Flax Seed to Garment

Project Dates 3/9/2021 - 12/15/2021

December 15, 2021

The summer and fall have been very busy in the garden and project world.  Had very little time to write.  I think it’s about time I catch us up on the flax adventure!  After the flush of flowers bloomed midday in late June, the plants started to slowly turn yellow, and the seed heads began to grow.  It was estimated to harvest in late July.  I measured the flax height, and it was very short.  I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect, but should have been somewhere between 36 and 48 inches.  I originally thought the flax would grow after flowering.  I have since been abused of that idea.  Flax is a cold season crop. It doesn’t like heat.  Heat forces flowering at which point the plant redirects energy toward seed production, and ceases to grow in height or girth.  There was a heat wave just a few weeks after I planted, which was very late, too late for flax in my area for this year.  My flax plants only grew to a height of about 16 inches.  They were also very thin.

 

However, undaunted, and still excited about executing the next steps, I proceeded to harvest.  The harvesting was just as easy as advertised.  I simply grabbed a handful and gently yanked upwards.  The flax plant and roots came out of the ground easily.  The first step after harvesting was to let it dry for a couple of weeks.  I put a clothesline in the garage for that purpose.  After hanging to dry the next step is to ripple or thresh the seeds heads.  I opted to use a rubber mallet which worked well.  Others mentioned stepping on the seed heads, but that didn’t work well for me.

After rippling then the flax needs to be retted.  This fiber is then allowed to rot under controlled circumstances.  This process breaks down the hard outer skin from the valuable fiber just under the cambium.  The flax is either dew retted on the lawn or pond or tub retted in a container large enough to fold the bundled flax under water.

I opted for dew retting, in honor of the naturalist.  I found this process to be challenging.  It was very difficult to tell when the process was done.  I think in large part it was due to the immaturity of the size of the harvested plant.  I researched online and reached out to the Hermitage in PA.  They were kind enough to sell me an example of their completed retted flax.  It was then I realized how immature the plants were in size.  The folks at the Hermitage told me that they failed the first two years to successfully harvest and process flax.  So, my disappointment at my first try, was weakened by their kind words of encouragement.  The two photos show the progress of retting by the color change.  Each day, for about three weeks, I turned the stooks by hand so the bundle was evenly retted.

My first year flax is not strong enough to be processed further.  I tried some samples and the fiber just disintegrates.  There are some longer threads, but even the longest was barely ten inches.  Not worth the effort.  So, I look forward to reinvigorating this process next year.  Since my plot is now opened, I will start at the optimum time which is just a few weeks before the last frost. Flax seeds and plants can tolerate frost even when a few inches high.

Now that the harvest season is over, and to protect the garden and nurture it for next year, I planted oats as a winter cover crop.  They have grown nicely and are just beginning to yellow.  I am a little worried at how thick they are, and how I will cut them down and plant next years’ flax.  But, we shall see…   This ends this years adventure in flax planting, harvesting, and processing.  In the meantime, I am practicing spinning flax from purchased stricks.

July 5, 2021

So, it’s been a month since the last writing about the flax garden.  Every day around late morning from ten o’clock to noon I eagerly went outside to judge the flush of blooms and compare the amount to the previous day.  It turns out that there were actually two full bloom blushes.  The first occurred on 6/25, exactly sixty days after germination as planned!  The photo does really do justice to the reality.  Thereafter blooms started to diminish, but then a few days later a blush equal to the 25^th occurred.  So, I have marked the calendar to start watching for the one third of yellowing to signal harvest time which is targeted to be around July 25.  This is thirty days from the first flush of blooms.  The height of the stalks is mostly about knee high, but varies from midcalf to just above the knee.  Most are about lower knee.  Promising!

On the project front, I’ve been working the third linsey-woolsey (LW03) project.  The intent of this project is to practice spinning flax into linen.  I had some flax roving from a purchase in WI about fifteen years ago.  I thought that practicing on this would be the same as spinning the home grown flax.  I have since come to find that the stash flax roving is a mix of short staple length line flax of about six inches and toe flax which is very short fibers left over from the flax processing.  This is not at all the same as the intended finished stricks from the flax garden.

