New Projects

I picked up a 24" 24-harness AVL workshop loom a short time ago. It's a computer dobby loom, and a very fun weave.

It's spawned a lot of weaving mojo, so I've started warping scarves to weave up. Three scarves, one for a friend and two for his wife. I don't know her favorite colors, but I picked color schemes based on what she likes to wear --jewel tones. I chose a winter palette and a fall palette because those seem the richest in tone and texture. The winter palette scarf is an 8/2 painted tencel warp with an 8/2 solid tencel weft and a rayon 6-strand embroidery floss pattern weft in gold. The fall palette scarf is a jumble of painted tencels and rayons, alpaca/silk, silk noil, and even a cotton/metallic.

The other scarf is for a man, so I chose an alpaca/silk pattern weft and a cashmere tabby (3/52 doubled as warp, 2/28 as weft) to weave a very fine (small) overshot pattern in a loom-controlled doubleweave. Yes, I'll post pictures when I get them on the looms.

Ignoring The Softer Side

I've been ignoring all of my craft works for a couple of years now. Part of that has been the intense pressure to succeed on a couple of work projects. Part of it is because my eyesight changed drastically due to some medications, and even after they were discontinued my eyesight did not go back to normal. Part of it is because I have not gotten along with my newest loom as well as I'd hoped. (Yes, it's LOVELY to weave without pressure on my knees, but I miss the balance of the Schacht Wolf loom.)

I do miss the work in my hands. I have made all sorts of things with my sewing machine, but I miss throwing the shuttle or holding the needle. I miss the feel of deep purples or teals or reds flowing through my hands as they make up the web of the work.

What I've been doing for four years now is a Lot More programming. And work on some things that I can't talk about. We finally made the first level this week --our small startup was seeded by an Angel Investor. There have been some really crazy hours logged on this project.

I've also been away from the blog for more personal reasons. I did a favor for a friend a few years back (has it been THAT long??) and the creepiest group of people imaginable began stalking me online. Fine, whatever.

So, my loom and needlework stands are calling me. I've found glasses that help me work again. It's time to just put away the electronic stuff and dissolve into handwork.

Progress

I've finished 3 samples in one evening for the Ratings Program. I'm still going to let the judging wait until September, but I should be ready in April or May.

I need to re-sley the project and start on other samples now.

I'll take some pictures tonight and post about the rosepath scarf that I'm weaving in space-dyed purple merino and 2/20 deep purple worsted. It's a bit fussy because I have to lay in each pick --not tromp down on the beat. And it's on one of my table looms which I don't care as much to weave on. (Unless it's boundweave figures) So it's slow going. I'm trying to weave off about 4 inches per night. I'll have it finished in about two weeks at that rate.

Futility

Today I'm beating myself up a bit about that last failed project. I should have recognized that the yarn wasn't twisted tightly enough to be a warp. It pulled apart in my hands indicating that it was too soft for a warp tension.

Ah well. There's no sense in dwelling on it. The next project is part of the Ratings Program, so I won't be posting pics of the piece in weaving or finished until after the judging in September.

Finished the Silk Noil

....but I didn't finish a scarf. I'm kinda bummed, but that warp was just shredding. It wasn't just the abrasion from the reed. The warp itself couldn't handle the tension strain put on it. It started snapping from the front where it was winding around the cloth beam. At that point, when 5 threads gave at once, I gave up, wove a header, and cut it off the loom.

Here's what my 7.5" sample looks like:



And this is what the start of the piece looked like cut off the loom. (Remember, these were the unsuccessful attempts so it doesn't look like much.)



Not stopping to cry, I started beaming another project. This one is a long warp in wool:



I've spread the warp in the raddle, tied it on the back beam stick, and I've started to wind on. I need help to wind on since I can't hold the friction brake, pull the warp, and wind the beam at the same time. So, tomorrow when Norm has more time I'll get this on the loom and ready to thread.

