New Stuff

  I am just starting out on my contract on my smaller loom. The first few inches are always unstable until I can all the parts of the loom that control the tension to cooperate. I took off the rotary temples as they seem to be unnecessary with this warp. So far so good. Half lf of this warp will be woven with a navy blue weft and half with a lighter blue. I think it will be very pretty.

  I am also thinking about my next project for the big loom. The stash of the wonderful 2/26s wool is calling me. Since this photo was taken I bought more of the pinks. Some of the colors are hardly different from the others but I know after years of weaving that subtle color variation makes the warp sing. It is an argument for hand dyeing your yarn but I don't have the time or space.

Now to Thread It

   My warp is on the beam now. I still have the thread each heddle and sley the reed. I have yet to measure and wind the tiny section of selvedge threads but I can wait on that. For now I want to push my loom back to where it should be and restore some order to that part of the house.

New Warp, Onward!

   I am rapidly getting to the end of my warp on the big loom. I like to weave early in the morning. I am an early riser so firing up the Compudobby at 5:30 is the time I do my best work. I have about 1.5 yards to go. I see the leaders that tie the end of the warp to the beam coming into view.
    I got "videoed" at the Weaver's Barn in Vista showing my method of warping a sectional beam using a warping board or mill. I have to be refilmed for certain parts because I was having trouble securing some equipment to the LeClerc loom I was using. My goal is to show a weaver that has a sectional beam that a nice wap is possible without a spool rack and tension box. Unfortunately there are many different looms with various back supports etc. It makes it hard to work for everyone.
     Meanwhile, for my next contract, I am putting on 19 yards of the Bockens 8/2s unmercerized cotton. I was asked to do a gradient and my boss sent me a colored pencil sketch. I followed her concept as best I could. I was a little amazed and thankful not to run out if yarn as I was making warp sections. My math skills are basic. I rely on calculations from various programs I have and add the fudge factor. My boss then orders the yarn. Whew! I kind of just made it. I need bits of each color to repair knots. This warp is beautiful. I do like the brillance of the colors and I will give Bockens the credit for that.

Coming to the End of the Warp

    Not much left on this warp. I believe I have enough to do another ring sling 2.5 meters. My brain bounces between yards and meters but I am beginning to think in meters and it is so much easier. I cut off a measuring tape to make it a meter long and travel along with it. This is the same twill pattern but no blocks and I do like the delineated stripes, forest green cotton weft,

Colors and Designs

I finished and removed one wrap from my loom. It came out very nice. Tomorrow I will have it "tested" at a Babywrap "Meetup" and then maybe I can learn to use it too. It has been hot here and the idea of wrapping anything other than a bag of ice makes no sense. I also have a length of sling material woven but I can't cut if off the loom until enough of the 2nd wrap is woven.

The Middle Marker

  Babywraps have "middle markers" to help momma find the middle of her wrap before she wraps herself and her niño in yards of cloth. Some are "tactile" so maybe you could find the middle and wrap yourself on a moonless night but I'm not sure about that. So there are various popular styles. Sometimes a "blessing thread" is needlewoven at the middle marker spot. It's just me but I think they don't look nice after a few washings. Whatever.
  So right now I have my own wrap(s) for myself anf family going on my big loom with the computer. I am almost done with 5 meters. I switched to metric, easier. My weaving pattern changed as I approached the middle. You could feel the "change"' maybe,  and you can sort of see it. I could have made it more remarkable with a very definite block change or even weft. Middle markers that are permanent including the needlewoven "blessing thread" variety are problematic if momma wants to chop the length of the wrap. You either forget about the middle or hack off the ends. Interesting if you have paid $500+ for a handwoven babywrap.

More Yarn has Arrived

I decided to weave some babywraps for myself on my big loom. I want to try out some of my ideas for a babywrap, different weave structures, from what I have seen. I bought 3+ lbs of unmercerized cotton, two similar shades of blue, for $8.00. from a weaving guild member. These are high quality yarns better than what I have bought recently. Yep, the U.S. had quite a cotton spinning industry. All gone mostly, sad. Without being jingoistic, we knew how to do it. This was not enough to finish my warp so I ordered 15 lbs of unmercerized cotton. It was spun in Brazil.