I spun an initial bobbin of about two hundred and seventy yards of single spun to about 20 WPI which is the intended grist for the overall project.  As I was winding off the bobbin onto a niddy-noddy it broke about five times mostly in the beginning third.  That tells me it was a learning curve.  But, I was concerned about the overall strength, and after testing just by pulling by hand, decided to size the flax before test weaving a small two-inch-wide warp.  After researching online, I found flax mucilage which is basically boiled flax seed.  I tested one tablespoon to one cup of flax.  I think next time I would use even less.  I liked the idea that the flax seed was helping to strengthen the linen, sort of a twist on self-reliance! The end result definitely stiffened the thread!

I warped a very short one-yard length on my floor loom.  That simple act of about twenty ends broke one thread.  Then after tying on the warp, and adding tension, five more broke.  I proceeded to weave a header to spread the warp, but another broke.  That was it.  Though leaving that under tension broke no further warp threads,  I realized that combining the fact that the flax roving was not the end product I would be spinning, plus the effort to size, plus the amount of broken threads, this was a very faulty test, so I abandoned the idea.  I settled on the fact that this flax roving will simply become weft!  

This weft will become part of a version of the LW03 project which will target kitchen towels and napkins.  I ordered flax stricks to practice on while waiting for my flax garden to mature, and the processing to be complete.  In the meantime, I am in the process of spinning the remaining stash flax roving into weft!  The intent of this project to learn to spin flax is still intact, plus I will gain experience spinning flax into linen weft, weaving with linen.  Though not a true linsey-woolsey project, this stepping stone will allow me to practice and hone flax spinning and weaving skills.  And yes, I intend to dye some of the flax to practice and sample that art as well, using natural marigolds which are currently being harvested, and onion skins which have been slowly building from the kitchen scrap pile!

June 6, 2021

Ok, I am getting nervous about the flax garden.  The flax is growing, it’s about a foot high in some spots, but overall it seems to be about 6 to 8 inches.  I read multiple references online that linum usitatissimum does not require much water as it prefers dry conditions.  Yellowing is a symptom of disease.  Mine is not yellowing, but I am concerned about the lack of height.  Target height is twenty-eight (28) inches.  Target bloom date is June 25, so we only have another three weeks to grow at least twice its height.  I am anxiously waiting on the results.

May 28, 2021

Finished weaving the LW02 project. I just recently added the Leclerc weighted temple which I am liking. It’s easier than the traditional temples. After finishing weaving, I wet finished by gently hand-washing, and using the dryer.  I checked the fulling in the dryer every 5 minutes.  Then I used a presser and steamed press using wool setting eight times.  I was totally amazed at how wet-finishing closed up the cloth, made it incredibly softer, and gave it a nice soft but gently firm hand. The transformation from wet-finishing is truly an amazing process!

May 23, 2021

Well, though it varies in height from about 2” to 5”, it definitely looks like flax!  There are some barren spots, but that appears to follow the spread pattern from throwing the seeds by hand.  I did notice a bird or two but they appear to pick and leave immediately.  The flax doesn’t appear to be to their liking.  This morning I also saw a rabbit, two in fact playing.  One of them entered the flax and nibbled once or twice then left back to playing.  Not sure what to make of that, but they didn’t appear to be too hasty to feed there.  I also noticed a couple of spots that are yellowing.  They are a foot or two in size.  I know flax is a cool season crop, and the weather has jumped into the eighties this week.  Hope that doesn’t continue, or harm the flax.  For having sprouted so quickly, and then only being coming up to half a foot in a month, I am a little worried that I may have waited too long to plant.  We had no choice, because it took a while to open the area.  It’s only been 30 days.  Another 30 days till flowering, we’ll see!

April 30, 2021

Hmmmm….the area where the flax was planted has started to sprout.  Linum Usitatissimum is supposed to take a week to ten days to germinate.  It’s only been four.  So, could it be that over anxious to appear?  What makes this suspiciously possible is that the area that is germinating is the ring of flax.  The area where a path was left is not germinating.  So, could it be?  We’ll see!

April 26, 2021

Finally, the flax garden is started.  The sod was removed over the weekend and a layer of topsoil was added.  I shaped the garden into an oval.  I had two seed sources.  The first was one pound from Strictly Medicinal and then eight pounds from Fibrevolution both located in Oregon.  Initial reading indicated that one pound was needed for a ten-foot square plot.  I ended up with an oval of about 15’ by 30’.  I started in the middle and planted and raked an oval.  I worked my way out in about two to three-foot increments spreading the seed by hand and then raking lightly.  After that was done, I used a hand tamper and tamped the whole lot.  Lastly, I watered it in.  Can’t wait for the seed germination which should occur in about ten days!  They should flower in 60-70 days, and then 30 days after majority of flowering they are ready to be harvested.

