Weaverly

Second Scarf

The second scarf on the handspun wool warp features a handspun weft, a mixture of natural wool and light blue dyed bamboo fiber. The weave structure is the same as scarf #1, blocks of 3/1 and 1/3 broken twill.

Now let's shift gears. This morning, too cold and gray for a walk, a friend and I went to the Sigal Music Museum and enjoyed looking at the fine collection of historic pianos & harpsichords. The detail of craftsmanship on these instruments is remarkable. I took the following snapshot of the upper section of an Adam and William Geib pipe organ, c. 1825. The pleated cloth in starburst effect is a cheery note on a gray day.

Reset

After a major sorting and unskeining & ball-making week, fully intending to get started on a double width handspun blanket, I switched gears. I found that I had more lightweight (approximately sock-weight) yarn than I had thought, and not as much blanket-weight yarn. A reset was in order. I warped up my 8-shaft loom with handspun odds & ends at 12 epi. There's enough here for perhaps 3 scarves. The first two photos were taken by artificial light.

The weft for the first scarf is a mixture of wool and Angelina. You can't quite see the sparkles, but believe me, they are there!

The next photo is by window light. For some reason it shows the texture better. The structure is blocks of broken 1/2 and 3/1 twill.

When all the sock-wight yarn is finished, then I'll see how I feel about the blanket project. Change is my middle name.

Seeing Red

These pictures are all the same red. Funny how the ambient light conditions make such a difference.

Well, here we are at the end of the red warp. It's been on the loom for many months, but I just got around to weaving off the last few inches. It is four different yarns: three red-family cottons of various grists, and one tencel. They were warped together four strands at a time but threaded in random order. The threading is rosepath:1,2,3,4,3,2,1,4. The tie-up a straight 2/2 twill order. The treadling is point twill: 2,1,2,3,4,3. The weft is pink slub cotton.

I cut it off New Year's Eve morning. 

I washed & dried it New Year's Day. The front & reverse are very different. I prefer the side with the little cats' paws. Click to enlarge. There's about 2 1/2 yards, enough for a short summer pullover blouse. When I get around to it.

In the Department of Books:

I just finished reading  Dennis Duncan's Index, A History of the: A Bookish Adventure from Medieval Manuscripts to the Digital Age. Fascinating. Bibliophiles will love it.

Also read: Alan Furst's Kingdom of Shadows. I don't know how to categorize this book. Spy novel? Historical Fiction? Crime Noir? Or maybe just a damn good read.

Tidying Up

On this last day of 2022, this very gray and drizzly day, a good thing to do is organize my huge trove of handspun.

I have what you might call a spinning addiction.

The double width samples I wove last week have been finished. 

I asked my resident critic what he thought: 8 epi or 10 epi? He thought 8 epi would make a good hat. So much for him.

I decided on 10 epi.

But today is such a lazy day that I put all the yarn aside, did a few drafts to exercise my brain...

...then curled up with a good book.

And speaking of books, I just finished reading Jane Gardam's Crusoe's Daughter. 

And just in case I don't pass you on the Trail, Happy New Year everyone. 

The Cold Season

We do have a cold season in South Carolina (I mean thermally cold). It's officially here. There was frost on the ground when I walked on the Swamp Rabbit Trail. It's very pretty. You only get to see it in the shadows. As soon as the earth turns a little bit the frost is gone. You have to be quick.

This is a good time for blanket weaving. I've never woven a double width blanket before, but I'd like to try one now. It will help me make inroads into my stash of handspun. A sample is definitely in order. I made a small (8"wide) warp out of bits & bobs of handspun wool, following the instructions in the latest Handwoven, following Malynda Allen's instructions. So far so good. The fold is on the left. You can definitely see the two layers in this picture. I'm using two ends per dent in an 8-dent reed, for a final sett of 4 epi. 

Hereabouts the pastry chef is going all out. This was the scene in the dining room today. It looks like some residents have been nibbling on the curlicues over the front door. Hm-m-m.

And at our little private Tuesday night gathering, we enjoyed brisket and noodle kugel and lit candles on the menorah. It's hard to take a selfie of five people (some of who are very tall) and get the candles in the picture, too, but she did it.

I wish all of you joy in this festive season and in the new year, whatever celebrations are on your calendar. And of course, Happy Weaving!

I don't have any new weaving projects to show you today, just lots of pixels. I've resurrected a draft from approx. 20 years ago, network drafting, no echoes or interleavings. It has provided me with an entire afternoon of play. Here are a couple of my favorite variations, and I might just be in the mood to weave them soon. Click to enlarge.

In the Department of Books, I have just finished reading a book by one of my favorite authors, Jane Gardam. It's The Queen of the Tambourine. If I had to describe it in four words, I would say epistolary, funny, surprising, dark. 

Taking Out The Garbage

Remember this warp? I called it a garbage warp, a term I learned in the 1970's to denote a mixture of odds & ends used hit & miss, in the service of stash reduction. I threaded it straight draw on a 16-shaft dobby loom and used a plain weave ground with a sprinkling of warp- and weft-floats in satin order. 

It repeats on 16 picks. If you click to enlarge, you can make out the draft in the lower left of the laptop screen.

I finally wove off all 6 yards a few days ago and cut it off and washed it. Surprisingly it lost about 20% in take-up & shrinkage. 

But what used to be a pretty boring project on the loom is now ~5 yards of delightfully squishy cloth which will some day (I hope) be something to wear.

Mostly cotton.

Thankful

It doesn't take much. Just that little bit of red.

Sometimes I overdo it. A bit less red would be better. But then the other colors would change, too. Everything is connected to everything else.

The threading & treadling are interleaved & non-parallel. I'm enjoying the combination of left & right diagonals and a bit of birdseye effect. Now how on earth did that happen? I'm sure I don't know. Click for enlargement.

In the Department of Books, I have just finished reading Foster by Claire Keegan and Signal Fires by Dani Shapiro.

Naturally

On a whim I ordered a kit of naturally dyed yarns from Cotton Clouds. I was blown away by the colors. I was also attracted by the community service aspect of the yarns. The final product is to be a simple vest of four rectangular panels. Instructions are for a rigid heddle loom, but I thought it would be an easy thing to adapt for a table loom with shafts. As it happens, it was not so easy. The warps are double (two strands acting as one), which is easy to accomplish on a RH, but a bit fiddly for a shaft loom. But I persevered. 

Once the loom is warped, the weaving is straightforward. Plain weave. There is a pattern suggestion of bands of pickup and other texture weaves, but I decided to stick with plain weave, and perhaps add fancy button loops as an embellishment post-weaving.

The colors are indeed wonderful. More about the dyers of San Rafael, Guatemala, here.

In the Department of Books, I have just finished reading the new English translation of Alessandro Manzoni's I Promessi Sposi, or The Betrothed. I don't intentionally go seeking out novels about the Plague, but they seem to find me. This one was wonderful and I'm glad I stuck with it. Lot's of interesting Italian history here. And it apparently inspired Verdi to write his famous Requiem Mass.

Washed

The very last bit of the 2.5 yard warp is woven off. I twisted the fringes & machine washed the scarf with a bunch of towels, then popped it in the dryer for 5 minutes, then hung it up to finish drying. After a steam pressing, here is a rough selfie. It is delightfully smooshie, not stiff at all. Take-up & shrinkage 8%. I'm really going to enjoy wearing this. But I might choose a different t-shirt. Or maybe not.

Each color block is a different weave structure. Four of them. Click to enlarge. This could be considered a miniature gamp in itself. I can imagine weaving any of these four structures by itself.