Savoring SAFF 2017

One of the best events of the year is SAFF.  Southeastern Animal Fiber Fair is one of my favorite things.  I love seeing my fiber friends, like Peggy and Kristen.  Not to mention fiber superstars like Gale Zucker.

I love Peggy's t-shirt, "What up my knittahs."

SAFF started in 1991 in Winston-Salem, NC and grows bigger each year.  I have only missed one year in all those years and had a good excuse, major surgery.

Somethings don't change, beautiful yarns and a desire to knit all the things.

The fleece show is hard to resist even if your house is filled with bags of fiber.

Beth Smith judged the fleece show this year and managed to entertain and teach me something!

Fleece face plant!

Today I took a class with Carin Engen, a felter (pictured above) who recently moved to WNC from California.

Some of Carin's samples.

Teaching sample illustrating the ways different silks respond to felting.

This piece is the one Carin is pictured wearing.  I love the look of "bricks of silk and wool as mortar."

This is a classmate's piece, laid out with the silk scarf, thin wisps of 19 micron merino and the design "tiles" of silk.

Rolling, rolling, rolling 450 times.

Checking to see if felting is progressing and making sure netting is not sticking to the scarf. 

The big reveal.

This is my scarf, there is still some work to do.  First it needs to dry then some embroidery and beads.  This was a fun class and I enjoyed playing with the silk remnants and wool.  Carin is so knowledgeable and laidback that she created a fun no stress zone for us.

Tomorrow, we return to SAFF for a final day of catching up with old friends, meeting new ones and sharing our passion for all things fiber.  Thanks to all the volunteers who organize this festival every year. 

Beauty in the Break - kintsugi

The  fifteenth century Japanese art of kintsugi involves a philosophy not of replacement, but of awe, reverence, and restoration. The gold-filled cracks of a once-broken item are a testament to its history, adding to its character and value.

This has been a valuable and persistent thought for me.  If I can embrace and honor my own brokenness,  my heart opens to see and value your cracks as part of your beautiful history.  I love that tapestry weaving gives me a way to focus on this concept and represent it artistically.

Because of the slow, meditative nature of tapestry weaving, I gave myself time to explore the cracks and experience filling in the space with gold thread.  Other than a rough idea of fractured old pottery aggrandized with gold, the image developed on the loom.  The warp is linen and the weft threads are rustic wool and linen singles from treasured Sylvia Heyden and Martha Matthew stashes.  I wove it on my Cactus Flower loom at 10 ends per inch.

Beauty in the Break, finished October 18, 2017.