Fini

        10.5 meters of cloth are flying their way to Arizona to be washed, dried, hemmed, and done-to-whatever to be made into babywraps. I burled my cloth looking for misspicks and any other weaving mess ups that are better fixed before the cloth is processed. I looked everywhere and especially at the selvedges but ... I could not find anything to fix. When I weave and I see something impossible to fix on the loom I will mark it with a small piece of painter's tape. I did not have to do this with this cloth. It is a bit arrogant to say I wove some perfect cloth and yet I can't find any mistakes. A bit scary.  My hope is that some mama somewhere will hold her "squish" (babywrap lingo) close, tight, and happy in the cloth I made and put so much energy into.

Subtle

   This warp is weaving very well. I am only working with two colors of the Bockens cotton, an unbleached natural and a bleached white. You can barely see any stripes or my attempt at a gradient. I had to carefully calculate the amount of each of these colors that I have. I needed to use up all of the bleached white because my weft is all the unbleached. Math is not my strong point and I have made some amazing errors. I was left,  after measuring the warp, with only a few yards of the bleached white. This is good. I need something if I have to do a warp repair.
   I still can't get close to the ppi desisired by my boss. This is a very different yarn. I need to look at it closely with my magnifying glasses and compare it to other 8/2s cottons. Maybe if the sett was lower I could pack in more weft? Really?  ... I should put on a more narrow sample and switch up the reeds, change the weave structure, wet finish it myself. We shall see. Meanwhile at my "guild" I bought two large cones of 8/2s unmercerized cotton of dubious origin that will make splendid babywraps for myself.

Getting There

      I am threading the next batch of the Bockens cotton. I have my 13 dent reed and have moved the warp onto the 2" sectional beam and I have a selvedge running on the 2nd beam. The warp looks nice on the beam. There are still some mysterious technical issues like the finished weight of the last warp.
        Apparently it weighed almost half of the usual tabby warp but those warps were woven with a different cotton according to my client. I still think the Bockens is quite lively and it seems to throw more lint than the WEBs 8/2s unmercerized which is the only cotton I can compare it to. I cannot seem to beat down the weft as much as I should for the specification I given. I feel a lot of resistence in the warp. The 2nd half of my last warp was perfectly woven but it did seem kind of airy. I didn't do the wet finishing so I am  relying on the person I am working for to take the weight measurement. It is difficult when you don't control the whole process but in previous contracts I just burl the cloth and returned the "grey goods" to my client.

What are we learning?

So I have been weaving for 30 years, not all the time, but enough time to know a few things. It is always humbling to realize we don't know all that much. So after horrible struggles with this warp, awful selvedges, looping weft, my problems have vanished! What was the problem? ¡The reed! Looms hate uneven numbers and the wonky reed arrangement for 26 epi in an 8 dent reed, 3-3-3-4, was fatal. The yarn stuck together, funky shed, impossible selvedges. I now have a 13 dent reed, 2X in a dent, no problema! I didn't need the rotary temples, all is calm, weaving fast, misspicks gone.
Right side selvedge,

Previous nastiness,

Between Looms

I finished up my tunic yardage on the big loom. I really need to take better notes and make myself do it. I think I put on 15 yards but I have no idea. I got a lot of cloth out of this warp! So far it is washed and dried but not cut apart and then I will know how many tunics I can really make. Next is to measure warp for the belts. My plan is to weave two belt lengths and then sew then together top stitched so I avoid the turning them inside out. The chenille is just too thick and the turning and snaking the belt inside out is very tricky with the seam. I can wind a two inch section, make two lengths and then I will only have the tabs to sew shut. That is the plan for now.