And It Just Keeps Breaking...

I'm finally liking this project and in a weaving groove. I have to lay the weft in lightly so that the diamond pattern doesn't pack down and obscure the painted warp. So the weaving is a bit slow and fiddly. I'm about 6" into the weaving when this happens:



Another broken warp thread. And this one is after the real weaving started, which means I can't just cheat and tie on a length of warp and advance past the knot to start weaving again. This time I have to employ a weight off the back of the loom.



I haven't done this in a while. I don't know where my old film canisters are so that I can use a penny weight system. So looking around for something heavy enough to weight that thread but light enough it won't break it, I end up with the bracket for my raddle. It works.

I continue weaving along. Around 7.25", this happens:



And I'm fixing it off the back with the other raddle bracket:



I hope this won't happen again, but I fear that this is the beginning of the end. I think the painted silk noil yarn is just too soft to be a warp thread. It's snapping like mad. I think the skinny weft yarn that has 16 picks to the 3/8" is just too many abrasions with the reed for this warp.

If I break another one, I'll stop weaving on this project and pull it off the loom. Maybe I can make a small bag out of the tiny amount of fabric woven.

Fixed the Warp

I fixed the broken warp thread by tying the portion that was around the back beam and through the heddle to a long piece that I anchored in the web with a pin. Like this:



Once the warp thread was secured, I advanced the warp so that the knot wouldn't be in my weaving (or fringe on the finished piece) and started weaving the piece again. This time, I used that lovely deep purple cotton 10/2 yarn from the Lunatic Fringe --10 Purple Blue is the color. I just stuck with a straight vertical herringbone, and suddenly this failed project turned into something pretty:



The weave structure lets the painted warp peek through the solid zigzags. It's lovely. But that photo above isn't quite capturing the colors. This one does:



And there we go. I've gotten one inch woven off so far. Only 71" more to go. Pure work now that I've solved all the problems, but fun to see that pattern emerge.

Stubborn Scarf and Broken Warp Thread

See that? Right there kind of curled to the right side of the warp?



That's a broken warp thread. Grrr.

This hasn't been as successful as I'd like. I like the undulating twill effect at the bottom of the web, but the weft yarn is a heavier weight 2/10 merino tencel and was obscuring the silk noil warp.



The yarn has such potential. It's a luscious blend of silk nubbins in deep peacock colors. Witness:



And I don't think the camera does it justice.

But when I use the 2/10 merino tencel, the fabric is too dense and spongy and hides the beautiful warp. And when I cross it off with itself, it looks rather boring.

So, later today I'm going to try to fix that hanging broken warp thread in the usual manner. Then I'm going to try a different weft yarn --a 10/2 deep purple mercerized cotton from the Lunatic Fringe.

The noil warp is too soft to withstand weaving that beautiful undulating twill, unfortunately. That twill is very dependent on the floating selvedge because it does 3 weft shots for every shed opening. And the selvedge yarn isn't doubled because I didn't realize the strain that was going to be put on it. So I'm switching gears and just trying a straight vertical herringbone twill on it.

Silk Noil Scarf

I've started a skinny silk noil scarf on my Louet David floor loom. It's going to be a 5" wide undulating twill scarf set at 20 e.p.i.. It's a pretty silk noil yarn in peacock feather colors of dark blue, deep green, turquoise, and olive.

I've beamed the warp. Made the mistake of using the David's built-in raddle for this project. The raddle has too close a sett for this warp (1/5 inch or 1 cm), and this warp is too soft to handle any serious stress. I snapped about a dozen warp threads when I started to wind on, so I moved the warp down to a 1 inch raddle on the back beam. That decreased the stress and allowed me to finish winding it on without snapping the warp. I'm just going to be weaving an even skinnier scarf now.

I'm threading warp through the texsolv heddles. I'll probably use a 10-dent reed to sley.

