Season of challenges

[altivo]

They say in order to improve yourself you have to push the edges of what you can do.

This winter seems to be doing that very well. Dealing with frozen water lines so that we are hauling 40 gallons (320 pounds) of water from the house every day is a physical challenge. Paying for the needed repairs is going to be a financial challenge. Managing the realignment of our consortial responsibilities at work has been a mental and sometimes emotional challenge.

Not only those, but the handspinning study group in which I participate has pushed me to spin finer, smoother yarn or thread than ever before, using fibers I've never handled, and even with drop spindles rather than the spinning wheel.

In my weaving study group, we are designing whole garments starting from just the thread. We have to design the cloth, design the garment, figure out how much fabric is needed, then weave the fabric ourselves before cutting and sewing the final project. I'm up to the weaving part, and have my warp on the loom now. Tonight I started weaving. This fabric is 38 inches wide, the widest I've ever tried to work in a single piece. The thread count is 32 per inch, not quite the densest I've ever done but close to it. There were over 600 warp threads to be measured, cut, and threaded on the loom, and there will be six yards of fabric to be woven. That will take 3,888 passes of the shuttle. The total length of the threads used in the fabric is about 4.75 miles. The fiber is cottolin, a blend of cotton and linen that doesn't have the best reputation for ease in weaving, but does produce a nice finished result. Definitely the largest weaving challenge I've ever undertaken in the 18 or so years I've been doing this.

I've discovered tonight that throwing a heavy shuttle with your fingertips so that it travels in a straight line for 40 inches is not a simple task. However, I'll learn. There were no errors in the threading at least. The first six inches of fabric are woven and everything lines up as it should. So far, so good...

[Edit: Actually, I should give metrics for the convenience of those not very familiar with US-centric measurements. So 40 gallons of water would be about 180 liters, and weigh 145 kilograms. The fabric on the loom is 97 centimeters wide and will be just under 6 meters long when finished. The length of the thread used will be 7.75 kilometers, and it will be packed together so that you would count 13 threads on a one centimeter line running diagonally over the cloth.]

Comments

[corelog.livejournal.com]

Sounds remarkably arduous.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Hauling water is arduous, especially in subzero weather (-20C and below.)

But I imagine you refer to the weaving, which I find satisfying. It's a blend of art, craft, and skill that produces something both beautiful and useful and does so with a consistent rhythm and repetition that mimics musical performance and inspires meditation. In a very real sense, it is the process of producing order from chaos. The patience and disciplines involved are universal, a point at which western artifice merges with eastern philosophy. It's almost like zen.

[octatonic.livejournal.com]

Turning negatives into positives is something I've
always been unable to do. But I do like your
philosophy. The only way you grow is by going
throw stuggles and coming out bigger on the
other side. Of course sometimes you look at
the struggle and say, "Damn, I'm gonna be King
Sized after this!"

^_^

[altivo.livejournal.com]

King sized maybe, I just don't wanna be supersized. ;p

[miktar.livejournal.com]

I had finished reading this post, when I suddenly became aware of the fact that I was in awe.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Eep. Maybe I overdid it. The facts are accurate, but it's no more awesome than what most people do every day. ;) I'll get some photos of the weaving and the steps that follow.

[miktar.livejournal.com]

I didn't know a horse could be modest.

"No more awesome than what most people do every day", honestly. I think you're not aware of what most people do every day.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

What is the saying? "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step?"

Certainly there are some skills involved that had to be learned. But overall the process is just an assembly of thousands of tiny operations, each very simple. Cooking dinner, doing laundry and ironing, mowing a lawn or shoveling snow, or typing up pages of text are common tasks that work in the same manner.

Weaving has held my interest for a very long time, though. There was a historical period in Europe when weaving was largely a man's occupation, and a skill learned by apprenticeship and practiced in solitary. I feel a connection with that history when I weave, and perhaps in some past life...

[marzolan.livejournal.com]

The more I work with it, and with physics, the more i like the metric system. I just wish that people who are gung-ho (not you) on everyone using the metric system would actually give weight as weight and not as mass. Metric using countries that I've seen always do that, and there is a big difference in kg and N. It's no more misleading basing everything on powers of six than it is calling mass, weight. Eh, random thought.

Anywho, best of luck with the weaving. It sounds like something bound for cataclysmic mistakes, i.e.: one mistake and you start over... That would require more patience than I have.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Do you know what a dyin' centimeter says?



[erg!]


I've actually heard someone say that switching to metric was an atheist plot because it was against the bible. I so much wanted to ask them how many talents they weighed and how many cubits tall they were. ;p

No, the weaving is more forgiving than that. Certain types of mistakes are best recognized early because they are easier to correct then. But I'm past that point and a minute examination reveals no errors. Because this fabric is just plain weave, no texture pattern at all and no color changes in the weft, there are few mistakes left that I could make and not recognize right away in time to undo them. I have 18 days to finish the weaving (well, really about two weeks, since the cloth needs to be washed and ironed afterward. Half a yard of progress each day (easy) will do it. I'll be trying to get ahead this weekend so I don't have to push during the week.

[marzolan.livejournal.com]

That's good then. Hopefully that moves faster than anticipated for you, though i gather you enjoy it anyway.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yes, I do enjoy it. There'd be no point in doing it otherwise.

[marzolan.livejournal.com]

I wish i had time to pursue hobbies... At best I manage to do some cooking on the weekends, which really helps with the stress.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Its a season of Challenges for the equine with the paffers ......Paffers!! *falls over giggling*

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I oughta... paff your ears for that.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

*holds his sides* ack stop stop, *has another attack of the giggles*