Meanwhile the new reed has arrived so I am reeding the babywrap warp,

Back in the Saddle

My new reed is supposed to be here today and I will forge ahead with what is left on the small loom. I put the selvedges on my 2nd beam so the selvedges can roll off independently tensioned. Hopefully that will fix a few problems with how the selvedges look.

Meanwhile I am back at the big loom and don't have that much to go on the warp. Always the choice of weft color, the weave structure and how the chenille (with the pile it has) changes the look of the cloth,

This has Not been Fun

Hmm ... 30 years of weaving experience and still surprises. I cannot say this babywrap warp is the best I have ever experienced. I am having problems with it. It is turning into a 12 yard sample but I think I know what is wrong. I am using Bockens unmercerized cotton. It is a beautiful yarn and I think it will make a sumptuously comfortable wrap. However the "liveliness" is a lot of the problem. It is not as smooth as other unmercerized cottons I have used. Very few knots which is good. I followed the specifications for the person I am working for. She wants a sett of 26 epi. That means I really need a 13 dent reed, two warp threads in a dent. So it is now sett in an 8 dent reed, 3-3-3-4. The yarn is too close and the shed sticks. So that means increasing the warp tension. Not good! Then the yarn catches on a thread and makes tiny tiny loops that are really hard to see until I have woven another few inches. The yarn sticks on the selvedges. One in particular is nasty even with the rotary temples. The weaving is SLOW! So now I have a lot of burling or repair work to do. I took 5 meters of the woven cloth off of the loom. The 13 dent reed should be here soon. I will use my 2nd beam to tension the selvedge threads.

Double Action: Let the Games Begin!

  I now have "DA", "Double Action", two projects going at the same time. For a summer I worked at Harrah's in South Lake Tahoe as a keno writer. Stupid game, worst odds in the house. I could write fast and set up a lot of customers before each game began so I got a "promotion" to "Double Action" games, two games going off at the same time. I can't be weaving at both looms at the same time but now both have warps.
 I have 12+ yards on my 40" AVL FDL and because of the unusual specifications for this commission I decided to put the warp on the plain beam with heads. The heads support the edges of the warp. Before I had sectional beams this was the only warping method I used. The warp is 8/2's Bockens unmercerized cotton. It is a beautiful yarn. It looks all white but it is not. Every other thread is off-white and the effect makes the warp shimmer. I will weave it with one yarn color as tabby.

Starting Again

   I got my 14 yds of warp on the beam and threaded. I have about 3 yds woven. A beautiful reddish-brown chenille looks surprisingly nice on this warp. I used the Compudobby to change the lift plan to get some variety.  I wove about 16" of blue chenille which might be tunic side panels. I tried out the flyshuttle and I don't like how it is working. Looms like things to be level and balanced. The bubblelevel is your friend. So the beater was a bit off  but something else is wrong. Flying shutttles are supposed to fly but they don't. Handthrowing is faster for me so I am not sure it a matter of practice or my pirns aren't filled correctly, or ... or.
   Anyway for now whether the flyshuttle works a or not is the least of my problems. My "experiment" to put a raddle cross of five ends at each end the warp and forget the threading cross was a mistake. I thought I could save some time. Hah! I followed the color order but I have way too many twists. Moving a lease stick back every 20" of warp and moving the twists back behind the lease stick is more than silly so ... we are taping the 2" sections of warp and picking the threading order from how it is on the beam.  I won't make that mistake again but I am sure to make plenty more!

Yoga and Weaving Ebook

  I am in the process of designing this Ebook that is part of the requirements to complete my yoga teacher training at Yoga Oceanside. We were asked to complete 5 hours of "karmic yoga". It was up to the student as to what would satisfy this requirement. Most students choose to teach five hours worth of free classes. I decided that I would like to combine my knowledge of yoga with my knowledge of weaving ergonomics and then donate any proceeds from an Ebook to a weaving organization of my choice. I have a few worthy organizations sidebarred on my blog that I think would be deserving of some monetary support. My idea is to have a collection of yoga poses (āsanas) that are beneficial to weavers to help reduce repetitive stress injuries.  But āsanas are a very small part of a yoga practice and I have a lot more in the book. I am not sure when I can publish it. I am close as most of it is written.

