Category Archives: Weaving

I am not a rug weaver.

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A llama and alpaca owner  sent me his mill-spun yarn to weave blankets. The alpaca yarn was OK for blankets, but not the llama–way too much coarse fiber. I wove samples to send to him.

I used the alpaca yarn for the lower left sample. The other two are using llama yarn. I wove them weft-faced as you normally weave a rug. However I am not a rug weaver. There is a lot involved in weaving a firm, sturdy, even rug and, although I admire handwoven rugs greatly, I don’t plan to be a rug weaver. I struggled with this project. I wove the first rug a few months ago and wasn’t happy with it. I was determined to weave at least one rug in my life that was adequate.

I have never used a temple  before but did for this project. The temple is that adjustable wooden bar. It has sharp teeth at the ends and you move it forward every inch or so to keep the weaving width the same throughout the piece. This is slow weaving in comparison to what I’m used to.

Here is the finished rug with a detail below.

Learning a new Rigid Heddle Technique

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My friend and business mentor, Irene of Cotton Clouds asked me to weave a scarf as a sample for the Coloring Contest for Weavers that is on her website. Usually I can whip up a scarf in a few hours, but with an “irene project”, as I fondly refer to our endeavors, there is always something that slows me down. This scarf was to be on the rigid heddle loom AND using a pick-up technique. I have been planning to teach myself those techniques, but have never quite got around to it. Well, now was the time.

Irene sent me several colors of Cotton Classic and Cotton Classic Lite yarn and I started to play around with color order.  I chose a warp float pattern out of The Weaver’s Idea Book by Jane Patrick. The pattern unit is six threads so I wanted to make the color changes in 6 thread increments. I arranged the colors randomly with the exception of using the same color at each edge. Here is the sample I wove. I used the heavier Cotton Classic first (bottom of sample) in purple and navy, then the lighter Cotton Classic Lite in navy and then lavender, and then black 5/2 cotton.

This is a detail of the middle part of the sampler. Notice the huge difference there is depending on the value of the yarn you use.  These two sections are the same pattern but the lighter yarn shows the pattern as circles. The darker weft accents the warp floats.

This is the back of the sample. Warp floats on one side mean weft floats on the other.

I like both effects but decided to use the darker yarn for the final scarf. I made other changes as well. When you look at the top photo what does your eye see? I first notice the light value stripes. I decided that was too distracting.  I also decided to vary the size of the stripes.  However I didn’t have enough yarn to wind another warp. So I removed the lightest value yarns from the warp and rearranged the other yarns in the rigid heddle, adding a few more warp ends as needed. Then I wove with purple. The result is below. Unfortunately the color of the photo below shows up differently than the photos above even though these are the same yarns. (But the trials and tribulations of photographing weaving are another story.)

Another bonus of this project–I love this pick-up technique. it’s not hard at all once you get used to the pattern. I can see more of these in my future.

 

 

Green scarves from blue and red jeans

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I get tired of over-worked words to describe concepts which aren’t all that new. Maybe it’s good when more people start to understand the principles being described. Green is one of those words…and concepts. But I couldn’t pass up using it in the title of this post. I honestly don’t know how this yarn is processed but it is 100% recycled jeans and I wove the scarves with no energy except my own.

The yarn is called Riveting and is sold by Cotton Clouds . The scarves are woven on a Huck Lace threading.

V-Shawl Class

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I taught a v-shawl class last week. It’s always fun to see the variety in these shawls. The v-shawl is warped for double weave. The fronts of the shawl are woven with two shuttles and the back is woven by cutting one pair of warp threads at a time and weaving them in as weft.

Tina chose natural colored Rambouillet and Jacob yarns.

Jackie used brown Rambouillet and a space-dyed yarn for accent.

Marilyn used softball cotton in natural and tan with accents of ribbon and a novelty yarn.

Yolanda has space-dyed wool yarn with a blue stripe.

These are the shawls right off the loom so there has been no finishing of fringes.


The back view shows the designs that you get from the warp stripes.

