T12, the Leftover Bear

 While putting things away in my studio, I came across the left-over fabrics from last year's bears that I made.  A couple others in the family wanted one, so I got out the pattern pieces to see what I could come up with.  I actually got enough pieces drawn onto the fabric to make three more bears.

I decided not to push myself this year because of the arthritis in my hands, but was able to get one done for a Christmas gift. 

This is T12 with his joints installed and ready for stuffing. 

Fortunately, I had the parts sewn and the seams pressed when our power went out three days before Christmas.  The bear ended up being one of the projects I worked on for the three days without electricity.

He was stuffed and I got his arms and legs stitched closed, but by the time I got his head on, the sun was starting to fade.

 Once he got his mouth, he told me he wanted to be an artist.  He does look a bit artsy with the patchwork of many colors. 

Here he is by candlelight, holding his ears.  While counting up the fabrics for this patchwork bear, I realized that I didn't have all eleven of the other bears represented.  I switched out one of the sewn ears for the other two fabrics that I needed.

I had Bob hold a flashlight so I could sew that ear on the sewing machine by turning the handwheel.  It's a good thing it was just a small part, or my hand would have been super sore!

We were quite the pioneers.  I finished the stitching of his mouth, claws and ears by candlelight. He now represents all eleven of the other Griswold bears

Here he is at breakfast the next morning with ears attached.  We shared a bowl of Mama Bears Porridge.

Later in the day, I took him to Petoskey so he could meet some of the other Griswold bears.  Cheeka, Ben, Othar, and T12 had fun playing a video game.

T12 wanted to make a watercolor painting to take to his adopted dad, so Emily got out the supplies and helped him get started.  He decided to do a picture of Peter Rabbit.

Since Emily and T12 are both artists, they got along very well together.  They did a little experimenting, since neither of them had done watercolors before.

 While they were working, Becky (Emily's mom) made a beret for T12.  He certainly looks like an artist now!  The watercolor was finished and set aside to dry and the table cleared for a party.

Davey, Emily, and Bobby joined in along with Othar, Ben, and Cheeka.  Becky fed them homemade honey wheat bread with homemade butter, and of course there was lots of honey on the slices too.










After the party, T12 had to be packed so he could go to his new home in Spokane, Washington.

He had a long arduous journey that was very nerve wracking on my end, since FedEx decided not to track shipments that week.  He finally arrived by January 2nd, and was very happy to get unpacked!

His adopted dad Nick was very happy with him.  They are going to get along famously.  T12 has a new name, but it is quite similar to his old name.  Nick is calling him Tiz, because that is what the tag that came with him looked like. 

Tiz is looking forward to art lessons from Nick, who is an artist.  It will be fun to see what kind of art work they come up with.

Boy Bears Play Dress-up

The little boy bears got out the dress-up box today and were really having a lot of fun.  T7 is so much like Auntie Rach and Auntie Care-Care, because he likes to play Pirates of Penzance.
"Arrrrghhhh!  I am a pirate king!".

T10 likes to play Viking.  He made his own sword and shield.

T5 likes to play ball, and looks so cute in his uniform.  He needs a Detroit Tigers cap to go along with it.  Unfortunately, T10 and T7 don't like playing ball.  They would rather do sword fighting.  I think T5 is going to have to ask one of the other bears to play catch and practice hitting.

T7 and T10 started getting kind of rough with their fighting.  I warned them that someone was going to get hurt (just like a mom).  Of course they didn't listen, and T10 got hurt.

Off came the costume and I took him to get an x-ray to see if anything was broken.

All of his joints look ok.  I hope they listen, next time I tell them to settle down!

Never So Thankful To See A Warp End!

This was one of my most hated warps!   I didn't have too much trouble with the paw fabrics or the first fabric, but this last fabric for T11 was nothing but trouble.  There were so many warp breaks, that I decided to measure another warp just in case I decided to throw in the towel with this one.  It sure was tempting, but I don't give up easily.  This was a very welcome sight, though, when I finally had enough woven.  Thankfully, the fabric is fulled and then fused with interfacing on the back, so it should be pretty stable when finished.

All these weights dangling off the back of the loom except for the two on the edges were weighting broken warps.  It's a good thing I had lots of hooks and fender washers.

The whole time I was weaving T-11, I was thinking I would use the side that I could see, but after finishing it and getting it off the loom, I decided the backside would be more suitable for a young man (my oldest grandson).  So here is what it looks like.  I was able to pull all the broken warps to the back, trim them fairly short, and then got the interfacing fused.  Marking, cutting, and sewing will come later this week.




 I dislike using table looms for anything but workshops, because they slow me down.  Someday, this little Glimakra Victoria will get a set of treadles, but for now, I'm doing what I can to make the weaving simpler.  Table looms have such a short area to actually weave, about an inch at best, that I was having to stop to release the ratchet too often.  Thank goodness I took a class from Kati Reeder Meek and learned about live weight tensioning.  It's such a sweet technique, especially for table looms.

I used a small cotton cord (less than 1/4" diam.) from the hardware store and some barbell weights that were not being used.  The cord is wrapped three wraps around the backbeam with no overlaps.  The heavy weights are hung on one end of the rope and a lighter counter weight on the other end.

So, which end gets the heavy weight?  On my loom, the warp is winding off from the inside of the loom, so that end of the rope gets the heavy weights.  If the loom had the warp coming off the outside of the loom, the heavy weights would go on that end of the rope.

Here is a closer photo.  The beam has to have a clear space in order for this to work.  This warp, which is only about 12" wide, has one five pound weight, two three pounders, and one two pound weight on the heavy end, and one two pound weight for the counterweight.  I tried eight pounds at first, but it wasn't enough.  Once the weights are installed and dangling, then the back ratchet can be released.  Now when I need to move my warp forward, I just turn it from the front.  I don't have to release anything, and it stays a constant tension.  I love it!  Thanks Kati!

Since this was my first time using the loom, except for a doubleweave class, I looked through my book of eight shaft patterns and picked a dornick twill because I liked the looks of it, and because the treadling had leavers grouped together.  I figured that would help speed things up, and made for a logical progression of leaver pulls.

I am quite happy with the resulting fabric, and am probably destined to add another bear to the Griswold bear family. 

This photo is more accurate for the color.  For scale, the woven black area is only 1" deep.  The fine gray yarn came from my Alice Griswold collection, and the black is from my stash.  It is a 9/2 size wool and is a bit thicker than the gray wool warp.  I need to weave about 52" for a bear, not counting the paws, and so far, I have almost 18".

Next photos will probably be when I finish T10 and T11.  Hopefully soon!