WGGB.org Apprentice Weaver Ratings Program

I've started work on the WGGB Apprentice Weaver Ratings Program. I met with a study group last month. It's a fun group of people. Since then, I've completed the written work, dusted off my completed color wheel, and planned the warps for the projects.

The required weaving in linen will be the last piece that I do because I'll probably set up a long warp that will be that project and my napkin project. I expect that that project will tie up the loom for a long while.

It's a good refresher course in weaving. I haven't done any serious weaving in 10 years now. This is a thorough introduction again.

I won't talk about the individual project pieces in this blog because it is supposed to be kept private until you submit. However, I *can* say that I've finished points 1 and 2 of five. Only 12 woven samples left to go.

Yarn-aholics Anonymous Meeting Minutes

I opened the closet today to look at some linen that I've been saving for a formal napkin project. It's a lovely shade of green in a 40/2 line linen. A balanced plain weave sett for this yarn is 36 e.p.i.. There is 8.8 oz on a tube measuring a total of 3,300 yards per tube. At a very generous warp for 12 22" square napkins with 6" between each napkin and a whopping 72" of loom waste, I will need approximately 8,844 yards of warp. That's a bit less than 3 tubes. I'll shorthand the weft yarn needed to an equal amount (though it will be less than that). So, 6 tubes will weave 12 22" square napkins. (5.36 tubes, really, for that shorthand)

I have 17 tubes of this linen.

17. Seventeen.

That's enough to weave a napkin set for a dinner party, individual placemats, and probably a tablecloth.

There is no way that I'm weaving that much linen. I bore easily, and the thought of spending the next three years weaving linen napkins chills me. I had enough trouble weaving the cotton napkins for the WGGB 50th anniversary party. There's an iconic photo of me bent over my loom weaving the umpteenth napkin looking pretty unhappy that the warp still had quite a bit to run.

Even if I up the sett to a twill weave, I'd only consume about a tube more. Owning this much linen is insane.

And yet, I have that much linen and an entire tub of linen of other varieties in my reserve stock. I don't even like weaving linen very much. It's a fussy yarn to handle.

The Shawl Was Cut From The Loom Last Night!

OH AWESOME!!

I cut the shawl off the loom and evened the fringe. I'm starting to twist fringe now.

But the LOOM IS FREE!! Yay!!

A Shawl Woven With a Supplementary Warp

I'm excited that I'm finally getting this piece woven off of my loom. It is a very pretty warp, so I was reluctant to just give up on it. But the metallic silver supplementary warp was fiddly, so finding motivation to just weave it off once the initial push to beam was done was lacking.

I weighted the supplementary warp with water bottles off the back of the loom. The initial tie on with a slight amount of weight in each bottle went well, but I needed to increase the weights in the bottles so that the warp would get pulled taut. Otherwise, you end up with the supplementary warp having enough slack in it to start pulling up little loops in the warp as you weave. Since I'm not weaving velvet, I wanted the supplementary warp to lay flat.

So what does this extraordinary finicky loom set up look like, you ask? Like this:




The silver warp kind of bunches and twirls up. It has a lot of elasticity for a simple metallic. The weight pulls it out straight, and having the bottles on the other side of the back beam allows the weight to distribute out a bit.

But the cloth that's weaving off is really lovely:



I like the way the space-dyed yarn is interacting with itself. Weaving with space-dyed yarn is a bit of a crap shoot. If the color regions are aligned you can end up with pooling. What's pooling? Well, here's a post by YarnHarlot (Stephanie Pearl-McPhee) that has a picture that is the epitome of what pooling can be. (Not one of Steph's better posts. She really was cranky that day. But that's a stunning picture of exactly what pooling is/does.)

Most of the time, however, my space-dyed yarns just end up looking muddy or indistinct. I have succumbed on an occasion to the idea of using space-dyed yarn as a pattern yarn in an overshot or other heavily patterned weave that uses tabby. Unfortunately, the eye can't follow both the pattern and the color changes and typically it ends up looking washed out. You're better off using the space-dyed yarn as the tabby in the warp and weft, but then you'd better like the way the yarn looks wound into a ball because that's what it's going to look like in the plain weave structure.

