<![CDATA[Dorothy Northcutt Gray - Fine Art - Arts and Crafts Blog]]>Fri, 07 Aug 2009 21:52:35 +0700Weebly<![CDATA[More drop spinning]]>Wed, 22 Jul 2009 07:59:37 +0700http://www.dorothygrayart.com/1/post/2009/07/more-drop-spinning.htmlSo last night at the Shire of Owl's Nest fighter practice (which does triple duty as a craft-along and a general social time) I received some good instruction on basic spinning using a drop spindle from THL Beldthora. She uses low-whorl spindles made with pre-Columbian whorls obtained from eBay. I got a better idea of what I'm supposed to be doing, and how to do it. I will continue practicing with that BFL top that came with my spindle, and then maybe dive into the beautiful aplaca/silk roving

]]><![CDATA[Nalbinding: time spent?]]>Mon, 20 Jul 2009 17:56:12 +0700http://www.dorothygrayart.com/1/post/2009/07/nalbinding-time-spent.htmlIn the comments of my last post on the nalbinding hat, Kim asked me how long it took to make. It was hard to say for sure, because I worked on it off and on for period of around two weeks, and didn't pay too much attention to how long I spent on each session. So I guessed maybe eight hours total, certainly no more than ten?

I've started a new hat, and I can say with certainty how much time I've spent on the work I've done so far, because I did it all in the car coming back from North Carolina! The below work-in-progress measures eight and quarter inches in diameter, and I have spent just at three and a half hours doing it. I guess that I am maybe halfway through, so unless I run into unexpected difficulties, the finished project will take between seven and eight hours. So I suppose my first guess was pretty close to correct.

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]]><![CDATA[Nalbinding hat]]>Sun, 19 Jul 2009 16:20:57 +0700http://www.dorothygrayart.com/1/post/2009/07/nalbinding-hat.htmlI started this hat a couple of weeks ago, and kind of struggled with it, but I finally got it figured out while we were driving from Atlanta to Cashiers, North Carolina on Friday. This hat was made with Oslo stitch in the round, then finished off with two rows of Coptic stitch. The yarn is something like 90% wool and 10% mohair and it is beautiful if slightly scratchy. I think in cold weather it will be quite comfortable.

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I have started yet another hat, this one also in Oslo stitch, but in Cascade 220 Heathers and Cascade 220 White (both 100% wool, worsted.) It's a good thing I like hats because I am going to have a lot of them before the weather gets cool. The end result is that I hope to be able to make an authentically medieval Viking-style cap for my husband's SCA persona. And I've got other things in the queue as well. I want some fingerless mittens or gloves for myself. In fact I have already nalbound up one such mitten, but I need to refine and perfect my design.
]]><![CDATA[Drop spinning: first try.]]>Wed, 15 Jul 2009 09:05:29 +0700http://www.dorothygrayart.com/1/post/2009/07/drop-spinning-first-try.htmlI spent an hour or so this morning fumbling with my new top-whorl drop spindle. The result is some lumpy but probably quite usable yarn. It looks like the two ounces of wool top (from Bluefaced Leicester sheep, and luxuriously soft) will go a fairly long way, even with the large amounts I am spinning. Even though my finished yarn will no doubt work, I am finding the process a lot more laborious than it appears on the instructional videos I have been watching - which is, of course, to be expected! All I know to do is keep re-watching the videos and practicing, until I run out of top. I've got some incredible alpaca/silk roving but I do not want to try to spin that until I have a better idea of what I am doing.

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]]><![CDATA[Current projects]]>Tue, 14 Jul 2009 06:44:39 +0700http://www.dorothygrayart.com/1/post/2009/07/current-projects.htmlI am taking the summer off from school, and I have been using the free time to learn some new things. I have become very interested in fiber arts, especially anything to do with wool and other animal fibers.

My focus so far has been nalbinding, which is an ancient - very ancient, - technique of using a single needle to create a fabric made of loops. Most of the stitches involve using the thumb of the left hand to manage the loops while the right hand manipulates the needle over and or under the loops in various ways. It's amazing the many different effects that can be had by simply varying the direction of the needle's entry through the loops. For instance, the York stitch and the Oslo stitch: the setup on the thumb is exactly the same for these two stitches; but in the York stitch, the needle goes through the top loop from behind, but in the Oslo stitch, the needle comes in the top loop through the front. The result is two very different fabrics.

I am also going to at least attempt to learn to hand-spin yarn using a plain drop spindle. One, because I am fascinated to know how it all works, and two, because a lady of my SCA persona's time (10th century Northumbria) would certainly understand how yarn and thread is made. I ordered a set from Lunabudknits on Etsy which includes a cheerfully painted wooden top-whorl spindle and two ounces of wonderfully soft Bluefaced Leicester top wool and as soon as I get my courage up I will be diving right in!

]]><![CDATA[Blogging Anew]]>Mon, 13 Jul 2009 10:24:30 +0700http://www.dorothygrayart.com/1/post/2009/07/first-post.htmlSince 2002, I have been blogging off and on under the name A Frustrated Artist. Since I am no longer frustrated, I am going to be starting completely from scratch at my new web site. Old blog entries can be read at A Frustrated Artist :: Reloaded.

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