A New Year—A New Warp

 Well, here's 2026 and the start of a new calendar. I like the first of the year because, to me, it is a way to mentally start again. Reboot and renew, I guess. Yesterday I completed my tapestry diary for 2025 and cut it off. It was a celebration of different oak species that are around Dahlonega for most of the images, plus one leaf I collected when teaching at Arrowmont. 

Fresh off the loom. It's 56" long x 11" wide and woven with natural dyed wool on linen warp, 8 epi.

 I have several more hours of finishing work to go on this so the year-long weaving turns into a year + of time. And that's OK with me.

After cutting off the 2025 weaving I tied onto the remaining warp ends with the new warp and got the loom ready for starting anew today, January 1. 

I tie on to the existing warp by holding the new one my left hand while I use my right hand and my left fingers to tie overhand knots with each thread, one by one in order. 

 

Looks like a mess once all the knots are tied but it's easy to straighten out with a little tugging.

 

 

I tension the warp by using orange juice jugs filled with water. I ease the knots through both the reed and the heddles before beginning to beam the warp.

 

 

And then hold up the tie-on rod that's attached to the cloth beam with bungee cords until I can get the warp tied to it evenly.

 

 

After tying on and spreading out the warp I'm ready to start! And I did so this morning although I didn't photograph the first day's weaving. For the month sections I'm thinking about following a year of transition for dogwoods for 2026. I'll decide about that soon and start the January image.

 

After preparing my tapestry diary warp for the new year here at home, I went to the studio to work on the current tapestry, the one of ginkgo leaves. I've woven consistently on it since November 29 when the Ruthie loom left. And now I'm about 9" from the top of the image. I'll need to weave beyond that for a few more inches of top border and the hem. I'm hoping to finish it in time for an exhibit of my work at the UNG Gainesville campus, Roy C. Moore Gallery, in the early part of 2026.

 

 

New year plans and hoping for the best. Happy year to come for everyone!

 

Moving along and Lightening the Load!

 I mentioned in the last post that my largest loom was heading to a new home. And indeed it is now installed with a young tapestry weaver at her studio a thousand miles or so from Georgia! She and her boyfriend came on Thanksgiving weekend to pick it up. She's sent pictures of it with a warp already on it ready to go! I am so happy that this transition has happened to give a new life to the loom. And especially for it to become a well-used tool for the next generation.

Emily and Wesley* with Ruthie at my studio

And Ruthie happy in her new home with her new friend, Aurora! Photo by Emily Wick.

It didn't take long for me put another loom in Ruthie's spot, though! My husband helped me move the Glimakra loom into the place. I'd gotten the loom from a friend in Dahlonega a few years ago and hadn't yet had an opportunity to warp it up.  

I love all of my previously owned looms (that's almost all of them, by the way) but this one is special because I knew the original owner. He was a colleague of mine at North Georgia College (as it was known then) about forty years ago. Although psychology was his field he was interested in crafts of all kinds, from woodworking and jewelry-making to weaving. He'd purchased the loom and he and his wife both explored tapestry weaving a little. After his death the loom went to his daughter, herself an experienced weaver. Although she sampled a bit on the tapestry loom, floor loom weaving is her first love and she decided to sell the loom. Now it's becoming a workhorse in my studio.

Progress so far on this new tapestry.

In addition to selling the large loom, I recently gave one of the frame looms to a graduating UNG student who I'd met in the weaving class. I also passed along a bin of yarn to her. And I gave almost all of the books about color and color theory I've collected over the years to the art department for students use. I have another stack of assorted weaving books to give to a friend at the Folk School next time I'm there. Bit by bit, I'm lightening my load! And it feels good. 

Yesterday I completed the end finishing of the coded weaving I did earlier this fall. 

My tapestry diary for 2025 is nearing its end and I've started thinking about what next year will hold. That will begin my 17th year of doing this daily practice with tapestry!

 *By the way, Wesley will be teaching birch bark boxes at John C. Campbell Folk School next year.

 

 

 

The time has come

 

“It’s time to begin to let go.”   

 

I thought I’d never have this conversation with myself about finding new homes for beloved and much used tapestry looms. I’ve had many through the last almost 30 years that I’ve been weaving tapestries, and I’ve been the second (or third) owner for most of them. Each has served me well in its own way and eventually almost all went to new homes because I added another loom to replace it. 

 

Eighteen years ago, a 60” loom came into my life, one that I’ve loved and on which I’ve woven eleven larger tapestries. I remember driving to Virginia to pick up the loom, bringing it home in pieces in the station wagon we had at the time. A friend and I set it up in my studio. Once assembled, I realize there were a few critical hardward parts missing and luckily I was able to get those from another loom company. 

 

I modified the loom one more time a few years ago to add a worm gear to the cloth beam and that made it even easier to use. Since 2008 I've woven large-for-me tapestries on it, the largest being about 60" square. 

 

However, in the past five years I’ve had several health issues, including two surgeries, a broken arm, a minor heart attack, and a few other hospital stays for various reasons. Those challenges have made it difficult to weave on my large loom and it took three years to complete the last tapestry, finished just this summer and mentioned in the previous post. 