April 19, 2021

Yesterday finished weaving the LW01 scarf.  As I was reading to see how to wet finish the combination of linen and wool, I ran across jack Schmidling’s website who has done something similar (Schmidling, 2021). Actually, I ran across quite a few people who have done the seed to cloth idea as well as worked in linsey-woolsey.  Interesting how many red cars one starts to see when one now owns a red car!  I put in four rows at each end of simple basket weave to tie the front and back of the double weave cloth together.  The hem was a straightforward simple weaving hemstitch.  I left a f
ringe of linen of about one and one-half inches.

The wet finish included the Laura Fry fingernail test (Fry, 2021)!  I washed the fabric in lukewarm water with Orvus paste and gently agitated for a few minutes.  Rinsed in lukewarm water and then wrapped in a towel to squeeze out the water.  I then put it in the dryer just on air and checked every few minutes.  At the beginning, the first nail test before putting into the dryer was like my very first ice skating experience.  I slipped and fell across that ice almost upon contact, and so did my fingernail.  Merino wool, me, and linen, the ice, behaved similarly!  It took about 20 minutes and I was amazed how much grab the felling process implemented.  The silkiness of the merino was retained.  All in all though I had my doubts at the thickness of the cloth, it turned out to be a great scarf!

On to LW02, which will use the same 20/2 belgian linen warp.  I had measured the remaining stash amount to two full scarf lengths in anticipation of this second test of linsey-woolsey.  This will be a much simpler balanced tabby weave.  The weft is a 20/2 romney wool (50%) and llama (50%).  I have two colors, a reddish brown and a light sienna.  I am leaning toward weaving in light sienna with an occasionally single thread of reddish brown.

April 9, 2021

Interestingly, it’s been exactly one month since writing which is just happenstance!  The initial linsey-woolsey project is coming along.  It is scarf sized.  I put on a warp width of about nine inches and used up that remaining stash of the 20/2 indigo blue belgian linen.  The weave is a warp-faced double-weave.  The fabric is much thicker and denser than anticipated but is silky soft.  It is about halfway of the finished length of sixty-four inches.  The wool weft is slippery on the linen warp.  The linen warp peaks through and provides a really nice basket weave pattern.  Literally, it reminds me of a woven basket with the vertical reeds straight and the horizontal reed curling back and forth through the vertical warp.  Because the merino grist varies, it provides a nice subtle textural pattern overall.

March 9, 2021

The idea for this adventure came brewing from several sources swirling around my brain.  Some months ago, I stumbled upon the movement known as Fibershed and immediately ordered their book.  The movement is about revolutionizing the textile industry as a way to support natural ecological systems to disrupt the climate change contributors from the fashion industry (Burgess, 2019).  It sang to me.  Clothing, textiles, fiber, love of planet, all speak to my soul.

Continuing that journey through networking with the movement and a local chapter in my geographical region, I joined the Chesapeake Fibershed.  The idea of the regions is that clothing should be grown regeneratively and returned to the soil all within the same ecological and geographical region to disrupt costly energy patterns in the traditional clothing making industry process.  Interestingly, the core members of that group seem to have affinity with either wool or bast fibers.

Recently, I attended a Fibershed webinar that discussed various aspects of the flax to linen process.  The fiber and the processing were fascinating.  I have worked with linen in my fiber art.  But, I have not yet spun flax, which is in the queue on the fiber to-do list!  Linsey-woolsey was mentioned in the webinar, a cloth made traditionally from flax warp and wool weft as being produced in our Fibershed area in colonial times.  Linsey-woolsey has traditionally consisted of linen warp and wool weft.  It primarily was used to conserve wool.  During colonial times, it was an important commodity in all of the states (Wikipedia contributors, 2020).

The colonial times cloth is always described as coarse.  It was used in the late 1700’s by those less fortunate with challenge getting wool fiber to make wool fiber last longer by combining it with flax, which was more widely available, and a staple crop in all of the colonies.  The origin of the word linsey-woolsey dates to the middle 1400’s in Europe and refers to a coarse fabric.

There are historical references that the wool that was used in the linsey-woolsey came from whatever leftover wool fibers were available.  These were generally of very poor quality.  It came from what the sheep left behind in bushes, and the poor areas of the fleece after shearing.  Combined with readily and easily available flax fiber, it’s no wonder that the quality of the fabric was coarse given the origin of the wool fiber. So, what does linsey-woolsey, made from better quality wool feel like?

