Sunday, September 17, 2006

Oh my!

Oh my! Does this look like my weaving studio? No, the room seems to have been taken over by those alien beings resembling sewing machines!

Oh my! They have taken over the loom space...moving the Purrington eight harness to the floor. The varpapuu is already on the floor and the tapestry loom hiding behind the door.

Oh my! Look they they seem to be eating all my wonderful sewing thread that I use for taquete.

Oh my! What is the best way to fight these sewing demons? There is only one sure fire method to get them gone. All yardage must be sticken from the room. Then, eventually they will become hungry and go and search for food - yardage elsewhere. Perhaps at your house....

Here's the yardage that must go...

Wednesday, September 13, 2006

My Dish Towels 2006

Well my dish towels are all complete for the 2006 Cyber Dish Towel Exchange...all 13 of them!

I apologize for no picture but alas Blogger does not seem to be loading my pictures today. I'll update the page with a photo, if and when it ever works...The towels are all woven, sewn, washed, ironed, pinned, hemmed, ironed and folded all nice.

Six dish towels will be in the mail tomorrow for a trip to Columbus. In October, I will be getting six back from various folks around the continent. What fun! It's always so exciting to get that box of dish towels in the mail.

I have never woven Summer & Winter before. I found this Summer and Winter pattern complex and athletic as well as intellectually challenging. Although it used only six shafts, it did use all ten treadles which made for some fancy footwork. It was polychrome so there were three shuttles of different colors that went back and forth 216 times for each pattern repeat. There were two color changes in each pattern repeat which slowed the progress but provided variety in the finished piece. It became more intellectually challenging by using five variations of summer and winter with the same ribbon pattern. By using 'pair X's' for one pattern repeat, dukagang for another, singles for the next and dukagang - alternative and 'pair O's' I was constantly having to think...no weaving zen state for these dish towels!

I like the result. It is great to have a summer & winter sampler with the five different variations. Some are nearly the same while others are quite different. I will need to keep one for my studio so I can study it in the future. The others will be used for their assigned tasks - - making people smile when opening a present and drying dishes. I ended up with thirteen of them...upon careful inspection I think they all have at least one error...which makes for a great treasure hunt to find the errors and a great mystery story while trying to figure out what I did wrong!

I doubt I would do another towel set in this pattern with five variations but I am going to do a thinner scarf shaped piece that I can use as a lapel on my Christmas jacket. Since I have this complex treading and tie-up done and correct it only seems rational to continue to use it until I need something different.

For those of you who have not followed me on a daily basis through my dish towel journey, here are links to the various days I blogged about my towels. I start with the oldest entry August 14th... and finished with this one; September 13th.

Whew! What a month!


The start of my towels!

Checking for errors.

First view of a Summer & Winter sampler.

Learnings from my sample towel.

My color choices!

Tweaking the loom!

Plodding along!

Warp one off the loom!

Starting to knot!

Tie that the second warp on the loom!

My second warp off the loom.

Monday, September 11, 2006

Almost Done


It took a bit but I just took the second warp of dish towels off the loom. There are six dish towels woven on this warp in the summer & winter pattern. Each is about 35 inches by 21 inches ignoring the hem - and unwashed. I sewed the ends and it is resting on the door for a day prior to washing. Several more hours of work to finish these these puppies...then that's it for dish towels. Whew!

I put up a finished towel from the first warp for comparison. The second is definitely a more saturated avocado green. I like them both.

Sunday, September 03, 2006

Starting the New Warp

I finished knotting 528 knots to tie on the new warp - - only took a couple of hours - that wasn't too bad except for a bit of a sore back. I will need to figure out how to raise my legs up the next time.

The worst part of the warp was rolling the yarn onto the back beater...what a twisted and messy journey. I had to roll on about six to eight inches at a time then take out the twists and knots. It seemed like a real long warp! Sometimes I wonder where I get all my patience.

I have woven twice since I got the warp all on. The first towel is done so I took a picture of the new warp and put the towels from the first warp on the top for comparison.

You can see how the second warp is definitely a more saturated green. It's an odd color combination but I do like it. I like the first warp too.

It will be tough to send them away.

Friday, September 01, 2006

A Knotting Day

Today is my day to tie knots.

I measured out the warp for my next set of towels. I am using that green which is second full cone from the right in this photo. I originally was going to go with the seafoam blue but decided it would be interesting to see how the pattern comes out with a bit more saturated green in the background. It's an avocado color of sorts - just a hare [hair?] greener than I am using now.

Having never tied on before, it seemed reasonable to simply tie on the new warp in front of the beater then pull the yarn through the reed and heddles and end with attaching to the front beam. I tied on one of eleven pattern repeats and thought I should go and go do some research as to what type of knot would work the best. My square knot kept turning into a granny but the overhand knot seemed to work well. We had a demo at at Guild meeting awhile ago where the weaver simply rolled her fingers somehow and the knots were made. It looked so easy and she said she could tie on a big warp in less than thirty minutes. I thought perhaps I could find out what knot that would be.

I stopped looking for knot info when much to my surprise, I came up with was this article. In a nutshell, it says it is easier to tie on behind the the heddles and not in front of the beater. It does sound counter intuitive but apparently it is so much more efficient. Ah well, this means I will probably be tieing on another warp after this one to try it out!