Going Again

    Two possible commissions for weaving projects are in the works so soon both looms will be busy. While I am waiting to get going on those projects I decided to make up a longer warp and try making my tunic design again. I still want to design the side panels so that they are woven separately and with a useable selvedge on each side. I also want to weave the belt separately. It would be easy to sew two lengths together, top-stitched, which would leave the tab area to be closed.  This is my new tunic warp, 14 yards:

The End of Ambivalence

I am done with this project. Right now I am wearing it because I need to see how it works. I made a belt which I think it needed. What did I learn? Most of my sewing techniques worked with this material. Considering that I did not use any interfacing or a lining or any other way of adding structure to this garment I like what I have done. I could see it done differently by making the center section more narrow and either dropping sections of warp to weave the panels or weaving them separately. Rather than cut the cloth to make two side panels I could weave two with nice selvedges. That would eliminate any bulk on the side seams.  Most "loom-shaped" garments aren't sucessful unless they happen to fit your body. My goal is not to make "loom-shaped" garments but rather to exploit the loom's potential for design. This cloth is not heavy but it has a substantial quality like a heavy velvet. So the trick is to match the weight and drape of the cloth to the design.

Ambivalence

  I finished my cloth and cut it and started some sewing. I made a few samples on some scraps including cutting out and finishing the neckline. All of these "tests" are a good idea because I get an idea of how the cloth will handle. My original idea was scuttled immediately because the cloth did have the dimensions to do my original pattern, so no sleeves. I let the cloth rest on my dress form. This allows the cloth to relax and stretch. I keep repinning the side panels. This garment needs a belt and the perfect belt would be made from the same cloth. I just might have enough for that we shall see. I could go on about the fitting challenges I see in this garment but I won't.

Cutting Up

    Normally after I have finished yardage for clothing I have no qualms about going to the next step, its intended purpose, that is to make it into a garment. Handwoven cloth does not have all the commercial finishing chemicals in it that can change the texture of the cloth. Many a home sewer has been confronted with that reality when they buy commercial cloth and are advised to wash it first. The cloth might shrink more and the sizings to make it look better on the bolt disappear. It can be an ugly surprise. Sadly some commercial chemical additions to the cloth do not disappear and are marketed as "wrinkle free".  The alive and spongy quality of handwoven cloth can make it a bit challenging to sew. It is a matter of experience. I have made credible bound button holes with my handwoven so I know conventional sewing techniques work. Still there is a part of me that doesn't want to cut into this cloth. I have almost 6 yards.

Weaving the Cloth

    The weaving of this cloth is going very quickly. Yesterday my Netbook software and the Compudobby loom control software were not happy together. The loom control got stuck in a loop between two harnesses and made a puzzle out of the selvedges. I disabled the screen saver and the WIFI and with the removal of those interruptions the Compudobby is working properly. I only have a few more yards to go.

Serendipity

Serendipity: "The occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way." 

I am hoping for some serendipity with this warp. My 10 warp chains are made. Now this is supposed to be for a tunic and it might be nice for various reasons if one side of the garment looked like the other, a reflection from the center. This isn't gonna happen. I used up every bit of left over warp and as I ran out of certain colors I tied on a new one. I tried to keep an alternate contrasting thread order which helps with color and weave effects but honestly I am not weaving 7 yards of this with two shuttles. I have yet to pick a weft. The warp chains look nice I will see how it "reads" when I start weaving. I have some large cones of beiges and off-whites. I just don't want to wear something that makes me look like I matriculated from Clown School. Is that a calliope I hear?

