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Episode 140: Exploring Tapestry Weaving with Rebecca Mezoff

On this week's episode, Sarah speaks with Rebecca Mezoff. Rebecca is a contemporary tapestry weaver in Fort Collins, Colorado, and a tapestry weaving teacher, both in person and online. She is an author of books about tapestry weaving, including the recently published book The Art of Tapestry Weaving. She was first a guest on our podcast in 2018 for Episode 11 and since then, Rebecca and Sarah have stayed in touch and Rebecca has been really instrumental in giving feedback throughout the development of our new line of wool tapestry yarn, Array. In this episode, Rebecca shares about an exciting new collaboration with us that is launching today!

Rebecca Mezoff's Website

Rebecca Mezoff's Blog

Rebecca Mezoff's Instagram

Rebecca Mezoff's Youtube

Rebecca Mezoff's Facebook 

Rebecca Mezoff's Online Courses

The Beginner Tapestry Weaving Bundle discussed in the episode, which includes the Mirrix Saffron Loom, Rebecca's new online course Introduction to Tapestry Weaving, and all the yarn you need to weave it, is available for pre-order hereBeginner Tapestry Weaving Bundle

Transcript

Sarah Resnick: I’m Sarah Resnick.

LaChaun Moore: And I’m LaChaun Moore.

Sarah Resnick: And we are the hosts of the Weave Podcast, a project of the weaving yarn shop, Gist Yarn & Fiber.

Sarah Resnick: Welcome to the 140th episode of the Weave Podcast. Sarah here. I haven’t hosted an episode in a long time but have so enjoyed listening to episodes that LaChaun has hosted, and I know all of you have been enjoying them, too. I’m popping back into the host seat today to have a conversation with Rebecca Mezoff about a collaboration we’ve been working on that is many, many months in the making. Today, this episode is releasing on Monday, August 9th, 2021. So, today our brand-new line of wool tapestry yarn, Array, is launching for preorder. Array is a 212 worsted spun wool, which is meant to be used by tapestry weavers in bundles of three or four at 8 epi in a weft-faced tapestry, and it is entirely grown, and spun, and dyed in 70 hues and shades in the USA.

We will be talking a lot more about this yarn and our collaboration with Rebecca in this episode and you can also go take a peek right away by visiting www.gistyarn.com/array. That’s G-I-S-T-Y-A-R-N.com/A-R-R-A-Y.

I am really thrilled to welcome Rebecca Mezoff back onto the podcast today. Rebecca is a contemporary tapestry weaver in Fort Collins, Colorado, and a tapestry weaving teacher, both in person and online, and an author of books about tapestry weaving, including the recently published book The Art of Tapestry Weaving. We first spoke for the podcast in 2018 for episode 11 and since then, Rebecca and I have stayed in touch and Rebecca has been really instrumental in giving feedback throughout the development of our new line of wool tapestry yarn, Array. And we have been collaborating on an exciting project that she’s going to be launching soon and we will talk about later on in this episode. Welcome back to the podcast, Rebecca. It’s so great to have you back on.

Rebecca Mezoff: Thank you so much, Sarah. It’s really fun to be here.

Sarah Resnick: Can you start out by introducing yourself and sharing how you found your way towards fiber, and weaving, and tapestry?

Rebecca Mezoff: Of course. So, I was one of those kids who always did the fiber stuff. My mom did all kinds of fiber things and I learned to sew, and knit, and all those things when I was a kid. And then went away, got a degree in occupational therapy because I thought I could use fiber in my treatment, which I actually did sneak some in here and there, but I really missed the art making and sort of the making piece of the hands-on thing. So, gosh, I was working as a therapist in Reno, Nevada, of all places, and I realized they had this thing called a fiber guild. It was a weaving guild, and I went one day, I was by far the youngest person there, and they taught me to weave. These ladies were amazing. I learned all about weaving fabric and I bought my first floor loom, and I wove all kinds of towels, and other things, and learned a lot about fiber, and then I got interested in double weave.

And I started trying to make pictures with double weave and then something clicked in my brain. I grew up in New Mexico and so I was exposed to Navajo and Rio Grande kinds of image-based weaving as a child also, and something in my brain clicked and said, “Hey, maybe you could make these pictures in tapestry.” So, I actually moved back to New Mexico and did a college course in tapestry weaving, a college program at… I’m not sure it exists anymore. It was at Northern New Mexico College. And that was wonderful, and then I became the apprentice of James Koehler, who was a master tapestry artist in Santa Fe, and I worked with him for several years until he passed away.

