Back to the Starting Point

I bought Bonnie Inouye's book in preparation for her workshop in Murchison in 2002. Back then, it took me quite a long time to get through each chapter, and in the month or so I had to prepare, I reached either the end of Chapter 3 or a few pages into Chapter 4 and gave up. But what little I had read helped me a great. After the workshop, I started again from Page 1, working through the exercises and weaving samples.

I started on Page 1 again last week, hoping to broaden my horizons and trying to create more interesting drafts based on what Bonnie and Agnes suggested recently. I had always believed that my experiments got as far as Chapter 3, but was surprised to find I had so much fun with Chapter 1 I never got beyond it. I'm finally ready to move on to Chapter 2, though; I made a few plaited tie-up drafts today with the treading I used for the last two pieces (seen here) so I can make samples with the yard or so remaining on the loom.

Immediately after Bonnie's workshop, those of us who attended spoke in terms of pre-Bonnie /post-Bonnie methods/work, but I didn't have much of pre-Bonnie to worry about. So for me, going back to her book and recalling some of the things she showed us is going back to my starting point.