There's a bit of striping going on in this web, but it's striping of a subtle, good sort. Overall, I'm pretty pleased with this project again. So it's ticking along quite nicely. I should have it woven off by this weekend. I wonder what I'll do when the loom is free?

My only gotcha on this warp is its length. You'd think, by now, that I'd throw on a couple of extra feet of warp just in case. But no, I'm going to be weaving up to the knots on this one. I've already planned to re-leash the water bottles with long ties so that they can hang off the back but allow the metallic warp to be woven all the way up to the heddles. I'm still about 24-30" from that scenario, though. A day of weaving.

TV, Holidays, and some Weaving News

We finally bought a 46" Samsung LED TV for $899. I still think that's pretty frivolous, but we've been enjoying it immensely (no pun intended). The three year stretch with our old TV when the flat panel was destroyed accidentally is over.

The holidays were quiet. We spent a week with the family in Virginia.

And the big weaving news? The shawl warp that's been languishing on my new Louet David loom for 2 1/2 years is now being woven off. I have half of it done. The warp had a secondary metallic yarn warp that was weighted off the back with water bottles for weights. Because doing a secondary warp with the weights is a bit finicky, I wasn't keen on messing with it. I finally got it threaded through the heddles, threaded through the reed, and tied on the front. Then I adjusted the weight in the bottles to pull the warp taut properly, and I was off and running. The sticking point for all those years was handling that secondary warp.

It's weaving beautifully. I like the mix of colors. The main warp is a rayon slub space-dyed in berry shades: deep grape, bright deep raspberry fuchsia, bubblegum pink. The silver metallic warp that peeps through is just a lovely complement. I only hope the warp is long enough. This is going to be one of those projects where I had so much trouble starting in the beginning that I wasted a lot of warp in the front. Now I'm going to be using the warp up to the knots on the back beam to make it long enough to drape properly.

I'll post pictures and a write-up on it later.

I'm also weaving a narrow scarf in a space-dyed merino yarn of purples and greys. I'm weaving it off with a deep purple 20/2 worsted wool. I'm not quite as enamored of that warp, but it will do. I still think that I should just weave it off fast. It's threaded to a basic rosepath threading.

TV Musings

It's been a full year, and we still haven't bought the TV.

I almost bought it last Christmas, but our old one was good enough. It's still good enough, and spending that much money just seems obscene for a luxury good.

Instead, I bought Norm a tent. We've gone camping in the new tent already. And I can stitch and watch TV just as easily with the little TV as I could with a monster TV.

Norm's Birthday

is soon.

And I have just --with one click--bought him a present. A 55" Samsung LCD TV. To replace the one shattered by our daughter a few months ago.

We have been doing without, and doing fine. But Norm misses sitting in his recliner with his laptop doing work and watching TV. Sitting at his desk downstairs doing work and watching TV just isn't as good. And for just curling up for an occasional movie, well, the desk downstairs just isn't romantic.

So I went watching a lot of TV displays and found that for our personal taste, I like the Samsung 55" the best. And then I looked for price. And Amazon had one of those teasers where you have to put it in the shopping cart to see the price. And then you have to enter shipping info. And then you see a price. And the price was about $1450 and that *included delivery to your HOUSE!!* And the delivery was next Tuesday in the afternoon.

I've run out of "And's."

The next closest price was Costco for $1697 but you have to cart it home yourself.

Somehow, without really thinking or examining it too much, I clicked the button. And bought it. And now some TV elf somewhere is madly scurrying to pack my TV up in China and get it on the plane to me before next Tuesday, 5 days from now.

My.