Serendipitously, as I was researching linsey-woolsey, I ran across an artist, who is also familiar with the Fibershed movement, and works with hand crafting linsey-woolsey cloth as background for her art.  Small world!  She also decided to plant some flax to spin linen.  Her opinion of the cloth used both as a shirt and as a blanket was that it was extremely comfortable in heat, and the drape was very soft.  Linnet was founded in 2000 and sells cloth that is 50% wool / 50% linen in the original linen warp and wool weft patterning.  It is also made into wearable clothing (Linen wool cloth, 2021).

The historical references of the linsey woolsey description of being coarse seems incongruous the fabric available today.  However, the etymology of linsey-woolsey has come to describe coarse cloth due to it’s historical origins.  Modern processing however have made the combination of flax and wool not only soft but next to the skin wearable.

An idea started to take form.  A project that is comprehensive, multi-stepped, and raw material to product oriented is very intriguing.  I really like the idea in projects to take them from design to product.  I am designing a project that starts with planting flax seed, merges with local Fibershed wool, and completes through processing the flax, spinning both types of fibers, and creates cloth for a garment or household item.  The area of flax that is needed for enough fiber to make something wearable is about 150 to 225 square feet of planted flax.  Well, that area of ten to fifteen feet by fifteen feet seems doable!  On it went to the master backyard gardening plan.  Online I went, and the seeds have already arrived.  One pound, which is the amount estimated to be needed for that size of crop area.  Now just need the weather to get a little warmer, and to stake out the flax area for sod removal!

Sampling for the cloth has begun.  Not the real eventual cloth.  LW01 is the first project in this journey from full seed to clothing.  LW01 starts with stash of linen and wool to begin to get a feel for the eventual drape and weave structure that may be targeted.  I have some leftover 20/2 linen from a knitted lace tablecloth that was done early in this century.  Also, wool abounds everywhere in my environ, and I have some leftover variegated gold and brown merino single-ply that is screaming to be part of the linsey-woolsey gang.  The original purpose is nicely ensconced as the front panel of a completed sweater named Atomic Blue.  I worked up a quick little two-inch square weave to test out that combo for sett and esthetics.  I realize it will be far from the truth of the eventual project, but it will provide the seed (pun intended!) to prod further thought and momentum for this longer-term project!

Enjoy!

References

Wikipedia contributors. (2020, August 23). Linsey-woolsey. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 19:44, March 1, 2021, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Linsey-woolsey&oldid=974496044

Burgess, R., White, C. (2019). Fibershed: growing a movement of farmers, fashion activists, and makers for a new textile economy. Chelsea Green Publishing. White River Junction, VT

Dictionary.com : linsey-woolsey. (2021). In Dictionary.com. Retrieved March 1, 2021, from https://www.dictionary.com/browse/linsey-woolsey

Linen wool cloth.  (2021).  Retrieved March 6, 2021 from https://www.lin-net.com/English/Linnet_origin_colec6.html#Linenwool

Fry, L. (2021). Wet-finishing for weavers with Laura Fry. Long Thread Media.  Retrieved April 19, 2021 from https://learn.longthreadmedia.com/courses/wet-finishing-for-weavers-with-laura-fry

Schmidling, J. (2021) Fiber Crafts. Retrieved April 19, 2021 from https://schmidling.com/fiber.htm

Merriam-Webster. (n.d.) Linsey-woolsey.  In Merriam-Webster.com dictionary. Retrieved May 23, 2021, from https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/linsey-woolsey. 

 

Coffee Dye Experiment

Project Dates:  2/12/2021 - 2/27/2021

Last fall I tried to dye with coffee grounds.  We diligently saved all the coffee grounds daily.  Actually, we still do.  They are composted regularly, and I save some in the refrigerator for dyeing.  The experiment last fall was on cotton.  I researched the web and my library for formulas.  The recipes were all over the place.  Ratios ranged wildly to not existent.  Some recipes were very serendipitous with instructions that sounded like a fairy godmothers’ incantations!

I am making a crocheted afghan from wool out of my stash.  It is the current morning coffee and wakeup project.  Hubby says, “that needs a couple of pillows to match!”  So, before the afghan got bigger than a very large dinner plate, I immediately made two more.  The plan is to applique them to make pillow covers.  So online I went and purchased pillow stuffing and raw silk fabric and zippers!  So where does the coffee come into play?  Besides fiber and coffee in the morning!