Odds and Ends

    I am sort of between projects right now. I really don't like an empty loom but I am waiting a bit on some commissions. Meanwhile I have some odds and ends on my spool rack and have wanted to try making a chenille tunic. I have enough rayon and cotton leftovers to make a short warp. I was thinking about which loom to use and I want to be more comfortable with my 60" AVL. So my project will go there. I have been playing with different designs. The computer on the 60" has some advantages because I can make infinitely long pattern sequences. On a treadle loom this would be possible but then you'd have to remember what you are doing. On the dobby loom, like my 40" AVL, the chain that controls the pattern sequence will not work well if it is too long. The dobby mechanism has trouble with the weight of the chain.
    The tunic pattern comes from an article by Virginia West in Handwoven magazine, Issue 105 May/June 2003. A length of 20" fabric is woven. The sleeves are made by cutting the panels in half. It is a simple pattern. I am not thrilled about the cutting and seaming of the sleeves only because it will have to be done carefully, but I have the chops for that.  The article shows a tunic made of 100% chenille. It looks nice so I know it is possible to do. If I set up the loom correctly I can exploit some design possibilities around the shoulder area. Lots to think about.

Going to a New Home

        The baby wrap is washed, dried, hemmed, and shipped off to mom and babe who have no clue it will be there on the 1st of March. I learned a few things, but just like many weaving experiments with variables, the type of left over mill end yarn that I used in the warp, are just that, "variables".  So my experiment only informs my weaving to a certain degree especially if I choose to weave another one. The finished wrap with a 1" hem on each end is 21" by 5 yards. The anticipated shrinkage in the weft direction was about what I thought, 20%, but curiously the warp direction did not shrink very much at all. It could be because the cotton was very different.  The weave pattern was not obvious. If I had used a highly contrasting weft you might be able to see it. I liked using a twill. It gives the wrap a nice stretch. Overall I don't think it is too stretchy. Handwoven cloth can have a lot of loft or a spongy quality I love. This is what this baby wrap is like.  I am looking forward to some feedback from mom.

Baby Wrap Update

The warp for the baby wrap is weaving very well. It is a pleasure to weave well-behaved yarn. The unidentified stretchy cotton has a few slubs and irregular textures but they are nice. I am almost done with the weaving and so far I have only had to take out and repair one warp thread that had a knot. I have been looking at various ways to finish this wrap. Some wraps are made as parallelograms so mom has some tails to tie. I am not thrilled with online instructions of how to do this especially with handwoven cloth that can fray. I imagine this warp will get washed and maybe a lot. So the hems need to be durable and not shrink in. My plan is to wash it and dry it more than once in hot water and a hot dryer then hem it somehow.  I may have enough left for a matching "beeky", baby blanket.

Meanwhile my concurrent project on my big loom is the Civil War horse blanket same with a 2/8's wool. This is weaving very well but the sample is already showing me that the selvedges will have to be tensioned separately because of various reasons. I am glad this isn't the Jaggerspun wool. Well the cone is old and maybe the wool has dryed out, not sure, but the texture is pretty harsh. Would the horse notice?

Restrospective

I have been weaving a long time, at least it seems to me to be a long time. Weaving trends come and go and the neat thing is that new weavers enter this world of endless design and creativity. I have been reading about weavers doing various "collapse" projects with over-twisted yarns, warps or wefts woven to be pulled and then the cloth fulled or shrunk, weave structures that are condusive to be changed by felting, and mixing material that shrink and take up at a different rate. All interesting experiments and like most experiments some are more sucessful than others.

I made this sample in the late 80's. It is a mix of metallic yarns and a fine wool that was meant for machine knitting. The wool was well behaved as warp and I pretty much ignore advice as to whether a particular yarn is not suited for warp or not. Yep, I can be wrong. The weft is the same wool but then every honeycomb cell, the weave structure I using, has a shot of fine clear elastic at the top and bottom of the cell. The sample was washed. It didn't need to be pressed. That would ruin the cool texture and probably melt and break the elastic. BTW, the elastic was very easy to wind on a pirn and never gave me any problems with the shuttle.

Baby Wrap?