And at that point, I started teaching in workshops, and I had so much fun. I really do love teaching. There’s just something about it. I think you’re either a born teacher or you’re not and I just really enjoy seeing lightbulbs go on in people’s heads when they get their hands into the yarn and figure out how things work. So, I started teaching and then I actually had a job that I did not like very much. I really enjoyed a lot of things about being an occupational therapist, but I had a boss who was really difficult for me, and I just was struggling, and I ended up quitting that job, and as I was doing that, I decided to take a few months and make my first online class teaching tapestry. And it went really well.

In fact, it went so well that I never went back to OT. So, that was in 2014, and I’ve been teaching, and weaving, and writing all about tapestry ever since then. So, it’s been sort of… I felt like I sort of accidentally stumbled into it, but it’s been such a fun career the last seven years.

Sarah Resnick: That’s such a great story. When you started building your online course for tapestry weaving, what was it like to try to translate such a physical and tactile experience onto a screen? I think over the last year, we’ve all gotten used to accessing learning through the screen, but it was not as common in 2014.

Rebecca Mezoff: It wasn’t. And I actually didn’t have any… I had some experience with still photography, a little bit, but I had never made a video of anything. And so, I would say a lot of the first stuff was just about learning technology, like figuring out how to run a video camera, and how to use lights, and tripods, and how to edit video, and I did figure all that out. You can learn amazing things on the internet. But translating the teaching into video is different than teaching in person. The one thing that I really miss when I’m teaching online is that immediate feedback. You can stand there in a workshop, if I’m teaching where someone’s right in front of me, I can stand there and watch their hands and sort of figure out how their brain is working, and see something they’re doing, and help them work through it, whereas in an online class, it’s a lot harder because I can’t see what they’re doing.

They’ll send me still photographs, but I’m guessing at what their challenge is. So, I do continue to teach in person because I really love that immediate back and forth. But in terms of the online classes, video is a pretty good way to teach the basic skills of tapestry weaving. So, it can be challenging, because a lot of times the video camera is like between my legs, like pointed at the loom so people can see what I’m doing. It can be really hard to get a really clear shot when your hands are manipulating stuff. But yeah, that’s the difference I think between online and in-person teaching, but there’s definitely a place for both things, I think, in the world.

Sarah Resnick: How have you found your teaching style change over the years and have the kinds of questions that your students have been changing?

Rebecca Mezoff: Yeah. I think I’ve certainly become a better teacher. I’m sure that’s true of everybody who teaches for a long time. But I think at first… I mean, I learned from… James Koehler was an amazing artist, but he was a very… He was also an amazing teacher, but he very much had opinions about how things should work, and I think when I came out of that experience of learning with him so intensely for several years, I really was pretty rigid in how I thought things should be, and I think when I started teaching I pretty much taught a lot the way James did, which was sort of like, “You know, this is really how it works the best and I don’t know why you would do it any other way,” was sort of the attitude.

And I definitely in the last several years have dropped a whole lot of that. I think that there are just so many ways to make beautiful things and I don’t feel like… You know, if you’re making something and you call it tapestry and it’s not officially, doesn’t follow some official definition of tapestry, it does not matter. It is your art. Make it however you want. So, I think I’ve really sort of shifted towards an attitude of, “I’m here to help you. Ask your questions. I will tell you what I know, point you in the direction of whatever it is you want to learn if I don’t know the answer, and let’s just spend time making things,” because it really makes a difference in the world to be involved in creating, I think.

Sarah Resnick: Yeah. Can you say more about the difference in the world that it makes in your own life with your own artistic practice?

Rebecca Mezoff: Yeah. I really… There’s some part of me is whirling around my occupational therapy training and neurology and stuff, because OT is also very much about function, and using your hands, and how your brain works, but there’s definitely… I think anyone who’s a maker, especially in crafts that are maybe a little bit slower… You know, and when we’re making things on the computer, a lot of times I think it’s very quick, and when we are doing things like making fabric, or woodworking, or whatever the craft is, it’s much slower and I think it gives our brains a place to sort of step back a little bit and process more than we get in our normal, super-fast-paced lives. And so, I find that if I don’t take time to… Sometimes if I’m really busy, I’m just knitting silly things. Or sometimes I’m weaving like I call it my tapestry diary. They’re just little pieces that are just for fun.

