Woolthing

My weaving was sadly neglected while I concentrated on spinning for the three weeks of the Tour de Fleece.  But that’s all over now so it was time to get some weaving going.

I have my Swedish loom all ready to go for a bunch of towels.

There is something so nice about a newly warped loom.  So full of promise, the hard part done.

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I’ve gotten the loft organized enough that I can actually work there.  I will always have to move stuff when I change course.  If I’m sewing my carders need to be put down and the sewing machines need to be brought out but until we have a bigger place that is just the way it is going to be.  What else do you expect with two looms hogging all the space.  Ellie, the countermarche loom is back up and ready for a warp.  Mac, the Macomber jack loom, has some new treadles and a new beater bar but will have to be folded up for a little while.  The couch has been uncovered.

Here is one side of the loft.  The floor is visible and there is a path to the door.

The stash is organized so that I can see what I have and start using it up.  Yup, it’s ridiculous.

There is a spot for George, my antique CPW, and he is easy to move so that the couch can become a bed.

I do have a bit more organizing to do to clear my desk tops but everything is there.

Yay, there is room for my sweet daughter and her darling husband.  Now I have some spinning to do

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I finally got the work on the table loom finished.  It turned out fairly well.

I just washed it and it needs to dry and have some ends clipped off and evened off.

Over all I’m pleased with it.  I don’t think there are any errors in it but it would be hard to see.  If I had to do it again I would have chosen a different pattern as the floats on what I’m calling the wrong side are very long and though they give a lot of texture they will also catch very easily.  So much so that I may have to line this in order to use it as a shawl.

I like the right side, although once again I went too subtle.  I used some handspun yarn that you really can’t see very well.  On the other hand, it is that kind of subtle that I like.

Okay, so today is a whole month since I said I would post everyday and I did it.  It wasn’t that hard and in some ways made me look at my life and ask myself if I’d done anything significant or interesting that day.  It’s important for my readers but even more important for me.  It forced me to think about my day to day life and made me open my eyes to some of the other things around me.

I will be visiting my parents for the next week and entering the land of dial up internet, so if I don’t post for a few days don’t worry I will be back.

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Yesterday I showed you my rustic skeiner.  It’s a useful tool but doesn’t give me any pleasure while using it.

Today I’ll show you a couple of tools that I have that are both useful and beautiful.  They appeal to my eyes and my hands.  The first is a shuttle that I got from Bluster Bay Woodworks.  It is made from curly walnut and it is so smooth and lovely it is a pleasure to use.  Look at the grain on that.

The next tool that I love to use is a Bosworth spindle, also known as Bossies.  This one is one of my favourites.  It has a  Spalted Bubinga whorl and a Bloodwood shaft.  Again, it is beautiful to look at and to touch.  And look at that grain.  I will always recognize this spindle as mine as there isn’t another like it.

Yes,  I love wood as well as fibre.

Another thing I like is pottery.  I’ve always been drawn to it but never had a chance to do it.  I now know that I can be happy just focusing on yarn, fibre and fabric but I also appreciate beautiful pottery.  My sister is a potter and this is something she let me have.  I have subverted it’s original use but I’m sure she’d be okay with that.

Here’s something that I’d love to get.  Someone else owns this one but I think FredParkerPottery makes some of the nicest knitting bowls going.  Someone else has this beauty but someday I will find one like it and it will be mine.  I am stalking his etsy store.

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I continue to spin, but it’s all the same, so nothing much to see there. I have done two bobbins full in the last couple of days and I have, oh, at least 20 to go. I might switch it out for something else in a while.

I continue to weave but it looks the same as well. I advance the weaving and it looks like it just did. Only I know for sure.

That’s all folks.

I’ve been doing some weaving today, as I want to get all my looms naked for some new flooring that we’re putting in the condo. I was working on, what I’ve been calling, my stash busting blanket. I’m about 2/3 of the way through it and the front beam was so full that I had to take off the first two sections. I’ve been having fun playing with combinations and inserting some of my more artsy yarns in. But, let me tell you, that will not be a blanket. It weighs a freakin’ ton. It would kill anyone who had to sleep under it. So, I’ll have to rethink that part of it.
Here’s what it looks like.