The five wool yarn colors are natural cream, a dark blue green, a variegated that ranges from pale blue green to light gray, mint, and a beautiful reddish-brown tween that also ranges in tones from light to dark.  I had some leftover dye in burgundy and blue green.  The plan was to tie-dye with the burgundy and blue green, and then overdyed with coffee.

The earlier cotton experiment was disappointing.  First, I used tannin as a mordant which dyed everything a very beautiful, but unexpected golden beige.  So, I then restarted again with fresh cotton and didn’t use a mordant because some of the guidance indicated coffee didn’t need a mordant.  I used a very light ratio of two to one.  The color was a very very pale beige.  Beautiful, but hardly worth the effort.

So, onto the current coffee experiment!  I selected four different fibers to test; naturally white wool yarn, white silk charmeuse, natural silk noil, and cotton knit.  Two experiments were completed.  The process was identical between the two.  The only variation was the ratio of coffee grounds to weight of fiber.  In the first experiment I tried 4 to 1, and in second, it was 12 to 1.  The results consistently were darker for the wool and silk compared to cotton.  The 4 to 1 came out a light shade of beige, kind of like coffee with a heck of a lot of creamer.  The 12 to 1 was much closer to what I was aiming for, and on the silk and wool resulted in a beautiful shade of dark coffee.

Figure 1: (bottom to top) cotton knit, silk charmeuse, silk noil

Figure 2: wool yarn

By the way, I through caution to the wind, and after seeing the results of the 4 to 1 ratio and deciding to triple the ratio to 12 times weight of coffee to weight of fiber, I just threw in the pillow covers before seeing the results of this test.  The pillow covers were created from silk soil hich had been sewn into round pillow shapes with zippers, and tie-dyed in burgundy and blue-green first. On the samples I let the fiber soak in the dye bath for 24 hours while cooling down.  I didn’t do that with the pillow, and it came out closer to the lighter color than the darkest shades above.

So, I re-dyed them one more time.  This time I tried 24 times weight of coffee to weight of fiber. The same process was used except because of the amount of coffee material needed I had to split up the fiber and coffee between two slow cookers.  The ratios remained the same, just done in two batches simultaneously.  I love how they turned out!  See the difference after this second dye below.

Figure 3: Over dyed once

Figure 4: Over dyed twice

Enjoy!

Hitomi Ode King Knitted Quilt

Project Dates:  12/18/2018 - 1/3/2021

This adventure started with a holiday present of the book "250 Japanese Knitting Stitches" by Hitomi Shida for the December 2018 holiday season. Next came a trip to the yarn store for a March birthday.  I spent a lot of time touching, testing colors and textures against each other during that yarn buying adventure.  I had no pattern, just the vague notion of a large bedspread.  This was and is this fiber enthusiast’s Nirvana!  The basket of yarn grew until it looked like it would be enough to make something to cover a king size bed.  The colors were in various shades of purple, green, blue, with rust and peach to add energy.

The design target idea morphed over time.  Originally it was going to be simply a conglomeration of different size knitted squares pieced together, sort of a modern take on a 1950’s mod esthetic.  It was going to be an afghan large enough to cover the bed which eventually turned into a  sewn quilt with stuffing and backing.  The end results incorporated knitted squares and rectangles appliquéd over grey flannel, and topped off with a combination of hand and machine quilting.  And, of course, it just demanded to have matching pillow shams.

This journey of the “make” starts with a habit.  Every morning upon waking, the very first priority after ablutions is coffee and fiber.  My husband and I get up very early to watch the sun rise.  While enjoying coffee, we have mild conversation and I enjoy the waking up process by making something with fiber.  Sometimes it’s knitted.  Other times crochet.  I have been known to do cross stitch.  But it is always something using fiber.  I start my day in the energy where I desire most to spend my life…my partner and my fiber enthusiasm!

I designed a mod art grid of various rectangles and squares. Gave them each a target measurement and then perused the Hitomi pattern book!  I measured the wraps per inch (WPI) for each of the yarns.  They turned out to all be within the same small range except for one.  Two swatch samples were knitted for each representative WPI group.  This was an analytical nerd’s dream.  Armed with the knitting gauge from the swatches, the block and color design, the target size for each square and rectangle, I then proceeded to allocate the yarns to each color block.  I methodically analyzed the amount of yardage for each square and matched the overall pattern to the amount of yarn available which sometimes required moving blocks of colored squares around.  This was a puzzle maker’s dream!

