Handwoven Placemats

How does 19 days go by without a post from me?! I guess I’ve been busier than I realized.

In addition to my usual amount of weaving and working at my paycheck job, I’ve moved 10 cord of firewood in the last two weeks. This involves opening a basement window, moving a homemade chute into place, tossing down a whole bunch of firewood, and then going down into the basement and stacking it to make room for more. Repeat daily, morning and evening. I developed a pattern that worked for me — toss down wood in the evening, then in the morning, before work, stack up what I tossed down last night. The only days I missed were when it had rained and the wood was wet; it’s no good having wet wood in your basement – it leads to all sorts of bad things. So now I have my winter’s wood — 11 cord — stacked in the basement. Within the next few weeks 22 cord will be cut & split in my yard and need to be stacked out there. The job is never really done with firewood.

Despite my firewood work, I’ve still been weaving. I decided I’d try some much more casual table linens than the placemats I’d woven previously. This is two sets of four placemats, woven from 10/2 pearl cotton in white, periwinkle, gray, and chestnut brown. On the left is obviously a tabby weave, on the right, a diamond twill. Neither the placemats nor my handwoven runner and napkins generated much interest at the 100 American Craftmen Show at the Kenan Center, so I probably won’t be making more soon.

Buy hey, you never know. Maybe people will be all over them next weekend at the Roycroft Summer Festival, or maybe that’s what’ll turn me on, and I’ll weave placemats & kitchen towels anyway. After all, I need to make what I like, or why bother?

Your turn — what are you doing this Father’s Day? I’m enjoying my memories of the sweetness of both my father and my husband, two men who enriched my life and made me who I am today.