I wove a full length sample today for the painted blanket warp. I used some 8/2 cotton, and also did a few inches of 10/2, doubled on the bobbin. Then I cut it off, zigzagged the edges, measured carefully and wrote down the measurements (experience talking here), then washed the sample in very hot water and dried in a very hot dryer. When I re-measured after it was completely dry, I was able to find my shrinkage percent (18 warp-wise, about 10 weft wise). I also have a piece of fabric that I can feel and see how the warp colors are going to interact with this weave structure. I like the weight of the sample fabric. I will use an 8/2 instead of doubled 10/2, since the 8/2 makes a more compact structure. I like the weave. It makes little puffs of fabric once washed and dried, and should make a nice warm blanket with all those tiny places for air.
What I don't like is the color of my 8/2 weft, so, what better excuse to order some more thread? I've ordered two pounds of 8/2 cotton in Alabaster from Webs. This is a light yellow. I decided to keep the weft light. There are a lot of yellow shades in this warp, and I think the Alabaster will tie everything together nicely.
It will probably take a week to get here, so I'll concentrate on rugs. I wound more warp for the Hammett today and have it through the reed and heddles, tied on the back beam and ready to wind on tomorrow. Warping for rugs is so much quicker!
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Monday, January 29, 2007
Almost warped
Finally, I have the painted warp beamed on the Newcomb. Whew! That was a job. Here's an in-process photo. 
It's all nicely wound on now, and I'll tie onto the front apron tomorrow. I'm not in love with these colors, and it's going to be a challenge to find the right weft. If I use one of the darker colors for weft, it will intensify the piece, and if I use a lighter color, it will dilute it. We'll see. I'll try several colors of 8/2 that I have in stock, but will probably end up ordering a specific color for this project.
Beaming this 10/2 cotton for this many ends took me some hours last week and lots of hours this weekend. It tangles easily and had to be put on front to back because of how it was wound and painted. A couple things helped a lot to keep my sanity and keep from breaking threads.
After the warp was threaded through the reed and the heddles, I moved the cross to the back, behind the heddles. To do this, I took the lease sticks out of the cross where it was, in the front, and, holding tension on the warp chains, stepped on the 1/3 treadle, inserted a stick behind the heddles, and then stepped on the 2/4 treadle and inserted the other stick. I then tied the sticks together and tied them to the castle so they hung at the same height as the heddle eyes. Another good tip is I lifted and tied the 1/3 treadles so the threads were separated as they went the reed. This helped keep the threads from gobbing up together and breaking.
It was still a very slow and tedious process. I listened to radio shows and also to Walter Mosely's book, The Man In My Basement. I liked this book a lot. It is multi-leveled, and in a disarming way.
Tomorrow I will tie this warp to the apron and see what I have. I also am at the end of my rug warp on the Hammett and I'll be winding more warp for that loom.
It's all nicely wound on now, and I'll tie onto the front apron tomorrow. I'm not in love with these colors, and it's going to be a challenge to find the right weft. If I use one of the darker colors for weft, it will intensify the piece, and if I use a lighter color, it will dilute it. We'll see. I'll try several colors of 8/2 that I have in stock, but will probably end up ordering a specific color for this project.
Beaming this 10/2 cotton for this many ends took me some hours last week and lots of hours this weekend. It tangles easily and had to be put on front to back because of how it was wound and painted. A couple things helped a lot to keep my sanity and keep from breaking threads.
After the warp was threaded through the reed and the heddles, I moved the cross to the back, behind the heddles. To do this, I took the lease sticks out of the cross where it was, in the front, and, holding tension on the warp chains, stepped on the 1/3 treadle, inserted a stick behind the heddles, and then stepped on the 2/4 treadle and inserted the other stick. I then tied the sticks together and tied them to the castle so they hung at the same height as the heddle eyes. Another good tip is I lifted and tied the 1/3 treadles so the threads were separated as they went the reed. This helped keep the threads from gobbing up together and breaking.
