Untitled - Weaving Workshop at Idyllwild Summer Arts Camp

Untitled (18 1/2" x 12" - approx. 13 wefts/inch)

This is what happens when you're allowed to choose three colors of yarn and told, "Go weave."

You might plan a design and find that you're not happy with how it looks on the loom, so you take out what you don't like and improvise the rest.

And then later, toward the end, you might ask your son (who is also working on his own weaving right next to you) if you can have a small piece of his red. He agrees, so you add a star to break up the brown.

I wove this piece in a Navajo Weaving Workshop held in Idyllwild, California this past summer which is taught there every summer by Barbara Ornelas and Lynda Pete, two amazing Navajo weaving instructors and insanely talented tapestry weavers.

Weaving this was like taking a relaxing breath. Not knowing initially where the design would take me was freeing for me. Not having anything planned out allowed me only to focus on the rhythm of weaving, the interlocking of joints, the tension of the warp strings, and my handling of the weft.

When I got home, I gave this weaving to my husband. I hope he can steal from it the peace and freedom of creativity that filled its maker while she wove it.