And here are some sections that I find interesting.

So what I’m thinking is that instead of joining them together I’ll leave them as three separate pieces and after I’ve finished them I’ll hang them as a trio on one of the tall, blank walls. Only problem is that the ceiling is over 20 feet and we don’t have a step ladder that will reach that high. Hmm, rental. They could also be rugs.

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Today I joined some other women to do some dyeing.  I didn’t actually do any dyeing but I watched and learned.  This was a free form type of dyeing were things were measured by the spoon and the jar and the glug.   It’s the way I often dye.  I measure some things but a lot of the time I like to be a little surprised and I find a great deal of fun and joy from the serendipitious things that I get.  I understand and use colour theory but I go mostly by feel.  I don’t need a colour chart to know that if I want something to go from yellow to green I add blue and if it’s too bright then I’ll add something else to the mix.  And when I’m done with a certain colour I know I’ll never have it again.

There is another sort of dyer.  They use thermometers and scales to the .1 gm and they measure everything exactly.  They keep track of everything in their journals so they can reproduce that exact same shade in a year or ten years.  Although I suspect they enjoy their art just as much as I do mine, I wouldn’t enjoy it if I had to be so meticulous.  On the other hand they probably would go nuts if they were forced to use my “slap dash” ways.

The different types of artists are both important.  If not one or the other we would be sadly out of balance.

And just to let you know I did get some weaving done today.

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I did get the warp tied back on but then I couldn’t figure out what I wanted to use for the weft.  I still can’t.  I think I have something in my stash but I just got depressed at my avarice and couldn’t look anymore.  I refuse to buy anything so maybe I have to do some sorting and cleaning to find it.  I did get the other shawl washed.

I learned a lot with this project.

Firstly I have to do a better job of spinning with more consistency.  That is happening already and this is yarn that I spun last year so next time I use my own handspun it will be better.

Secondly, I can’t use the full width of the loom as the warp tends to fall of the edges.  Now I could probably buy some contraption but … no more buying.

Thirdly, if I want these snazzy patterns to show there should be more contrast with the warp and weft.

I could go on but … boring.

So without further ado, here is what the shawl looks like.

And a closer and closer shot.

It’s a tencel, wool blend handspun warp with a reclaimed cashmere weft.

That means unraveled a thrift store sweater.  Cashmere of course.

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I got half way through the warp on my table loom.  I’ve discovered that it isn’t my favourite tool.  I’d much rather be using treadles.  But I took one scarf off and will start the next.  I cut it off because it will probably be too thick to fit on the front beam and I wanted to redo the warp on the back beam.  It’s a bit better but next time I’ll put a narrower warp on this loom.  Anyway I’ll tie it back up tomorrow and get going.  I want my table back.

Today I started a new warp.  It isn’t the most exciting part of weaving so I let my mind go and I thought about what it is about weaving that I find so compelling and there are a lot of things.

It puts things into order.  Now I’m not an orderly person and chaos seems to follow me around but when I was in high school, math was one of my best subjects.  I used to have a understanding of numbers and weaving is bringing out that buried part of me.  It’s about numbers and putting things in order. There is a binary code with a harness up or down, a thread in or out and it brings me back to the belief that spinning and weaving are/were essential to civilization as we know it.  If not for spinning or weaving we would  not have had sails.  And  looms were one of the first computers.  If you doubt that have a look at jacquard looms. They used punch cards just like the first room filling computers of the 1960s.

For this project I’m making some towels (yes, I can buy them but were’s the fun in that) so I have to decide what I want them to look like and how big they will be.  Then I have to figure out how many threads per inch I want and from there I figure out how many warp threads I need to measure out.  Bored yet?  Well, I love the figuring out.  I also need to figure out how long each thread will be.   And then I measure it out.  There are lots of ways to do that but a warping board is very consistent and reasonably priced.  See the order?

It’s all straight and counted out in groups of twenty and I’ve made a cross so that each thread is separate and easy to see.

I made 4 groups of one hundred threads each.  Four hundred threads to count seems overwhelming but when it’s broken into hundreds and twentys it’s no big deal.

I took each of the groups and chained them and I was back to chaos.

Tomorrow I will start to dress the loom and return some order.

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