Next came the hunting expedition to come up with a series of Hitomi patterns that I thought worked well together.  Each square was to be a different pattern.  I ended up with fourteen different knitting patterns.  Each square had to be designed separately.  Though I had an overall pattern, the specific size of the square and the pattern repeats all had to be figured out.  That was a fun exercise!  I did this as I went.  For each square, after coming up with the design, I documented the start and finish, tracked the rows, knitted and bound off, wet finished, laid each square out and pinned to size to dry.  They collected themselves in a cardboard box awaiting their next incarnation!  This whole exercise of squares, pattern design, and knitting lasted over seven glorious months.  The completion of each square intrigued my creative self.  The pattern mixed with the color and type of yarn was a fascinating experience to watch unfold.

Just about the time this was being completed it was time to move again, plus the new house needed some renovation.  Morning coffee and fiber continued but in other, more mobile projects.  The next steps in this project required longer blocks of time which meant that I needed weekends.  
During the house renovation these blocks of time were unavailable for fiber art, so this project got put on hold for about eight months from about February 2020 until October 2020.  It was at this time that the idea morphed from a pieced afghan to a quilt.  The lightness of the squares and the intended size didn’t seem like they would hold up well.  The mod look of the squares would be lost.  Applying the squares to a backing to showcase them properly seemed the way to go.  Plus I could exercise yet two more crafts: quilting and sewing!

To bring out the color of the yarn squares, I chose a gray flannel.  My husband suggested metallic thread for the quilting which I opposed at first.  However, he is an artist in his own right, so his experience is valued.  I relented and tried out the metallic thread, which turned out wonderfully to my eyes!  I ended up by using the metallic version of all the same yarn colors.  Each of the metallic threads were used in the same area as the colored squares which nicely pulled the design together.

The process of placing the squares onto a king size quilt was rather arduous!  On the cleaned wood floor my poor old knees went.  I opted to pin baste.  The target size of the squares and the end results, given the knitted aspect of the fabric, forced a few small redesigns on square placement.  Basically, I ended up with three blank squares.  In these I created quilting designs using an oak leaf, branch, and chestnut motif.

After all this pin basting, then came appliqueing the squares to the top layer of flannel fabric.  I was able to do all of that using various colored metallic threads and a new sewing machine.  Even with just one layer, it required some effort to handle and manage the amount of fabric.

After a few weeks of that fun, it was back on the wood floor, on my aching knees to pin the lower layer, the cotton batting, and the appliqued top layer together to form the quilt proper.  Carefully rolling each end to the middle, I carried this surprisingly very heavy bundle and approached the sewing machine. Uh, it was like David and Goliath meeting.  The intent was to quilt from the middle out as is customary.  Let’s just say, there was no way a rolled-up king size quilt, even just one half of it, was going to fit through that unbelievably tiny area between the sewing needle arm and the machine proper.  What to do.  Well, hand sewing it is.  I spent several weeks hand quilting and outlining each square and even within the squares to not only complete the design, but to hold the batting sandwich in place like a good quilt should!

Two more steps to go!  Next came quilting the all-over quilting around the outside edges.  All around the quilt was a space about eighteen inches that needed to be quilted.  I chose a combination of straight lines and stippling.  Stippling creates a visual affect much like wind blowing over water, except rather than circular waves, it looks more like spaghetti dropped from a height!  For those of us who like structure and order, trying to do a freeform stippling affect, while maintaining somewhat regular spacing but with irregular design, seems like a task for a superperson!  I can follow lines.  But to arbitrarily move the quilt around to create a random pattern was strenuous to say the least.  It was an exercise in letting go!  Yikes!

Each of the blank squares that I mentioned earlier that received the oak leaf pattern was done with pinning a paper pattern and machine quilting over the top of that.  I chose that over trying to transfer the design to the fabric.  But, that required a very time-consuming exercise, or should I say meditative exercise with small scissor tweezers to pull the paper pattern off the quilt, bit by miniscule bit!  I did that in between the long wait times that dyeing entails which was a process that was occurring simultaneously on another project.

We finally made it to the final step, the binding.  By comparison that was fun and easy.  It was machine sewn on one side, and then handstitched all round on the other side.  It was done in a purple that matched the purple yarns, and pulled the entire project together.

All of the above was tested first on the pillow shams which served as a sort of sampling exercise.  The only difference was that the entire pillow shams were machine quilted.  There was no issue with squeezing the shams under the sewing arm.  I didn’t discover that until I tried with the king size quilt itself.

This was a very labor-intensive experience, but one fun adventure!

Enjoy!