And those things are just as valuable to me, because it’s a place for me to step back and relax a little bit, and get into that flow state, which is a common thing. There’s a psychologist who wrote a whole book called Flow about getting into this mental state where you just feel like time changes. And I feel like that’s a really healing place for us to be and it’s… As humans, it’s really valuable for us to spend time in that place. And for me, I most frequently access that through tapestry weaving, or walking is another good way to sort of let all the little worries of life sort of fall away.

Sarah Resnick: Yeah. Speaking of walking, you live in Colorado, and I know you spend a lot of time hiking, and backpacking, and that you’re about to embark on a long trip?

Rebecca Mezoff: Yep.

Sarah Resnick: And I’m curious if you bring your weaving with you and if you have advice for other people who want to bring their weaving with them on long trips?

Rebecca Mezoff: I do. I love taking looms with me when I travel, and I travel a lot when I’m teaching in person. Obviously, not during COVID. I haven’t taught in person for over a year now. But I’m talking about if I go camping, or on a road trip, or go to visit family, or go hiking, I definitely bring a smaller loom that I can easily bring in the car, or if I’m backpacking, I have a little tiny loom that was made by Jim Hokett, who no longer… He’s no longer in business but there are other people who make small looms like that, and I put it in my backpack and bring some little bits of yarn wrapped on cards, and I weave at night in the tent, or under a tree during the day, and I really enjoy translating the colors and the feelings of those kind of trips into weaving right in the moment. I think it’s different than trying to come home and remember how it felt to be out there and weaving it when you get home. So, I think it’s a really great practice, to be able to bring your artwork or craft along with you when you’re traveling.

Sarah Resnick: Do you find that your pieces are pretty different? The ones that you weave outside versus inside in your studio?

Rebecca Mezoff: Yeah. At least to me, they seem different. I feel like the ones I’m weaving outside are more spontaneous, and I really am not worrying at all about necessarily the finished outcome, but I often like them better. I don’t know what it is about it, but I’m not so attached to the outcome. I’m just weaving for fun. I often also bring a drop spindle, a little tiny Turkish spindle, and some fleece with me, so I actually will spin yarn and I hand dye little bits of fleece, and then I sort of cart it together on the trail and then spin it, and so I can make this yarn that kind of changes colors as I go, and sort of pick the colors from the environment and then weave them in a really simple way on the trail. So, that’s fun, and that really has a lot to do with what I’m feeling and seeing around me.

I don’t always have the colors that I want in my kit, but that’s okay. It doesn’t matter. So, yeah, I think more often when I’m in my studio, I’m sort of embroiled in whatever my work is, or I’m making a course, or there’s a lot of computer time, and I’m a little more… I’m less flexible and open to new ideas than I am when I’m away from my studio.

Sarah Resnick: Yeah. That sounds like such a beautiful practice, spinning special colors to match the trail and working outside.

Rebecca Mezoff: Yeah. Yeah, it’s fun.

Sarah Resnick: Yeah. So, you published a book last year and anybody who hasn’t seen it yet definitely should. It’s such a comprehensive resource. It’s called The Art of Tapestry Weaving and it’s filled with photographs and descriptions to help people learn tapestry weaving basically from nothing. I’m a beginner tapestry weaver and I have found this book really helpful, and I am curious why you decided to write this book and what the process of writing it and photographing it was like?

Rebecca Mezoff: Well, this was one of those moments where I actually had several different people push… I shouldn’t say push, but a couple… It hadn’t occurred to me, actually, to write a book. It was sort of one of those, sort of like teaching, it was one of those things where I thought, “Well, someday I’ll write a book, but not right now. I’m busy.” And a couple people, Jillian Moreno was one, she’s a spinner who wrote a beautiful book called Yarnitecture a few years before my book came out, and then Jane Patrick, who is one of the owners of Schacht Spindle Company, which is right down the road from me, so occasionally I run into Jane, and we chat about things. And both of those people in short succession said, “You need to write a book and here’s the name of my editor,” and it was the same person, the editor.

So, I was like, “That might be a sign.” So, I contacted Story Publishing and just thinking, “Well, you know, I don’t know. I’m just gonna send them a little proposal and we’ll see what happens.” Well, it turns out they were super interested mostly because there really hasn’t been a… The book is a basic tapestry techniques book, so it’s intended for people who are brand new to tapestry weaving and there hadn’t been a book like this that was a fairly meaty book since I think like 2000 was the last one, and those books were sort of reprints of earlier books. So, there really needed to be an updated tapestry techniques book, because the way we learn sort of changes. I think with the advent of the internet, we think more in terms of pictures and short steps instead of these older books are much more narrative in terms of how they describe how to do things.

