State of the Studio

 

March 2, 2025 - prepping to weave

In so many ways New Year seems a year ago.  But actually looking at the calendar and it appears to be just close to spring break up.

I finished the previous warp last week, and spent the past few days getting a few things done.  I inspected and repaired the towels after cutting them from the loom, then ran them through the washer/dryer.  I pressed them over two days and now they are drying on the rack which gets set up behind the loom.  It's a bit of a 'squeeze' to get into and out of the loom room, but I'm pressed (pun) for space and that is where it fits 'best'.  For the time being, at least.  And it gets stored away when not in use, so it's just a couple days of dodging through the goat trail.

I still have a long way to go to weave down my yarn inventory where I would like it to be, but by the same token, there are almost no boxes of yarn packed away out of sight.  I have 'boxes/bins' of yarn as a way to keep them sorted.  Some of the colours I use are very close in hue/value and hard to tell them apart.  So I tend to put them into small boxes so I can more easily see which ones I need.

On the past warp I was able to use up a rather large part of a very big cone for weft, but I still have these giant mill cones I inherited from a friend.  I am trying really really hard to leave less than a tonne of yarn when I shuffle off this mortal coil.  It's great to see some progress happening.

Friday night I started the new pain medication.  I have no idea if it will be a good fit for me, but things are 'changing'.  How?  Not sure how to describe it.  One of the adverse effects is 'trouble sleeping' - and I've had 2 nights in a row that I could not *get* to sleep.  Until it was nearly time to wake up.  So, we'll see how that goes, given I doubled the medication today.  But it appeared that the very lowest possible dose was not going to work very well for me, so now I'm on one capsule morning and night - and we'll just have to wait and see.

The medication is, as far as I can remember, the most expensive one that I've tried - yet.  However, none of the rest were working, and this new one isn't a nerve blocker, so hopefully it will come with a different set of adverse effects.  Time will tell.

Over the weekend I beamed the warp, then started threading, alternating with pressing.  I'm trying to not stress my body too much while I wait to see how it reacts to the new medication.  

My handwork has been slowed way down due to the joint pain, but that finally seems to be easing.  So perhaps the new drug won't cause muscle/joint pain?  (Pretty please????)  But even there I've managed to hem one towel (most) nights.  So the last one will get done tonight, just in time to bring the new 'teal' ones up.

Now that I'm beginning to feel a bit better and my hands don't ache so much, I need to sort through the samples for the article I'm working on.  I did open a file last week and wrote some introductory text.  Now to go through what I did, exactly, and what resulted.  And where someone may want to go to learn more.  Time to wrap this one up.   Because I've agreed to write another article.  :)  That one will be more 'play' than focused look on a topic much much larger than reasonable for a magazine.  Pretty sure I will exceed my word count.  Again.  Fortunately the editor doesn't seem to mind.  :D  And there is no reason why most the aspects of weaving can't be broken down into smaller bites to chew through.

Speaking of which, I still haven't really gotten into Michelle Boyd's book Twist.  I've paged through, and dipped in here and there, but frankly the past few months have been pretty crappy and I just haven't felt like I had the mental wherewithal to really dig deep.  If I can get my sleep sorted out, maybe that will change soon.  In the meantime, I know it's there, I know there's great info in it, I just need to wait until my brain is functioning 'better'.

It is 6 months ago since I woke up in the hospital in Vancouver.  I'm 1/4 through what everyone tells me will be a 24 month recovery period.  And then, whatever I have managed to get back of what I 'lost' in an injured brain, is what I will have to work/live with.

On the other hand, I confess to beginning to feel rather like a cat, watching their 'nine lives' falling into the abyss.  Do I have 9 lives?  I seem to have used up rather more than the one that humans are granted.