I was ready to write another Random Farm Photos blog post but then thought that maybe, since this is the last day of the year, there should be some sort of retrospective. Most of my blog posts this year have been about the sheep and the pasture, but I am also a weaver. I have neglected that.
I keep a notebook with all my weaving info. The warps are numbered. I looked for the first one of 2025 and couldn’t find a photo. I sorted my photos into date order and found 275 photos in the weaving collection. Yikes! That doesn’t mean I wove that many pieces–not even close. But they all are part of various stories, none of which I shared in my blog. Maybe forget the sheep for a while and focus on yarn?
This is the issue of Little Looms, Summer 2025, with my clasped warp scarves in cotton. They were woven the previous year, but the magazine was published this year.
These are samples, all woven the same size in three different wool yarns. This is the photo after I took them off the loom but before any finishing. Wet finishing is the topic of an article in an upcoming issue of WEFT magazine. There were some surprises but you will have to wait for the magazine to be published to find out!
This is a workshop sampler for my Learn to Weave class. I taught this at the Conference of Northern California Handweavers (CNCH) in the spring and wanted new cotton samples. Students have the option of weaving wool or cotton in this class. You can’t tell from this view but every 6″ is a different treadling pattern. The green and white one gives four samples in one for each treadling by showing white on white, green on green, and the green/white blend.
Another sampler. This one is to experiment with color-and-weave using six colors. There will be an article featuring a project based on this in the Summer 2026 Handwoven magazine.
This is another scarf/shawl/wrap (which is it?) using Art Fiber Frenzy yarn. I have been intrigued by this yarn since I first discovered it a couple of years ago. I have also created a class to lead people through weaving a piece with so many fibers and textures.
I didn’t neglect my favorite fiber–wool. I wove several blankets and shawls during the year. This is one in a more traditional color-and-weave pattern with only two colors. The yarn is, of course, black and white Jacob wool.
This is a chenille scarf in shadow weave. It has sold but there may be a similar one at the Artery–I’ve lost track.
My new favorite wool (other than my Jacob and Timm Ranch yarns) is Brown Sheep Company Nature Spun. I’ll be introducing this for some of my classes this year. I wound some white v-shawl warps and space-dyed them. Then I needed to find weft colors.
Here is how the one on the right turned out.
Oh boy! A crazy thing I got into was triaxial weaving. I wove some pieces 15 years ago and now have resurrected the idea. I spent way more hours on the four pieces I finished than maybe they warranted. But now I’m ready for more. Two will be in a January show at The Artery.
This is a v-shawl using the Nature Spun yarn. This one and the samples below are ideas for other articles I may propose and for pieces that I will sell.
Log cabin on the left is another color-and-weave pattern that looks much more complicated than it is.
If you read this blog regularly you know that I’ve been complaining about the fog, except for the beautiful sunny day we had two days ago. That didn’t last. It’s foggy again and it’s supposed to rain later. The “shop” where I have my bigger looms is not insulated and I don’t even try to heat it up with space heaters. I will put the heater on right next to me but It won’t have much impact on the surroundings. I am trying to finish the baby blankets that have been on this loom since October. That may be another blog post when I actually finish.
I worked on this loom yesterday and plan to finish today. First I need to put some more layers on.
Chenille scarf using clasped weft.
Local yarns dyed with coreopsis and dahlia flowers.
More local yarns dyed with mushroom and black walnut.
This is the stack of ponchos that I finished in early November just before the Fibershed Wool Symposium.
This is how the loom looks from where I sit.
The rainbow colors are a result of a prism that hangs in the window behind me. After my mom died a friend gave me the prism and said that it was to remind me of my mom. And it does, as it reminds me of the friend, Sylvia.
Coreopsis dyed yarn.
The computer that holds the “brains” of the loom. This loom does not weave without me doing everything (for those people who think that having a computer hooked up means I’m not really weaving). It only keeps track of the pattern that I have put in.
This is what that pattern looks like. It will be completely different after fulling.
A look down through the warp threads to the cloth below.
OOPS! I think I have this in an earlier photo and I haven’t told the story yet of what I did about it. That will still come.
Some of the finished ponchos.
Talk about a versatile garment. I have grown to love the poncho. It’s really just a blanket with a hole in the middle for your head. Whether you’re at the computer late at night (gee, does that ever happen?), in the car, or trying to stay warm while reading in bed it’s an easy garment to throw on. And it also makes you look young and pretty! Just look at those photos! (Disclaimer–that’s really not me.)
I didn’t list this one because right now I can’t find it. That may mean it is at the Artery. Or did I sell it? This is what I mean be trying to keep track. I’m not doing very well with that.
My niece was nice enough to model for me at Thanksgiving.
Photobombing brother.
These are yarns from Lunatic Fringe and all appear in the latest scarf I wove. Hopefully I’ll get to that blog before too long.
This is my latest warp. I wound 13 yards of mixed 
The other thing to notice about this photo is that the last piece woven on it is so much narrower than the others. This was the fourth shawl on the warp. The one before this one is a different weave structure (advancing twill treadling), but the first two are the same structure as the fourth one. The only difference is the weft yarn. The first three shawls were woven with 2015 Timm Ranch yarn on cones. The weft for the fourth shawl is 2016 Timm Ranch yarn that has been dyed. This is a perfect example of the difference that “finishing” yarn can make. 
This is one of the previous batch of shawls. It is mostly Jacob yarn but the weft is last year’s Timm Ranch/Jacob blend used from a cone without washing. In this case the width of the warp in the reed was 30″ with a sett of 6 epi. That is very open but when wet finished the shawl is lightweight and has great drape. However, the finished width is only about 20″ (33% draw-in and shrinkage). So I sett the brown warp the same at 6 epi but started with a 39″ wide warp.
Here are the shawls from the brown warp after wet finishing. That one that was so much narrower on the cloth beam? That is the one that is a little wider here. It is now 27″ wide (30% draw-in and shrinkage). The shawl in the same pattern but woven with the white weft is 26″ wide (33% draw-in and shrinkage). The difference between width in the reed and the finished piece isn’t much, but the photos show the dramatic difference in how the yarn behaves while it is woven. 
Here is a before and after photo. The bottom shawl has been wet finished. The top one is the same weft yarn and same pattern, but has not been washed. Look at the very first photo in this post. You can see how wide open the yarns are. Off the loom they are a little closer, but that looks nothing like it will when finished. 
An example of trying to take product photos with the help of a Border Collie.
Here is one of the final product photos. I noticed a surprise. I started to see a purple cast to one of the warp yarns. At first I thought that I just hadn’t noticed that shade inside while I was weaving. I tried to convince myself that it was still brown.
Do you see it here? 
Another photo of one not washed (no purple) and one washed. I lined up the same warp threads in these two pieces. 
Depending on the light setting in the photo (and maybe your monitor) you may see it more clearly in one of these other photos.
In person it is clearly visible, although it doesn’t stand out.
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