So, as a teacher, it was an interesting project for me to bring this material forward in a way that fits more with the way I think people learn, at least people who use the internet a lot learn, and just to make it simple and clear of the steps of how you do this thing. I did think when I started that I would just translate my online classes. You know, I would just take the handouts and rewrite a few things and I would have a book. That turned out to be complete folly. It was a huge amount of work. It’s over 300 pages and it was a couple solid years of writing, and editing, and a photoshoot that was more than two weeks long, but I had an amazing editor and team at Story, and I just think they did a fantastic job helping me turn all of these teaching ideas into something that’s really usable.

So, I was really thrilled with the outcome and can’t thank all my friends and my Story people enough for making that book happen.

Sarah Resnick: Yeah. It’s really just such a beautiful and comprehensive resource. I think one of my favorite parts is that it really marries beginner clear instructions with tons of photos of tapestries.

Rebecca Mezoff: Yes, yes, yes.

Sarah Resnick: From so many different designers. And it really just gives you a taste of what the experts can achieve with this medium and the wide variety of ways that people are interpreting this art form. And I love how you pull those together, often on the same pages and in the same chapters.

Rebecca Mezoff: Yeah. Thank you. It was important to me. Actually, that’s one of the things I’ve really loved about… Nancy Harvey and Carol Russell wrote those two older books that have always been great resources for me, and both of them use examples of tapestries, of professional weavers or whatnot, and it was important for me to show, “Here’s how you get started, but also this is what is possible.” I just wanted people to understand what tapestry actually is, because we sort of think of this as this old thing from the Middle Ages that was in Europe and stuff, and tapestry is so much more than that.

Sarah Resnick: Yeah. What kind of yarn and weaving equipment and looms do you recommend that beginner tapestry weavers start with?

Rebecca Mezoff: Great question. In the book, I tried to sort of simplify all the options. In terms of equipment, there are so many different things you can use. A loom, of course, is just a piece of equipment that holds warps tight, and then you weave across them. It doesn’t matter what kind of weaving you’re doing, that’s all a loom does. And so, with tapestry, we’re just doing plain weave. It’s just over, under, over, under. And the warp is spaced a little bit wider so that the weft completely covers the warp. And so, you can do it on a very simple loom. You can make it more complicated. As the tapestries get larger, I think it benefits you to have a loom that might be a little bit more complicated, like you might have a shedding device, or you might have treadles that you use to shift the shed.

But there’s certainly plenty of amazing tapestry weavers who just use big pieces of pipe to weave on. So, in terms of beginning tapestry weavers, I think starting with a small loom is great because you don’t want to be overwhelmed at the beginning and there are lots of different looms you could use. Mirrix Looms is one company that makes some really great… they’re basically fancy pipe looms. They’re looms made out of metal that have a tensioning device and they hold the warp nice and tight, and they also have a shedding device, most of them, so that you can weave against it. They recently came out with a small loom that has little pegs on it called the Saffron Loom that also has tensioning, which is a really fun thing to start with.

And there are lots of other companies who make simple peg looms. You could even start with a picture frame. You know, a sturdy square piece of wood, and then you warp it, and you can weave on that. So, there’s a wide variety, but any sturdy piece of equipment that’s made for weaving will probably work for tapestry.

There’s various other small tools. You’ll need a tapestry fork and various needles, or bobbins, or other things like that. There’s a wide variety you can use. And it’s not that important which ones you use, just that you use something that works for you. And then for yarn, I recommend not using knitting yarn actually is my first thing. Those of us who are yarn people love our yarn stashes, but if we’re knitters, it’s often full of super bouncy, fluffy yarn, because that’s what you want when you knit a sweater or something. You want it to be stretchy so that it stays, it keeps its shape. Those yarns are pretty bad for tapestry because the yarn wants to pull back on itself and then as you’re weaving your tapestry, it’s hard to manage it in a way that works for the medium.

So, a tapestry yarn is usually not as soft and doesn’t have as much air in it, and beyond that, there’s a lot of weaving yarns that work well for tapestry. For brand new beginners, one yarn I talk about a lot is made by Harrisville Designs, which is a company in Harrisville, New Hampshire, that… They have a small mill, and it’s quite a wonderful place, and they make a yarn called Harrisville Highland. It’s used a lot for weaving blankets and such and it’s a fairly good tapestry yarn to start with.

There’s a couple others. There’s some Swedish yarns that are lovely, and a Norwegian yarn I really like, and then I hear rumor that there’s a new yarn coming from you, Sarah.

