Spring Flowers

A tiny, perfect little orchid

bouquet delivered a week ago and still going strong

Latest arrangement

Plum shawl warp

April is not the nicest month here, especially when winter has overstayed it's welcome.  The tulips in my front bed are barely above ground, buds still tightly furled.

So it was especially nice to be gifted with lovely fresh flowers the last couple of weeks - their cheery blossoms chasing the drab grey days away. 

The plum shawl warp is turning out very nicely, too.  Often when I do a run of something on the same warp I will try to make each item different in some way - changing the treadling/tie up or the weft yarn.  Since this yarn is all about stash reduction and I know that this particular combination makes a lovely quality of cloth, and because I am also trying to use up a bunch of very fine yarn for weft, I'm making all of the shawls on this warp the same.   Besides, with shows in the Seattle area (2), here, Vancouver and Calgary, hopefully the shawls will sell in different geographic regions.  :)

The weft is a lace weight alpaca and I'm hoping to use it up on either this warp, or another.  I think I've got 5 or 6 more shawl warps in the queue.

Unfortunately just before lunch time the fly shuttle stopped working.  The piston on the left hand side came apart so I took that as a sign to take a break, have lunch and do the repair after I ate.  I have to dig out the wrenches that will remove the bolt that holds the piston coupling onto the picker, screw the end part of the coupling back onto the piston itself, then reattach that to the picker.  Not a big deal, but awkward with my ankle still tingling and protesting too much flexing. 

But Doug isn't home and won't be for several hours, so if I want to finish this shawl today I have to be the loom mechanic.