My black walnut piece is just about at the 1/2 way point...maybe I'll get there today. Once I've leveled up the left and right sides and begun the first of the second group of leaves I'll have about another 28 to 30" to go to the top. I'm still trying to finish for the VA exhibit--have to have work there by the 20th of September.

Raymond, our cat, is going to the studio with me on some days. This is a new experience for him and he's found a "safe" place behind a spool rack to hunker down! We're having assorted repair work done at our house and, as he's a house cat only, I'm hesitant to leave him by himself when guys are coming and going in and out of the house. He seems to have adapted all right to this situation after awhile of slinking around the studio checking it all out!

The black walnut tapestry is nearing the 1/3 mark. The right side with the bark texture is the slowest area to weave and I've been able to work away from it, in fact needed to, but it's the next area that needs serious work. I'll tackle it during the upcoming week and maybe get to the point of being above that section of it. There's another part that will come later, in the upper 1/2 of the design and on the left side. But that section is smaller and shouldn't take as long to do. Maybe I'll have figured out how to weave it by that point, as well!

On Saturday night I cut off a small tapestry that's been on my loom since last November--was to be a Christmas gift for my husband but is a belated one. I've used it at various demos since I began it, including taking it back and forth to the Southern Yarns exhibit in Asheville whenever I'd go there for demonstrations. Anyway, I wanted to tie up that loose end (every pun intended!) and so finished it off over the past two weeks.

Last week I took a few pieces to Southwestern Community College in Sylva, NC where I'd been invited to exhibit. The wall for exhibit is in the Balsam Center, apparently a multi-purpose building including student center, offices, and some classrooms. Not an "official" gallery but a nice small wall in the main lobby of the building.

I'm still waiting for yarn to arrive for the larger black walnut tapestry so that's sort of still on a bit of hold. There are some parts I can work on and began to do so yesterday afternoon. But, I'm waiting around a bit this morning before going to the studio hoping that the yarn will be into day's mail--wait, that's the postlady's van! Hooray, the yarn came--so off to the studio to get serious again about the black walnut piece. I hope to finish it by the deadline for the exhibit at the Artisans Center in Virginia that Joan Griffin has arranged--work has to be there by Sept. 20.

AND, I learned on Thursday of last week that I've had a piece accepted into the ACC Spotlight Southeast 07 exhibit that will be held at Arrowmont. The piece is the one of the roots that I finished earlier this year. My friend, Pat Williams, has also had work accepted into the show--two pieces for her! The ACC conference is in early September and I may attend...it's been years since I've gone to an ACC conference but this is close enough and I would also be able to see the exhibit.