A Fiber Weekend

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I spent the weekend at the Sacramento Weavers and Spinners Open House. When I wasn’t helping in the Sales Area I demonstrated carding with my Ashford drum carder.  I chose a fleece from the November shearing and washed it in two batches. I also wanted to experiment with my new Power Scour to find out how much I needed to get the wool clean.  The first 2 pounds of greasy wool weighed about 1 1/2 pounds when cleaned. I don’t think I got all of the lanolin out so I’ll probably increase the amount of Scour for the next batch. Even if there was still a bit of lanolin in the fiber it carded beautifully. I took this batch to the Open House on Saturday and here is what it looks like after carding.

That will provide a lot of spinning time. I was sure impressed with the drum carder. It breezed through that fiber.

These are a couple of skeins spun by a friend of mine using fleeces she bought from me. Aren’t they lovely? The wool in the lower skein is blended with carded sari silk which adds beautiful flecks of color.

This is a close-up of one of the pieces I had at the show. It is a tencel scarf woven in undulating twill.

There are some very talented weavers in SWSG. Here are a couple of stunning pieces woven by members.

The warp for this screen is silk covered wire and it is woven with rice paper “yarn” if I remember correctly. (I thought that I’d remember from yesterday to today without taking a close up photo of the tag.)

 

The meaning of WWW

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To my friends  it means Weekly Weaving Workshop. It is usually the Wednesday Weaving Workshop, but is sometimes on Friday. I have had a request for an evening group. Is that  EWWW? Maybe not.

Modeling three circle shawls. The one in the middle is the prototype that Diane brought a year ago. We analyzed the fabric construction and the design of the piece, after which Chris and I both wove shawls. Check out the back of these shawls:

Yesterday’s WWW was truly Wonderful–soaking up the January sun and talking about our favorite pastime!

Maybe I’ll change the name to WX4= Wonderful Wacky Weaving Women.

Tired of twisting

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We’re setting up the Artery show on Thursday so instead of weaving all day I twisted fringe all day. I don’t particularly like twisting fringe, but I think that most of the things that I weave are best finished with a twisted fringe.

This is a shawl woven with fine bamboo yarn. If I leave the fringe loose it will get hopelessly tangled in use. Also, the bamboo yarn seems to separate into it’s plies fairly readily. So twist it is.

When I weave wool blankets I count on fulling them in the finishing process ( agitation in hot soapy water). The threads become somewhat attached to each other and the whole thing becomes a cohesive unit instead of a bunch of intertwined threads. That is not the process that you want for loose fringe. Twist again.

The green and brown blanket has already been washed. This light blanket (inspired by clouds in a painting of the Sierras while the green one represents the forest) has not been washed.

I wove this ruana fabric a few weeks ago but hadn’t twisted the fringe. Even though I had woven a lot of items I had hours ahead of fringing. Now I think I have just one shawl left and the scarf that I’ll finish tomorrow.

 

O’Keefe and Courbet weaving

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I wove these projects a few weeks ago but just got them finished–that is, I wet-finished them. When a weaving comes off the loom it is not considered finished until it has undergone some kind of treatment. That could be anything from gentle soaking in water and spreading out flat to dry to vigorous processing in the washing machine and dryer. Whatever finishing process is chosen it changes the character of the project, sometimes dramatically. The finishing method should be factored in to the planning of the project.

This is a waffle weave blanket woven in Jaggerspun Lambspun wool that I sell. It is machine washable and won’t felt with washing. It does change character however.

This is the same blanket after going through the washer and dryer.  The inspiration for this blanket is the following Georgia O’Keefe painting. I started with white yarn and sprinkled dye powder over the yarn to get the varigated shades.

I love the subtle colors of this painting, but I also love the vibrant ones in the next.

Seascape by Courbet. I used the same washable wool yarn for this project. I wound the warp and then dyed it. Here is the finished v-shawl.

Van Gogh blankets

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After the ruana project (which still has not been sewn, fringed, or washed) it was a relief to do something easier. This project was inspired by this Van Gogh painting.

I dyed yarn. This is Jaggerspun Superlamb, a washable Merino yarn. I usually don’t leave white spaces in the space-dyed yarn, but there is a lot of white in the painting so I thought that I needed it here.

I warped the loom for two blankets in an advancing twill.

The color in the detail shot is more true. It’s a soft blanket with a nice drape.