A friend of my daughters just had a baby. So I have decided to weave a baby wrap. I am sort of amazed by the baby wrap craze. After so many years of weaving, weaving for myself, and for others I have seen and woven cloth for all kinds of uses, towels, clothing yardage, upholstery material, etc. etc. Being a handweaver and supporting yourself with this occupation is hard. It is difficult to weave and have enough inventory and at the same time market yourself. So it is with some amusement that I see the proliferation of handwoven baby wraps. They seem to sell for a lot of money and I see a kind of weird "greed" that goes on with Facebook "auctions", limited editions etc.

We do not come from a culture of "babywearers" which is something women have done with their babies for thousands of years. It makes a lot of sense. I can see that if you could comfortably wrap and walk with your baby it would be better than pushing a stroller. However I am a bit cynical of the popularity of baby wraps because, sadly with babies and baby paraphenalia,  you know a lawyer and a lawsuit are just around the corner. We live in a litiguous society.  No cloth is perfect and accidents do happen but an accident can happen just as well with a commercial baby wrap. Just some thoughts.

And the Sample Reveals ....

Well horse blanket I have not. The 2/26's wool would make a great shirt or scarf but nowhere close for a horse blanket. The fulled sample is on the right, the "grey goods" are on the left

These Civil War horse blankets aren't like the Southwest designs made of a very heavy wool  weft on a thinner warp. The CW horse blanket is more like a good Pendleton blanket in weight and loft.  It was folded and placed under the saddle. Looking at CW saddles it seems to me to be horribly uncomfortable for both the horse and rider. At night the horse blanket became THE blanket to sleep under or on. With my handloom and how I can finish and full the cloth I make there is no way that I can full up, basically shrink the cloth enough, to get close to original specification. A handloom just can't pack the weft in high enough, more picks per inch. A power loom is smacking and quickly advancing the woven cloth. So the warp, even though it is under considerable tension, is not being damaged.  So what to do? After many calculations the ideal yarn for this project would be a 2/16s. I cannot find that yarn. So maybe something thicker that I can order repeatable quantities of. It all comes down to doing more sampling before attempting a prototype.

I found a photo of a Canadian vintage horse blanket on Ebay that was made on a handloom. It is made in two panels and crudely seamed but I think it would be what a soldier would have to do if he could not get army issue,

Uncooperative Tension Arm on my AVL

AVL's tension is nice when it works but I can't seem to get this right. I've tried less weight, tightening cords, etc. etc., and the arm just drops on top of the tension disk. It seems to weave OK but I don't think it is good for that weight to ride on the disk,

*Update 2/6 .... Uhh, kind of embarrassing ... uhh ... this warp is rolled on the beam backwards! I am surprised it weaves at all. Thanks for all the help fellow AVL weavers. I don't need to fix it now but it certainly explains why the tension arm was dragging.

Sampling

Samples can tell you some things but small samples are not very useful for a production item. It is probably a good idea to do a "sample" and then a full-sized "prototype" before you commit time and yarn to a project. So for my Civil War horse blanket project I began with a 12" wide sample of 2/26s wool, sett at 32 epi and picked out at 34 ppi in a 2/2 twill. What's that you say? All weaver's lingo but it really doesn't matter except to me or anyone who wants to attempt the same thing.

I have about another yard to go on my sample. Then I will measure it, weigh it, wet finish it, full it, sew pieces of it together, measure and weigh it again dry. What am I hoping to learn? I need to know how much this wool will shrink and if my sett and pick out are in the ballpark so I can the  attempt the prototype. The blanket has stripes. It will have to be woven in two sections, one section flipped, seamed, washed and fulled. I like challenges. This is a challenge.

Already there are snafus. The 2/26s wool is a mill end so no more of it once it is gone. Each blanket will take 3.5 lbs of wool. I located a mill that has the wool but it is slightly thicker , a 2/20s . The mill has the right colors and you can  reorder. I will need to do another sample with what I can get, then the prototype. The 2/26s sample is not a waste of time. I am learning how my 60" loom weaves. It really is a beautiful yarn to work with.  And yes there is a flaw, 5 threads in one dent, 3 in another, not worth fixing.

