I had the pleasure yesterday to meet up with three lovely colleagues for a little bit of weaving together - working with backstrap loom techniques used by the Maya in Guatemala. 

It was really fascinating for me to see the overlaps and the differences between the other bits of backstrap weaving that I have done. Some things remain the same, some things are done slightly differently, some are very different. I've also managed to do a few of the steps much better than in previous tries - so I was pretty chuffed at the end of the day. 

 I'm especially fond of the super simple way the heddles were made for this variation - they are just loops pulled across the stick, no knots, no nothing, super quick to make. Which was a good thing, because I didn't get the length right the first time around and had to re-heddle, and then there was an error or two so I had to re-do some bits again. And of course there were two errors in the cross (how did they happen, I ask myself, and why did I not catch them?) so I'm planning to do the heddles again next time I sit down with this and return the two stray slackers to the fold. (Also one of the heddles is too long, and despite several tries at adjusting it which is possible in theory, I have been quite unsuccessful.)

So I returned home a very happy lady after that day, and with a few more insights on what is important on a loom type like this, both in regards to the process and the tools. A grand day out indeed!

I'm already looking forward to NESAT - this conference is always a highlight of the three-year-period that NESAT takes place. This time, it will be in Warsaw, Poland. I've been to Poland once already, many years ago, for an excavation, and I have a lot of good memories of these weeks, so it will be really nice to re-visit some of the local delicacies. And, of course, meet with the friends and colleagues from all over Europe.

The conference programme looks quite stuffed with interesting things - you can find it on the website, in case you are interested.

Somehow this post didn't get sent off properly yesterday - so you're getting the black morel photo today: 

These are, apparently, not very common anymore. They are also edible - though I think I prefer looking at them if they are rare, instead of eating them. (Especially not eating them rare.)

These mushrooms are also the first thing that had the rating "selten" (rare, probably, in the English version) in the ObsIdentify app. That is a recent discovery the Most Patient of All Husbands made - it's an app where you can upload images of (wild) plants and animals, and it will compare them to a database and tell you what it is, and with what probability. Observations that are made with surety can then be uploaded. Your uploads help with monitoring where what species are found, and thus for tracking biodiversity. The app will even recognise caterpillars, so it's a really cool help in finding out what critter you have somewhere.

You can find out more about the app here on their website, or search for Obsidentify in your app store thingie of choice. 

Weekend is coming, and I'm very much looking forward to it - there's good weather predicted for tomorrow, so we might go for a bit of a bike ride to make use of that. There would also be garden stuff to take care of, but, well... we'll see.

Otherwise, spinning is progressing. I'm also trying to get all kinds of things sorted out and all ducks in a row as far as possible before going mostly off-line and on a break for all of May, for a number of appointments and things.

Meanwhile, the Little Cat is already channeling the weekend vibes:

That is relaxation proficiency!  

If you're interested in historical weaving, this video by Marta Hoffmann might make you happy. It shows traditional weaving in Norway, recorded back in 1955; the tradition of using these warp-weighted looms there for this kind of fabric goes back into the 1500s at least.

If you're an archaeologist and you are digging somewhere else, or reading about a dig somewhere else, you might also find yourself digging for words in your brain. After all, you might know what a "Brandhorizont" is, but how do you say that in English?

In case you need some help with archaeological terms, you might find it here at the Grabungswörterbuch. There's translations between German and a number of different other languages (of course including English). If you're looking for a slightly larger one for English and German only, available as .pdf, you can find it here.

Just in case you're looking for an excuse to look at a soothing murky green screen... you are helping fish?

There's a boat lock in Utrecht that is closed during spring - but that is the time of year that fish migrate upstream for spawning. The city has found a rather ingenious solution: The Fish Doorbell. You can watch the livestream from a camera in front of the lock, and when you see a fish, you can ring the doorbell for the fish. Once enough fish are waiting, the lock is opened and they can travel on.

You can find the doorbell here (even with an English version for the site). It's just the right thing to watch when you need to look at more or less nothing for a bit. And if you're lucky, you might see a fish!