 

The large loom has sat empty since then. I've worked daily on my tapestry diary on another loom and also have woven a few things on small pipe looms. But the other day I finally accepted the reality that I should find a new home for the big loom. Sometimes it takes me a while to make decisions but once I do, I act fast. That very day I posted announcements on social media, sent a few emails, and, fortunately, a young tapestry weaver saw it mentioned at Instagram. 

She got in touch and, even though it's a great distance from her home, she’s willing to come dismantle and pick it up. I know she’ll take the loom into its next decades of service and I’m grateful. I’m happy for her and for the loom. And, in a way, for myself because I’ll know the fate of the loom (at least for a few years). Yes, it’s just a piece of furniture; a bit of equipment. But, as weavers know, whether it’s a simple frame or one that has treadles and shafts, the conversation between the weaver and the loom is intimate. By deciding to send this one on its way I’ve taken the first step in letting go of things and not leaving it all to others to do in the (I hope, distant) future when I’m gone!

 

Next week I'll be giving books away and I've already passed on beading supplies to the new textiles instructor at the university. I have lots more supplies and equipment at my studio that I know I won't ever use again in my life. Options for my art making aren't getting more narrow but rather are becoming focused on what I have time and energy to be doing.

 

Some news, or rather catching up on things!

 Well, I guess I have once again neglected to keep up with my blog posts! My last one (and ONLY one) this year was way back in January. Lots of things have happened since then. So I'll have a go at catching up.

One thing is that I completed the big tapestry that had been on the loom for a little over three years! I warped the loom in early June of 2022 and finished it in mid-June of 2025. It's now in Asheville for an upcoming exhibit of Southern Highland Craft Guild members at the Folk Art Center. The show, called big/LITTLE will be hanging from August 2025 to January 30, 2026. Here it is lying on the studio floor just after being cut off:

I'll post a finished photo of it sometime in the future. If I remember to do so!

I have other tapestries in exhibits right now, as well. One is in Chicago at Epiphany Center for the Arts in the American Tapestry Alliance Biennial 15. It's one of my tapestry diaries:

 

Another tapestry is in Elkin, NC in an exhibit by Tapestry Weavers South members. It's a smaller piece, one that's of kudzu. 

I continue to be interested in kudzu, in fact, did a large painting of the plant for painting class last semester.

 

 I might use a portion of the painting to design a future tapestry. But I'm not sure about that yet. I've been photographing the plant quite a lot this summer and adding those to the many I already have in an album. 

 

Another tapestry diary was accepted into the Chattahoochee Handweavers Guild upcoming juried exhibit to be held at the Hudgens Center in Duluth, Georgia. I delivered the piece to the Center earlier this week and I hope to see the exhibit when it's installed later this month.

 

The workshop Dana Wildsmith and I were teaching in Dahlonega in March was quite fun and we're looking forward to the longer version we'll be co-teaching in a few weeks at the Folk School. Dana and I met up at the Hambidge Center earleir this week to discuss our plans. While there I dropped off a tapestry I'm donating for the Hambidge auction. It's one done with natural dyes, primarily using black walnut and henna dyes. The design was based on an earth pigment painting I'd done while on a residency at Lillian E. Smith Center a few years ago.  It's called Earth Echoes:

 

 

 

I taught a workshop at the Folk School earlier this year, one with the theme of "marking time"—it was a full class and each person had great ideas about ways to created their own version of recording time and information. It was wonderful to see four people who had been in the Arrowmont class I taught a couple of years ago, as well as have Roxie as assistant again! 

 

Later in the summer I took a writing class at the Folk School. It was an opportunity explore different writing genre throughout the week as Rosemary Royston led us through creative non-fiction, fiction, and poetry for our writing. My two terms as a board member have now ended so I'll be spending less time in Brasstown but I'll be back to the Folk School as an instructor or as a student many time in the future!

 

In late September/early October I'll be teaching a workshop for American Tapestry Alliance, to be held at Arrowmont in Gatlinburg. It will be another version of the theme of marking time and recording data through tapestry.

 

During this year I've had the opportunity to select works for the Handweavers Guild of America "Small Expressions" exhibit. It opened in Blue Ridge, Georgia at the Blue Ridge Arts Association and the opening reception was a few weeks ago. I'll be giving an online juror's talk about the exhibit in January so having a chance to see the work in person several times is great.

 

Earlier this summer I learned that my book Marking Time with Fabric and Thread: Calendars, Diaries, and Journals is now a Kindle option. And yesterday, the first book published by Schiffer became available as a Kindle version. The hard copy of both continues to sell well and now there's an additional option.

 

And one last thing to mention is that I've gotten to see one of the first tapestries I did! It's from 1989. It is in the UNG art collection and hanging in one of the offices in Price Memorial Hall in Dahlonega. I volunteered to clean it and have it framed. So yesterday I gave it a good bath and it's lying in my studio floor on blankets to dry now. I'd dyed the yarn used for the weft and so I thought it would wash just fine—and it did. So nice to see it again and get to refresh it for the next decades to come. Here it is in it's bath and then laid out on some towels. I hope to get a good photo of it once it's framed.