Déjà Vu

Déjà Vu - "having a strong sensation that an event or experience currently being experienced has been experienced in the past". This is the feeling that I get when I sit on the bench of my big loom. I remember going to see it and sitting on the bench before I bought it and having the same sensation. I am part way through threading the Civil War blanket sample. I find that activity relaxing. Yes, I've been here before. You will never like weaving if you can't enjoy the many processes of setting up the loom. I do know weavers that live for the finished project but ... you don't always get there or maybe your project doesn't turn out as expected. I think the process is what keeps me commited to handweaving which is a segway to my next project, an E-Book.

I am a yogini and soon to matriculate from my 200 hour yoga teacher training. I no desire to teach in a yoga studio. My yoga teacher training at Yoga Oceanside, http://www.yogaoceanside.com, has been invaluable to me in other ways. Part of my training is to do 5 hours of  "yoga karma" which could be anything you can  think of that "gives back" some of the yoga wisdom I have acquired to anyone, anywhere, anyhow. I came up with the idea of publishing an E-Book on "Yoga for Handweavers" to be available to anyone who wanted to buy it. The focus of the book is to show ways that yoga can relax the weaver's mind and body and make handweaving more enjoyable and less stressful. I also intend to include information on handweaving ergonomics and ideas for modifying your loom to help avoid overuse injuries.The proceeds will go to support the "Flying-Eight" (link on right side of this blog) or a similar group that helps handweavers in the world. What do you think?

When All is Said and Done

Final photo of them  all together. Not too bad, 13 scarves from 35 yards of warp, one went to a new home, one was a dud. The dud will remain a mystery because one yarn decided to "worm". The scarf in question got worn a lot and then this particular color "wormed" or started to slide out of the warp and make little bumps. Nasty. Why oh why did this happen ?? Same chenille, same weight as the rest, same manufacturer. In any case I found the offending cone and now it is in quarenteen.Too bad as it was a nice color, bad dye lot?

I really like "crackle" as a weave. I threaded half of the loom in straight-draw and half as a crackle pattern. The treadling or order of lifting the threads was for crackle. I want to try this pattern again on my big loom with the Compudobby because I can make the lift sequence really long. I would like to make some cloth to sew with and I like the complexity of the crackle weave.

All She Wrote

The Grey Goods

My 35 yards of rayon chenille scarves are done. I got something like 12 scarves out of the warp, maybe one more but I have already given few away. As a post mortem I can say the warp wove fairly well. The rotary temples helped a great deal. Honestly they were more important to the quality of my product than the automatic pick advance. I am considering getting another set of the temples for the big loom. If I have two projects going at the same time I can't remove them. Well I could ... but it would not be a good idea to move them to the other loom mid-warp. I will definitely pay more attention to the selvedges when I beam any loom again. I know better. These are some pictures of the grey goods, six scarves with the edges overlocked but before being hemmed and wet finished. They are crinkly and stiff from being under tension on the loom. All that goes away in the water.

The "Grey Goods"

Organizing

I have a lot of weaving equipment that goes along with having two looms. I have spool racks, bobbin and pirn winders, a swift, a tool chest ... Of course all this takes up a lot of room. I actually had even more stuff but now my space is limited and my needs are different so I have sold or given away what I can't use. I think I heard from one of my yoga teachers that one needs to be mindful about letting new possessions come into your life. They take your concern and your energy. So I am a mindful yogini but space abhors a vacuum and having "stuff" is hard to avoid. It sort of creeps in.

My looms have hundreds of nylon heddles, "texsolv" heddles. They make for a quiet loom, no banging metal harness frames with metal heddles. But texsolv heddles can be hard to keep aligned so they can be easy slipped on the harness frames. If they are thrown helter skelter into a plastic bag they form into unmangeable balls. Yes, a weaver's work is organizing thread but that time should not be wasted on organizing nylon heddles. Every once-in-a-while I acquire a very useful and specific tool, another weaver's answer to texsolv heddle organization, merely dowels in a nice looking board. You can even hang it on the wall, voila! :