Sarah Resnick: Yes.

Rebecca Mezoff: Gist Yarn has been working on this new tapestry yarn, which I thank you so much for letting me preview this yarn. It is a beautiful yarn. I’m really excited about it. So, I think it’s gonna be a really excellent addition to the tapestry yarns available. And it’s going to be… Because it’s made in the USA, it’s just a really special thing for those of us who live here.

Sarah Resnick: Yeah. Yeah. I so appreciated your advice as we’ve gone through the development process and your suggestions as we’ve been refining this yarn. We’re really excited about it. It’s a 212 wool, worsted spun, and it’s grown out West, and it’s spun and dyed in North Carolina, and it’s gonna be in a lot of colors. It’s a first for our company.

Rebecca Mezoff: Yay!

Sarah Resnick: The largest line we have currently or before this has 16 colors, but we are launching with 72, and it’s gonna be in 18 hues and then in shades. Each of those hues has shades so that people can weave gradations. Yeah. We’re just really excited about it and we’re excited to see what the tapestry weaving community thinks of it. And we’re excited that we’re able to make it all locally to us.

Rebecca Mezoff: I think one of the things I… You mentioned the shades, and this is one of the things that I just appreciate about this yarn so much. The other yarns I mentioned don’t come in shades, so what you’re talking about there is that you have like… Say I have a red violet. That’s a particular color. But then I have a very light version of it, and maybe four or five different shades from light to dark, so that’s what tapestry weavers love because we can shift the colors that way and make images that look very different than if we only have one green, and one blue, and one red. And the other yarns I mentioned actually don’t come in those kinds of shades. Actually, there’s very few yarns for tapestry that do. Most of them are embroidery yarns and then there’s one outstanding yarn in the UK and one in Australia. And other than that, there aren’t a lot of yarns that come in all those shades.

So, this is the exciting thing for tapestry weavers, is that we’re gonna have access to this new yarn that comes in colors that we can really use to make our images. So, thank you for doing it.

Sarah Resnick: Yeah. You know, when we started thinking about the colors and I thought, “Okay, we’re gonna start with 72,” that just seems like so many. That’ll be everything compared to the number of colors that we’ve launched with so far. And then when we actually get down to it and pick the hues and then the shades, I just end up thinking, “Wow, these are beautiful, and we could do so many more.”

Rebecca Mezoff: Yes.

Sarah Resnick: It’s just an amazing thing about color that I think is such a special thing as artists, that we get to remember, is the really infinite number of colors that are out there.

Rebecca Mezoff: It is so true. Yes. And that’s why a lot of tapestry weavers end up using embroidery yarns, because they also come… There’s a couple that come in lots, like 400 colors. I’m not saying you have to go to 400 colors right off the bat. 72 is a good number to start with.

Sarah Resnick: We will see how much it sells. What we’re planning to tell people is if we can sell enough of this yarn, we will keep making more colors. We will see how it goes.

Rebecca Mezoff: Good. Okay, well, that’s a goal then. We will keep buying it because you always need the next new color.

Sarah Resnick: Yes, indeed. So, we are really excited to be collaborating with you on a new intro course that you are creating for beginner tapestry weavers and that you’re using Array, our new yarn with, so can you talk about this new course and who it’s meant for?

Rebecca Mezoff: Yes. Absolutely. So, I have my very first course, that one way back in 2014, where I never went back to my OT job, the course that I was making was called Warp and Weft: Learning the Structure of Tapestry, and that is still my sort of signature class. It’s a beginning tapestry class. It’s a big class. It has a lot of content. And over the years, I’ve had so many people take the class and have gotten some great feedback on it, but there’s a subset of people who it’s too much. When you think about, “I don’t know if I really want… if I’m gonna like tapestry weaving. I don’t want to jump into this class that’s gonna take me three months, or six months, or a year to work through. Can I get a simpler start?”

So, I did do another class called Weaving Tapestry on Little Looms, but that’s sort of focused on how to make different… how the different looms work, and how to do different headers, and some other… a different focus than what I was looking for in terms of let’s have a really simple intro and help people figure out whether they like this or not and whether they… what tools and materials and stuff will work the best for them.

So, this class is just simply called Introduction to Tapestry Weaving, and it’s meant as sort of your first dive in. And then if you love it, you can take another class, or read a book, or there’s lots of other people who teach in person, and so this particular class, I teach it on peg looms. Most of the demonstrations are done on that Mirrix Saffron loom that I was mentioning. I like that little loom because it comes apart into three pieces and I can stick it in a bag and take it on a camping trip or something. But it also has tensioning, so it’s a really nice little travel loom. It’s also a great starter loom.

