Last summer was a dragonfly summer. Countless dragonflies zipped and zoomed in glorious flashes of color and startling aerial acrobatics.
It was fabulous!
What wasn’t fabulous was the reason for their huge population upsurge: A vicious swarming plague of mosquitoes. UGH!
Ah well… here we are in deep mid winter, and now it’s just the memories of the dragonflies that are a pleasure, without the nasties of the mozzies.
I celebrated my love of dragonflies by weaving a shawl on the 7 foot configuration of the Dewberry Ridge triangle loom (LINK)
triangle-loom-dragonfly-shawl-copyright Noreen Crone-Findlay
I wove it with handspun wool that has shots of silk and angelina in it.
I also included rows of eyelash yarn every 28 nails, which gave me the perfect grid for embroidering the dragonflies.
triangle-loom-dragonfly-shawl-copyright Noreen Crone-Findlay
I embroidered the dragonflies onto the shawl while it was still stretched on the loom- the loom is the perfect embroidery hoop!
It is definitely a one of a kind, as all the combination of elements that came together to make it just won’t happen again.
triangle-loom-dragonfly-shawl-copyright Noreen Crone-Findlay
When I was doing the embroidery, I turned the loom every which way to make it easier to get to each square.
The dragonflies are embroidered with silk that I spun on my support spindle.
triangle-loom-dragonfly-shawl-copyright Noreen Crone-Findlay
I didn’t use a pattern or drawing to embroider the dragonflies.
Pardon the pun, but I just ‘winged’ it. :p
triangle-loom-dragonfly-shawl-copyright Noreen Crone-Findlay
People stop me to admire the shawl when I wear it. It gives me an opportunity to talk about weaving, spinning and embroidery (and spool knitting, too!)
triangle-loom-dragonfly-shawl-copyright Noreen Crone-Findlay
I don’t like fringes on shawls- so I spool knitted a looooooooooooooooong cord, and stitched it onto the shawl while it was still on the loom.
That was wonderfully easy! I held the spool knitted cord up against the outside of the nails, and ‘v’ (baseball stitch) it to the shawl.
This video shows how to stitch cord to a finished woven edge:
VIDEO Happy dragonflies! Happy triangles! Happy everything…. 😀
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