Throwback Thursday: glass frames

On By CarynIn Craft, throwback

Back in February of 2009 I was doing glass fusing in a small Paragon kiln. I was experimenting with fusible glass paint, which is applied with a bottle fitted with a thin steel tube. Colored ground glass is suspended in a liquid medium and placed on the glass, rather than painted with a brush. It is an interesting technique and one that requires a steady hand, a pin to clear the nozzles, and a wipe to clear up the mistakes. I like that these pieces reflect my preference for the Art Nouveau style. After I fused the paint to the clear glass in the kiln, I mounted the glass on acrylic photo frames. (I don’t know why I went this direction, it seems counterintuitive to glue glass to plastic rather than just use a frame. I’m sure there was a reason.)

Photo description: two clear fused glass panels with red, orange, and white designs done with fusible glass paint

Examining Chain-plied yarn

On By CarynIn Craft

Chain-plying yarn takes a single spun yarn and makes a three ply yarn from one bobbin or ball. The spinner makes long chain links, like in crochet, but each chain can be the length of an arm. There is no waste as the yarn is always tripled to the end of the length. It is a very useful technique especially if the spinner wants to preserve a color gradient, or doesn’t want to waste any precious material dividing the ball into three and risking running out of one ball before the other two. It does leave its mark, though. Each chain has a bend of yarn, a hiccup in the twist of the ply. This is difficult to see in a finished piece, but in a half-woven swatch, the chain loop ends are more obvious in the warp.

Photo description: Ramie chain-plied yarn warped onto a Clover mini loom and done halfway in plain weave
Photo description: same picture, but with the visible chain bumps circled in blue, and one weaving error circled in red

These chain bumps are more of a concern if the weaver wants to leave a fringe. I wove in the ends and trimmed them. To fix the missed warp in the weave, I took a small piece of yarn and sewed it over the warp and tied it in the back.

Photo description: back of finished swatch showing trimmed ends and fixed warp
Photo description: front of swatch

The chain bumps are not readily visible in the end piece, but the edges are uneven, and I pushed the weft into the loops left by the loom, arcing the bottom of the swatch. Which is why I swatch, I learn so much from each piece.

RIP Magnet

On By CarynIn chickens

And then there were four.

Magnet the Black Star hen that has been with us since May passed away. I found her in the coop in a quiet dark corner, cool, but rigor mortis hadn’t fully set. The day before she was fine. There were no signs of mites or outward disease or trauma and she was still at a healthy weight, so I expect something when wrong in her reproductive tract. Both Black Star hens had a hiatus from egg laying for the last month while they were in molt, and I’ve heard that the time when the processes starts up again has a higher mortality rate. I did not do a necropsy. Although I have done a couple in the past, it is intense and takes some uninterrupted time and space, which I didn’t have.

Photo description: three hens on the roost, one hiding in a nest box at night

We’ll keep an eye on Wing Ding, the other Black Star hen. She and Magnet had been coop companions before the move to our flock. They didn’t really hang out together at my place, especially at night, but they were the top two in the flock. Magnet was a sweet hen and coexisted well with my Faverolles.

Peanut cage

On By CarynIn Wildlife

Squirrel challenges continue, this time I cleaned up a suet cage and put shelled raw peanuts inside.

Photo description: wire suet holder filled with shelled peanuts

This was a big hit. The squirrels went bonkers getting the peanuts out and running off with them. It was challenging, but not impossible. I even saw a small bird swoop in, pluck a peanut from the side, and fly off. Not a coconut, but still the peanut was larger than I thought a bird that small could carry! On day two I had to wrap the chain around the hook once because the squirrels figured out how to get it down and dragged it halfway across the yard.

Jumbo flyer

On By CarynIn Craft

The new-to-me Ashford Traveller spinning wheel came with a jumbo flyer that hadn’t been assembled. I finished all the wood parts with Howard’s Feed-n-Wax. (See? I love this stuff.) Ashford wood products typically come unfinished.

Photo description: Ashford jumbo flyer with sliding hooks and two bobbins, the whorl (bottom right) has had an application of Feed-n-Wax

After a few applications and some drying time, I finished the assembly by screwing in hooks and tried it out on the spinning wheel to ply my three singles. It occurred to me that three full bobbins will not all fit on a single bobbin of the same size, but a jumbo bobbin could hold it all. The flyer came with a new end bracket to fit the larger end of the flyer, but it also came with grommets to fit the original flyer so I don’t have to change the bracket to switch back and forth. Nice.

Photo description: jumbo bobbin and flyer mounted on an Ashford Traveller, bobbin is half full of three plied yarn
Photo description: to ply, I hold the single spun yarn leading from the lazy kate bobbins between my fingers to keep tension between my hand and the flyer orifice. This keeps the pigtails of twisted yarn from catching in the ply.
Photo description: jumbo bobbin full of three ply alpaca merino yarn

The jumbo flyer is marketed as an aid to make bulky art yarn, but I think it does a lovely job of plying as well.