And I also show a couple other peg looms in that class, so if that’s… if you have a different loom, you’re welcome to use something else. And then it was a great opportunity to practice with your new yarn, Array, so the class focuses on using five colors. You can use as many colors as you want, of course. I’m sure you won’t mind if people buy as many colors as they want of those 72. But I wanted people to be able to start with just a small selection of colors, and we learn… I sort of introduce you to what tapestry weaving is in a simple way, and what the few… There’s really only a few foundational things you really have to know for tapestry, and after that you learn a lot by practicing.

So, we go through a few of those introductory ideas and then there’s probably three or four basic sort of techniques that I teach in four different projects, and then show you a little bit about how to do some finishing, and it’s a fun class, and at the end of it if you did the whole class, you’d have four little tapestries and a good deal of practice with the Array yarn if you wanted to use that, or you could use any other yarn you wanted to. But I recommend trying this new yarn. I think it’s just gorgeous. It has a beautiful sheen to it. It’s just a tiny bit shiny and it really looks beautiful as it’s packed into the tapestry.

Sarah Resnick: Yeah, so when this podcast is live, Array will have been launched for preorder and we will also be selling a bundle of five tubes of Array with a Saffron loom and this course from Rebecca. So, this is a really great opportunity for people who have been curious about tapestry weaving but didn’t know how to start to have the learning, the loom, and the yarn to get going, so we really hope that some of you will come join us.

Rebecca Mezoff: It would be so great to expand the world of tapestry, so yes, that will be fun. And actually, the kit is a great way to go too, just because you’ll get all of sort of the basics that you need, and the only thing beyond that you’ll need is a couple yarn needles and a few other minor tools you probably already have at home, so… Yeah.

Sarah Resnick: Yes, indeed. So, where can people go to learn more about you, and your work, and your online courses?

Rebecca Mezoff: I have a website. That’s probably the first place to go. It’s just go to tapestryweaving.com. And then there’s a tab for online learning and there’s a list of all the classes. I also have a blog that I’ve been writing for… Oh, gosh. I think I started in 2008, so it’s been 13 years now. And there’s a lot on there, but there’s also a category list, so if you’re looking for the posts about yarn, or the posts about looms or something, go over to the blog and click on that category list and you’ll find a lot of information about how to decide what you want and how to get started and that kind of thing.

I also have a YouTube channel with lots of free videos, which are a great supplement to the courses or this package, the kit that we’re going to be doing with the Array yarn. I’m on Instagram, @RebeccaMezoffTapestry. I’m also on Facebook, Rebecca Mezoff Tapestry Studio. And any of those places is great. I’d love to see any or all of you popping up and post pictures of what you’re weaving on those social media sites.

Sarah Resnick: And we will also include links to everything you mentioned in the show notes to this episode. I’m wondering before we end if you have any closing advice or words of wisdom for weavers?

Rebecca Mezoff: Oh, yes. I definitely would say now, today, I don’t know what I would have said seven years ago, but today I will say that first of all, weaving in general is such a joyful activity. And I would say to embrace a spirit of experimentation. I find that often when I start a new thing, I get very antsy about making it perfect, or trying to match an image in my head I have about something that I’ve never done before, and it’s far more fun if you can just let go all of that and learn to explore, and experiment, and see what happens, and have fun, and I think it’s actually the way we as adults need to go back to playing. So, pretend that you are a child or rope in a child to teach you and go back and practice and play with it. And it’s a really great addition to any life, I think.

Sarah Resnick: That is beautiful advice. Thank you, Rebecca, for being on the podcast, and for collaborating with us on these projects, and I’m so glad to have you on.

Rebecca Mezoff: Thank you, Sarah. You’re so welcome and I’m just so excited about all of the new trends in tapestry weaving and let’s all go and play together.

Sarah Resnick: That’s a wrap. To see photos of Rebecca’s work, links to her website and courses, and to check out and purchase our beginner tapestry bundle that includes the Saffron loom from Mirrix, Rebecca’s new course, and all the yarn you need to complete it, you can visit www.gistyarn.com/episode-140. That’s G-I-S-T-Y-A-R-N.com/episode-140. You can also learn more about our tapestry yarn and support our preorder while getting a special discount by visiting www.gistyarn.com/array. That’s A-R-R-A-Y. Thank you for listening and we will be in your earbuds again soon. And until next time, happy weaving!


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