I don't usually buy big expensive things without discussing it with Norm. Plus reviewing and analyzing ad nauseum with him. But I LIKE this TV. And we're tired of using the 19" LCD screen in the basement next to Norm's desk. It's depressing. And Amelia has figured out the TV is there and slopes off without parental knowledge or permission to watch The Suite Life of Zack and Cody or some other PG teen flick that promotes attitudes that I despise. Three days ago I thought she was coloring on the kitchen table so I sloped off to get a bit of weaving done. She quietly slipped downstairs and was watching Shark Boy and Lava Girl when I found her. And evidently she's seen it before because as I was turning it off she wailed, "No Mommy, that's the sad part! Let me just watch that part until he " ...(and then she rattled off a plot point that my brain couldn't wrap around).

Yeah. Time to get the TV back under watchful parent eyes. With a timer lock on it that won't turn on until her bedtime.

We turned on the parental controls on the cable channels last week because we figured out that her "play" time down in the basement wasn't with her toys, dolls, and desk but with Norm's desk and TV. I was terrified that she'd find one of the R-rated films and see something really inappropriate. And then tell all of her camp friends. And then get alienated forever. And I'll get branded as the trashy mom in the neighborhood.

Those "And's" again. Moms have a lot of time to spend worrying.

So the TV cometh. You know, I'm rather sad about that in a way. Just it's very presence can lead to me caving in and letting her watch TV. I'm going to have to be very strong to keep the ban in place until Oct 16.

---
Update: No, I'm trying to cancel the order now. I'm not sure of the settings or plugs on that one and I'd like a chance to see the one at Costco again before I take the plunge. And while Amazon would take it back, I'd have to pay for shipping it back. Pricey, I'd imagine.

---
Update #2: Got it canceled. Turned out that I was right, the one I'd ordered for $1450 wasn't equivalent to the Costco one that we'd liked. $1450 = LCD which isn't bad, but not as good as the $1700 Costco LED one. Amazon offers it for $1800. Tax might trip the difference here. That's $100 on top. But Costco offers a 2-year warranty for the item, not one. And I can haul it back to the Costco if needed. If I get really generous, the Samsung 55" 3D LED TV is only $2200 shipped to our house.

Ode to Light

One of the biggest peeves about our new house is that the light in it is poor for craft work. Our old house was 90+ years old with windows taller than me that flooded the house with light. Tall ceilings, lots of windows, gentle bow windows. I miss that house more than you could imagine.

The new house, in the fabulous new neighborhood, was designed by trolls. Pretty spaces, but smaller windows, lots of shading trees, low ceilings, and no light.

Craft work requires light. A lot of light.

So, after whining about no light for a year, I bought lamps. And now I've bought more. The first set were to light up the living room and family room. The second set are in my studio (which is the only room in the house that gets light but it only gets it in the morning hours [when I'm at work]) and in the bedroom.

I put a decent light in the bedroom in the "sitting area" corner. I have my recliner there. And a handy shelf for needlework supplies. It's the clearest corner of the room because I'm sort of militant that nothing sits on the recliner but one of us. Last night, I put bulbs in the floor lamp. Two 150 watt bulbs and one 60 watt direct reading lamp on a snaky neck. And suddenly, I can actually *do* needlework in there. It's fabulous!

I dragged my favorite needlework stand upstairs (a System IV) with the Theresa Wentzler "Fortunate Traveller" piece on it. I read a book in my chair! Ahhh, the life.

On another note, the camping towel is proceeding. I have 27 pattern repeats in the body of the piece, each about 2" long. I'm done with 9 of the repeats now.

And the house is getting much cleaner and decluttered. Lots of time spent in decluttering.

New Life for an Old Dawg

This was a post that I made in the Weaving Today forum about Slow Cloth:

Many of us who weave spend a lot of time in the planning stage. Planning a new project is exciting. Picking the yarns from our stash. Settling in with graph paper or computer program to figure out structure. Finding those small victories when you only have enough yarn in one color for 7 warp threads but manage to find a way to showcase them in the structure. Deciding on a finishing technique. Hunting beads or other accessories to use in the finished product.