It was still a very slow and tedious process. I listened to radio shows and also to Walter Mosely's book, The Man In My Basement. I liked this book a lot. It is multi-leveled, and in a disarming way.
Tomorrow I will tie this warp to the apron and see what I have. I also am at the end of my rug warp on the Hammett and I'll be winding more warp for that loom.
Friday, January 19, 2007
Change
The striped warp I had on the Newcomb just wasn't catching my interest. A few days of making myself work on it, under protest, so to speak, and I started planning another warp. The time I get to weave is too short for working on a piece that doesn't have a future. So, I chained that warp off and laid it aside. Who knows what it will eventually show up as? I am now threading a painted warp in yellows and rust browns through the reed and plan to make a cotton blanket out of it. This will be for me. I can too easily put off projects for me until "someday." I'll continue making rugs for my show stock, with time for my blanket woven in. Heh, heh.
The blanket warp is 10/2 cotton, set at 24 epi. I am threading it in a Rose Path. I'll have to try out wefts, but am thinking I'll use an 8/2 cotton to give it a little more heft. I will have to make three widths and seam them together, since my loom isn't wide enough for a queen size blanket, and I'm glad it isn't! My arms get enough stretch throwing the shuttle as it is.
The blanket warp is 10/2 cotton, set at 24 epi. I am threading it in a Rose Path. I'll have to try out wefts, but am thinking I'll use an 8/2 cotton to give it a little more heft. I will have to make three widths and seam them together, since my loom isn't wide enough for a queen size blanket, and I'm glad it isn't! My arms get enough stretch throwing the shuttle as it is.
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Molly's closet
I realized I was missing some colors of Pendleton selvege, and thought to look in my loom room closet. There it was - another 30 lbs to add to the pile on the bed, which had been decreasing as more rugs came off the loom.
I'll be putting some worm selvege with the fuzzy selvege in this next batch of rugs, so I started fluffing the worms in the dryer to remove as much lint as possible. It's quite a linty, and lenghthy, operation. I'll have to finish tomorrow. Lovely worms, though - some very nice colors in this shipment.
I also got a couple bibs almost complete. I have to get some velcro for the closures. They're cute and look very serviceable, always a requisite for me.
It's still quite cold outside, but it was toasty inside. I had a nice time winding warp on the Hammett tonight and listening to my friend, Jean Ponzi's, radio show: Earthworms on KDHX. Time just flew.
I'll be putting some worm selvege with the fuzzy selvege in this next batch of rugs, so I started fluffing the worms in the dryer to remove as much lint as possible. It's quite a linty, and lenghthy, operation. I'll have to finish tomorrow. Lovely worms, though - some very nice colors in this shipment.
I also got a couple bibs almost complete. I have to get some velcro for the closures. They're cute and look very serviceable, always a requisite for me.
It's still quite cold outside, but it was toasty inside. I had a nice time winding warp on the Hammett tonight and listening to my friend, Jean Ponzi's, radio show: Earthworms on KDHX. Time just flew.
Monday, January 15, 2007
Ice storm cometh
I've always paid attention to weather. I love the outdoors and try to get out for a walk several times a week, so I notice nuances of wind and moisture. Sometimes, though, nature takes front seat and demands more of your attention and energy.
We had a doozy of an ice storm, and now are in the deep freeze. This means more attention on keeping the wood stove full and wood brought in, thinking ahead to heat water and warm up food on the wood stove because we were without power for over a day.
Thankfully, the power is back on. I wove off the last of the rug warp on the Hammett and am in the process of re-warping it for more rugs. I have the Newcomb warped up with the painted warp and wool stripes. I ran a sample of different wefts, and I'm not sure I'm going to get much collapse, drat it, but it should be pretty nonetheless.
Tomorrow I hope to finish a bib, and see how that project pans out.
Here's a photo of our ice storm. I took a walk through a field, well away from crashing tree limbs and power lines.
