Since 2017, we’ve kept a Sievers calendar close by, writing in the names of students and teachers who we haven’t seen for some time that happen to stop in for a visit. Generally, we have several entries each week and during July and August, it can be several each day. We love re-connecting in this way and keeping this record has been so much fun, we wish we would have thought of it years earlier! Just a couple weeks ago, a former student stopped in while biking on the Island. She’d taken one class here in 1987, spinning with Franie Philps. Since our first year, Sievers has offered spinning and Franie was the instructor from 1982-1999. For one of her […]
Wonderfully woolly
A class specifically to study the wool of different sheep breeds and their characteristics as they apply to spinning (and more) made for a wonderful woolly week. As always, instructor Deb Jones brought a wide variety of wools and other fibers for use in class. Some of the spikiest of tools are used for carding, combing and blending the softest of wools. Putting the fibers to work, the spinners had their wheels in motion, interspersed occasionally with faraway looks, contemplating which blends to combine next. Swooning over all the wools and yarns from class! Cindy R. shared her “Sievers Story” with us: “What a wonderful experience. The bunk house was fun and the class was out of this world. Deb […]
Taking the plunge
It is an Island tradition for some to run down the rocks from the top of Schoolhouse Beach and dive into the clear, cold water. You can imagine how invigorating and refreshing that would be. This year, Sievers “took the plunge” on a new class, Rigid Heddle Weaving. We wonder now why we waited so long. When Deb Jones offered this class for our 2019 season, we knew immediately that it was the right time with the right instructor. Like Schoolhouse Beach, this new class was invigorating and refreshing! Everyone started with a simple scarf. Learning to warp the loom and seeing their scarves take shape on the loom happened in only a couple of hours. The scarves on the […]
Be All You Can Be
Attention!! The recruits in Deb Jones’ Spinner’s Boot Camp grant permission for you to inspect their field of operations (aka the Walter Studio). Deb brings so much for the students to experiment with, from wheels to blending and carding tools to an amazing array of fleece. It certainly allowed them to be all they can be! In this class, the boot camp atmosphere began with each student receiving a fatigue hat to form a spinning squad. Daily training in techniques and challenges were part of the week’s wooly “obstacle course”. To become a more intentional spinner along with instilling more skills and confidence were the goals of these training exercises. At the end of the first day, the comments were, “I’ve learned so much already”. […]
Straw into gold
Well, maybe not technically spinning straw into gold, but the students in Deb Jones’ Beginning Spinning and Rainbow Dyeing class took simple wool fibers and turned them into something equally precious to a beginning spinner, their own handspun and hand-dyed yarns. By the end of the first afternoon, these beginners were spinners! You can see more photos from the class as Deb has posted them on The Fiber Garden Facebook page. Her next stop, along with other Sievers teachers (Nancy Frantz and Mary Germain), students and friends is the Wisconsin Sheep & Wool Festival from September 7-10. Spinning is one of the classes that’s been offered at Sievers each year since the start. One of those first classes in 1979 is shown in the black and white photo. Dyeing was added later, using […]
Happiness is…
…a colorful quilt. ….being inspired by nature. …warm woolens. …wildlife in the backyard. …watching clouds and sunsets (especially the ones on Washington Island). As promised last time, the Open Quilt Studio “challenge quilt” border fabrics were on before class was over. Everyone likes…a colorful quilt. In Susan Hoffmann’s Landscape ‘Painting’ with Fabric class, students worked with the same set of fabrics. Although they all started with the same theme, there were as many variations as students, each person creating a unique woodland scene and …being inspired by nature. The Spinning Art Yarns class taught by Deb Jones used a variety of fibers and combined them into special and fanciful yarns by using the drum carders, picker, spinning wheels and plying in order to have some one-of-a-kind…warm […]
Through July
It’s hard to believe we are approaching the half-way mark of our classes, but we’ve found ourselves there. Bringing us through the end of July were three classes which overlapped a day or two on each end, Lynn Schuster’s Boundweave Rug Weaving, Deb Jones’ Spinner’s Color Workshop and Susan Hoffmann’s Landscape ‘Painting’ with Fabric. We started with Boundweave Rugs and the gorgeous wools and colorful designs created by each of the students. One person was able to finish two rugs in class…a first in our recollection. (Some late hours were definitely involved. We wondered if she wove after the 2 a.m. timer on the outdoor lights went off. As some weavers know, that would not be a first!) While […]
Spinning and weaving, as promised
Dyed fibers and yarns from past years came back to visit the spinners during Spinners’ Retreat (or perhaps more aptly named Spinners’ Advance!) class with Deb Jones. The drum carders were put to good use as were the wheels during this 5-day class. We’re looking forward to Deb’s next class, “Dyeing to Knit”, August 21-24, where students will dye yarns that create “Fair Isle” and striping patterns when knit. The weavers, with instructor Nancy Adams and assistant Susan Johnson, wove not only their projects on the looms, but themselves together as a group during the week. We will also see Nancy Adams again when she returns to teach “Beyond Beginning: Weaving” from September […]