Then comes the warping. That's incredibly exciting because you see the vision unfolding. And the tie-on. Then the final glorious moment where you throw the first shuttle.

Unfortunately, many of us find that as soon as we weave off enough weft to truly see the pattern, we lose a substantial amount of that excitement. In fact, after that, it becomes just work to get it off the loom. The rhythm and soothing meditative nature though, makes the process worthwhile and relaxing. You lose sight of the 'work' aspect when you are lost in the hypnotic peace of actual weaving.

Unless something goes wrong with the warp. If you can't fix it quick, you may be facing a dreaded 'dawg on the loom.'

I've had a dawg on my loom for 4 1/2 years. And it's a beautiful color blanket warp in 10/2 mercerized cotton threaded to an overshot threading. But one color was fraying in the reed (wrong reed for the sett and one color was a softer twist yarn). I also found that there wasn't enough weft yarn to finish it in the same colors. I ordered more yarn, but the dye lots were so significantly different that it ruined my finished vision. And there it sat. Until 4.5 years later when I fixed the reed, and decided that I needed a camping towel for our camping adventures. A couple of cones of tropical jewel colors in unmercerized 6/2 cotton later, I'm weaving off a 27"x65" camping towel really fast.




The excitement can make or break a project. And while I do slow projects, I'm one of those excitement-in-the-planning sorts. My favorite meditative process in weaving happens at the warping board. I use one instead of a warping reel simply because those arm movements and counting to wind the warp are one of my high points in the process.

4.5 years is a bit long in the life of a dawg. Many succumb to scissors in short order. My husband and I are a "100-hour couple" and have a small child. So pleasures for self have narrowed down to measurement in minutes. This warp was too lovely for me to cut off. Threaded in a versatile structure. It just took 4.5 years for me to finally get the "Aha!" moment and find the right use for the warp.

And yes, the edge of that towel is a hand stitched blanket stitch in a space-dyed 5/2 cotton. It stiffens the edge and hopefully will keep the edge from fraying. I'm not quite finished stitching one edge of the towel as you can see in the full scope photo of the towel. (The towel is laying on 2' square tiles in the kitchen to give the piece some scale.)

Part of a Camping Towel

Friday I wove about 18" of Camping Towel. I found the right weave structure in a plain 2/2 twill simple wave pattern, with occasional reversing star motifs every 40 weft shots. It's a pretty thing, 28"-30" wide finished, and will be about 80" long.

Camping Towels & Re-threading the Loom

I decided that the very colorful 10/2 perle cotton color blanket warp (for the color-blanket-that-won't-be) shouldn't go to waste even with a shredding black segment of the warp. It's 30" wide, you know.

I cut off the sampling web and put another reed in the batten. Instead of using a 24-dent reed, I put in the 10-dent and am sleying it 3-2-3-2-3-2-3-2-3. I've re-sleyed about 1/3 of the warp so far in 45 minutes of precious free time two nights ago.

I've been looking at possible tie-up and treadling combinations for the overshot threading. It should be *easy* to find one I like. But, I'm probably going to weave off one towel at least in the overshot pattern without tabby.

I picked some really lovely tropical beach towel colors in unmercerized 6/2 cotton (and some 8/2 cotton) that I had in my stash of yarn. I'm going to weave one towel in bright turquoise with some lipstick red and deep plum highlights on the ends. Maybe a couple of shots of orange in there too. If there's enough warp, I'll do a second towel with the deep plum and turquoise, light blue, and orange highlights on the ends.

I'm thinking about weaving a nice plain weave (even weave) for an inch or two on the ends so that I can embroider names on it after the towel comes off the loom and is washed.

I haven't been this excited about weaving in years. The idea of making something useful is like catnip. And I love working with cotton. I'd probably be happy enough just weaving plain old common dishtowels forever. (in uncommon colors and weave structures)