We had a doozy of an ice storm, and now are in the deep freeze. This means more attention on keeping the wood stove full and wood brought in, thinking ahead to heat water and warm up food on the wood stove because we were without power for over a day.
Thankfully, the power is back on. I wove off the last of the rug warp on the Hammett and am in the process of re-warping it for more rugs. I have the Newcomb warped up with the painted warp and wool stripes. I ran a sample of different wefts, and I'm not sure I'm going to get much collapse, drat it, but it should be pretty nonetheless.
Tomorrow I hope to finish a bib, and see how that project pans out.
Here's a photo of our ice storm. I took a walk through a field, well away from crashing tree limbs and power lines.
Thursday, January 11, 2007
On to the new
Yippee! The bib fabric is done, off the loom, and washed. It has a nice bib-y feel to it. Now I just need to get some bias tape and cut and sew.
I decided to use my blues and purples painted cotton warp for the next project.
I've already used about half of this warp for scarves, so I had 244 threads left in 7 yd. length. I decided to try a collapse weave. I'm threading it in a basket weave threading and using some wool singles with it: 10 threads of cotton, 4 of wool. This is a natural stripe threading and hopefully, the wool will shrink nicely and give me a collapse, or pleated, perhaps, weave. The cotton shouldn't shrink any more since it's been finished in extremely hot water several times during the dye process.
Good thing it's only about 15 inches wide in the reed, since I threaded in the wrong sequence for the whole thing before I caught it. I got to do that part twice today! Tomorrow I'll start through the heddles and possibly get it wound on. It will be a little touchy since the wool singles are fairly weak compared to the 10/2 cotton.
I wove a rug this evening. It helps to feel like I completed one thing today.
I decided to use my blues and purples painted cotton warp for the next project.
I've already used about half of this warp for scarves, so I had 244 threads left in 7 yd. length. I decided to try a collapse weave. I'm threading it in a basket weave threading and using some wool singles with it: 10 threads of cotton, 4 of wool. This is a natural stripe threading and hopefully, the wool will shrink nicely and give me a collapse, or pleated, perhaps, weave. The cotton shouldn't shrink any more since it's been finished in extremely hot water several times during the dye process.
Good thing it's only about 15 inches wide in the reed, since I threaded in the wrong sequence for the whole thing before I caught it. I got to do that part twice today! Tomorrow I'll start through the heddles and possibly get it wound on. It will be a little touchy since the wool singles are fairly weak compared to the 10/2 cotton.
I wove a rug this evening. It helps to feel like I completed one thing today.
Monday, January 8, 2007
New gallery photos
I added some new rug photos to the rug gallery today, and also some photos into the scarves gallery. I'll be posting more photos as I can.
I painted several warps this last year and hope to paint more. It's time-consuming and mind-consuming. When I'm choosing colors and preparing to paint, I go to the color wheel and to my stock of dyes, then to my visual memories of nature's palette that I'm using for inspiration. The fact that the dyes have a mind of their own and mix and mingle sometimes quite differently than I thought adds to the fun. For this warp, I underdyed the warp chains a deep yellow, then painted on blue, which turned to green when it mixed with the yellow, and red, which I thought was going to turn orange. Well, it did have some orange overtones, but mostly stayed red. This first piece was crossed with yellow, the second with red.
I painted several warps this last year and hope to paint more. It's time-consuming and mind-consuming. When I'm choosing colors and preparing to paint, I go to the color wheel and to my stock of dyes, then to my visual memories of nature's palette that I'm using for inspiration. The fact that the dyes have a mind of their own and mix and mingle sometimes quite differently than I thought adds to the fun. For this warp, I underdyed the warp chains a deep yellow, then painted on blue, which turned to green when it mixed with the yellow, and red, which I thought was going to turn orange. Well, it did have some orange overtones, but mostly stayed red. This first piece was crossed with yellow, the second with red.
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