mold without disturbing the seeds. When the piece came out of the mold, the stem was trimmed off.

This does allow some air into the piece (which means there will be some reaction with the stem over time), but because a dandelion head is already dried out, the change over time won’t be noticeable.

The result is a perfectly preserved dandelion head! I love these, will definitely make a few more :) Thanks for your questions Coral!
Brickworks HDR

June 4, 2014

A few weeks ago, Rayna’s parents spent a week here in Toronto. Her dad, Jerry, is a shutterbug (perfect, right?) and I never did post the second half of our photo trip from that weekend–the Don Valley Brickworks. The Brickworks are a place where, should you be inclined to HDR, you can really have some fun.

A note to other photographers in Toronto; sadly, the Brickworks are no longer free to shoot in. Commercially, or personally, the fee is $250 per photographer for a one day license. I feel it’s quite steep for non-commercial shooting, so that was likely the last time Tito and I would go back there (with cameras at any rate) but, as a staff member pointedly said, ‘It’s no longer abandoned’. Fair enough.
New Wheel!

June 3, 2014

Leslie came over last night to give me my first really intensive spinning lesson.

The wheel is a thing of beauty. It’s a Baynes, single drive, scotch tension, double treadle wheel. One day I’ll know what all that means.

Leslie gave me a number of exercises that, all together, helped me be spinning something that my wheel would at least wind on by the end of the evening.

Even while learning, the wheel is such a pleasure to use that I’m sure I’ll be able to keep up my goal of spinning at least 3 nights a week for practice, even if it’s just 15 minutes.

I’m already going nuts on pinterest boards full of beautiful handspun to inspire me, more pics to come as soon as I’m showing some progress!