My name is John Mullarkey, and this web site was developed for two reasons:
-to help me keep track of my projects, and gains in experience and methods, and
-to share what I have learned with other weavers.

Please click on a link at left to continue.

3/18/09
I've finally gotten some those projects finished. Unfortunately they are super secret still. One is a gift for a friend, and I don't want to spoil it by showing it off here before I see them in June at the Midwest conference, so you'll have to wait until then.

I finished the felted hat from Handwoven too. That was great fun, but very distracting from my more immediate projects. Ah well, it is the fun ones that get us through the more difficult ones.

I'm still finishing the TWIST band exchange piece. I call it Barbed Wire. It is a rams horn variation. I'll get pics up here when I'm done. If you want a piece of it, make sure to submit your own band to TWIST.

1/19/09
Been a busy holiday season, but unfortunately not in the good weaving way. Most of my projects have stalled for one reason or another. One I just have to get back to, but it is cold, so just like my car in the winter, it is going to take awhile to restart. Another is a rip and redo, and those are never fun. Then there are all of the other bright shiny things that keep distracting me.

Like spending New Year's Eve in Cartagena Colombia, South America. We just got back last week. You can check out those exploits at http://www.mytripjournal.com/mullarkenbergcolombia08.

There was some weaving excitement in Colombia. There is lots of wonderful crochet and knitting. I bought a bag that was crocheted wool with a finger woven band probably used to collect coffee or coca leaves.

I also found tablet woven wrist bands. This is the first time I've seen tablet woven goods in another country, and probably the last place I would have looked for them. They were in a small artisan shop in a small town in central Colombia (Salento). Simple threaded in designs, but very fun, and I like the simple way the ends were finished. Gave me lots of good ideas.

Thanks to the Weavers' Guild South in the Chicago area for letting me spread the gospel of Tablet Weaving to them for a day this past weekend. We had a great class, and a great time. Thanks Gail for the wonderful hospitality too!

10/4/08
Off to SOAR tomorrow, and I can't wait! Reconnect with old spinning friends, make new spinning friends. I'm not bringing a wheel this year because the workshop I am taking is Sharon Costello's felting workshop. We'll see if this is a mistake or not. I imagine I will get much better at spinning with a drop spindle next week.

The Daryl Lancaster workshop was incredibly fun. Tons of work, Dios Mio, I had no idea sewing was that time consuming! We spent three full days, and a couple evenings constructing "Daryl Jackets", and there were still only a couple that actually finished the jacket. What great fun though.

Check out the project notes here

8/20/08
I've been going nuts weaving yardage. I've never woven yardage! The widest thing I had ever woven was 24" dish towels, and I thought that was a long warp at 6 yards. This is 40" wide, and over 10 yards of warp. Okay, that may not sound like much to all of you floor loom weavers, but to a tablet weaver who generally weaves something no wider than 2", this is HUGE.

The yardage is for a workshop on sewing handwovens with Daryl Lancaster. It should really be exciting!

7/9/08
Two weeks of weaving instruction and fun and fellowship! Speaking of fellowship, while I was in Florida I met up with a high school friend I haven't seen in 25 years! We had a blast! I was afraid it might be strange and awkward, but it turned out to be a wonderful experience. It was interesting to see how past shared moments were recalled very differently by us. Memory is a strange thing. But good people are good people whether you see them every day, or only if you see them once every decade.

Convergence and Complex Weavers' were wonderful! Thanks Angela for all of your help on the class materials and at the TWIST meeting. Thanks to everyone who attended the TWIST meeting. We had a very good turnout this conference, and many new members signed up.

The conferences were a success for me as well. I hope those who attended my classes enjoyed them, and found them informative and fun. I know I had a great time teaching, and I am thankful to have met you all, and you taught me a great deal as well. Thanks to all of you who purchased our book. Please send me pictures of bands you've created using the patterns.

I'm going to be busy for awhile putting the next issue of TWIST together and implementing the changes we talked about at the meeting. Hopefully, I'll have time to actually weave some fun stuff. I have to get some yardage woven for Darryl Lancaster's workshop she's doing for our guild. How's this for an idea...a book jacket! I'm going to use the UPC code on the pattern book as the warp striping order for the yardage and then use bands woven with patterns from the book as edging and accents. Stay tuned for the finished jacket! If you like what you see here, and are feeling generous, feel free to donate for the maintenance of this website.

Feel free to email me at Edgarpoe64@hotmail.com

Much of the photography on this site was done by: Studio Menard

Some of the photos are my poor attempts at photography. I know, stick to weaving.