My little cotton patch

I'm finally starting to get come cotton from my little backyard plot! And green is coming in first. It got rained on, so it's a little matted looking. I was hoping it would be all green, but the outside is definitely on the brownish side. Which makes me wonder if it's going to be colorfast, or if it's going to fade with time. I guess I'll take some samples and put on a window sill to see what happens. My two plants are covered with bolls, so I should get enough this summer to start spinning. The plan is to make a 3-ply yarn in green, brown, and white. I bought a charkha for cotton spinning, but I'm not proficient enough yet to take a chance on wasting any of the colored cotton. So I'll be doing all the spinning on the Lendrum with the very fast flyer. In my spare time. Ha-ha!!



edited 8/30/2009 to add photo showing white and green cotton for contrast.

Finished Baskets

After many distractions in July, I'm finally getting around to posting pics of the finished baskets. The wine basket is always a good gift, but I wasn't too sure how the big urn was going to turn out. Overall, I'm happy with it. But it was a pain working with so many pieces of such long pieces of small reed.





Now I'm looking forward to picking Riley up this weekend for a week-long visit. He's bringing his motorcycle, so I'm sure he and James will be spending a lot of time at the track with that and the carts. We don't really have a lot of stuff planned, so we'll just do whatever he wants. Isn't that they way it's supposed to work?

Weaving Weekend!

A long 3-day weekend, and no chores! Priceless! So yesterday I started the "Double Chief's Daughter Urn" from The Ultimate Basket Book by Lyn Siler. So far it's looking ok, but it sure is hard to work with all this thin reed! This may be gifted if it turns out symmetrical. It's is pretty difficult to control the shape. We'll see.





I've also finished rethreading and resleying the loom, and have started the first placemat again. The weaving definitly shows some beginner weaver errors, but the selvedges are nice and the threading is correct. By the time I get to the end of this 5-yard warp, my weaving should improve tremendously!


This is the first placemat in progress.

The advancing twills saga continues...

I had the 20/2 linen for the weft in my stash, and ordered navy 10/2 cotton for the warp so that I can do this project on my loom at home. So by last Sunday I have the loom warped and ready to go. I sit down, start weaving, and a glaring threading error appears. In retrospect, I thought it was odd that I didn't have a couple of threads left over as I was warping (I threw in a couple extra in case I miscounted). But I marched blindly along without checking my work. You know the old adage, "measure twice, cut once". Well it applies to weaving too.



So there was nothing to do at this point but cut it off, pull everything out, and rethread and resley the loom. Six miserable hours later, I was back at the point I was at when the weekend started. But hey, I learned another hard lesson. And I've got a three day weekend coming up and plan to spend it weaving. I do really like the hand of the fabric and am looking forward to seeing all the patterns reveal themselves. There should be enough warp for 4 placemats and a table runner. But I may use the table runner yardage for a cushion on Gran's old rocker. Wish me luck, and hopefully it will be a productive weekend!

What doesn't kill me will make me stronger...

The Bay Area Spinners and Weavers are doing a study in advancing twills. I love twills, so this is the perfect project for me. They are providing all the looms and materials, so this should be a snap. Just follow the instructions. Right? Wrong!

When I arrived, I had to untie and retie the treadles on the small 8-shaft loom. That took about an hour, but I learned something new since my loom only has 4-shafts and you do all the combinations with your feet. Now it's time to start weaving. Yea! The weft is a beautiful slubby linen and I'm using an end feed shuttle. The first throw comes to a screeching halt. The little slubs are catching on the tensioner and making my selveges pull in like crazy. Arrggh! And the skinny treadles are hurting my feet. And since the sides are pulling in, I can't beat the weft in completely. What a mess! Then I notice a broken warp thread. Our instructor comes in to help and decides that the warp was sleyed too wide and is causing part of the problems. So she cuts off what I've struggled to do and I move over to the 4-shaft loom. After I go get something to eat and chill out for a while.

So I come back, fed and happy and ready to start again. This should be a snap. I'm weaving on a loom that's almost exactly like mine. So I'm going along and get almost to the end of the first pattern when I notice 3 broken warp threads on the right side. Our instructor fixes them and I continue. Two more throws then 3 more broken threads. Being the optimist that I am, I take this as my opportunity to learn to tie a weavers knot and repair broken warp threads. So we practice with a small rope until I get it down pat, and I move back to the loom. I tie a knot, and snap! It breaks again when I snug it down. So I try again, and again, and again... Now I'm getting frustrated again. I see the cone of warp thread sitting by the loom. I wind off a piece and pull. It snaps in two with hardly any force at all. Ah-ha! This loom is warped with weak thread. I give. Weaving gods - 2, Theresa - 0.

Although I didn't get any actual project finished, I did learn a lot today.
- Never assume that someone else has set up your work properly.
- Check tension frequently on loom and shuttle
- Always use good quality yarns for your warp since it has to hold up to strong tensioning and frequent abrasion.
- I can now tie up treadles on a 8-shaft loom.
- I tie a mean weaver's knot.
- I finally really understand how to read a pattern draft.

Since I have yarn here at home to do this study, I'm just going to warp my loom and do it here. I need the warping practice anyway...

Tencel Scarf Project

Just finished the prototype for the shawl I want to weave. When the Lone Star Loom Room closed it's storefront, I bought some 10/2 Tencel in a beautiful lilac. I had knitted with Tencel before and it has a wonderful drape, so I thought it would make a really nice scarf. And I was so right! Here are the specs and pictures:

Project: Scarf
Materials: Warp and Weft - 10/2 Tencel (Lilac)
Pattern: 2/2 horizontal herringbone twill (p.34 of Handweaver's Pattern Directory)
Dimensions on loom: 11 3/8" x 72"
Dimensions after finishing (not including fringe): 10" x 68"







I'm learning a lot with each project, mostly things not to do or things that could be done easier in a different manner. I'll be glad when all those things are burned into my brain and projects will move along faster. This was my first attempt at warping from back to front. I thought for a while that it was going to go in the trash, but thankfully, it straightened itself out. And James was home so I had an extra set of hands for tensioning. Overall, it was slow going because I'd read a little and do a little, check my work, and do some more. But the end product certainly justified the time. I wish you could feel through the screen. This stuff is soooo soft!