Cottonwood leaves

Finally I felt ready for weaving.
CottonCloud's Cottonwood leaf towel kit was waiting for too long.
As I am not fond of measuring warp and dressing the loom, it takes a lot of time for me to made up my mind. It seams I "overwaited". As a result I made three major mistakes that took two weeks to correct.
First of all I measured wrong number of 10 brown threads (6 instead of 16). However, I noticed this only after the loom was fully dressed. Initially I thought I miscalculated natural ones and this would only make my towels a bit narrower. No big deal.
Wrong! Big deal!

As I could not leave the warp as is, I decided to do everything properly and measured 10 more browns and was planning to add them to the left part of the warp, it's not that I need to re-dress everything.
Wrong again!
Somehow the threading did not work, it was supposed to end on Shaft 3 but it did not.
I recalculated all ends and realized that I had 2 extra ends in the middle, 307 instead of 305. Not a problem, just take them out. But still no match.
I checked every thread and every heddle twice, everything seemed to be correct, but still no match.
Two days later it finally came to me that I misread the threading chart. It had one thread at the end of the middle section for balance and I viewed it as part of the pattern and repeated it three extra times.

Happy end.
I am proud of myself for not giving up and finally having everything in order.

Warp rep debut

After long pause I found strength to start new warp. This time I'll be trying warp rep.

Maine Island Runner from Handwoven May/June 2007 seemed like a good choice but... 

This time I decided not to buy new yarn and use only what I already have. I have nothing similar. Out of ten colours of 5/2 cotton I have I used nine in a kind of similar sequence. Hopefully the result will not be a total disaster. 

Look at my warping paddle!

In braids warp looks nice. Now I think I should have used fewer colours.

Loopy progress

My huck studies finally over and I can come back to my loopy cloth.
Not much progress but there is a colour change!

Huck in violet

My huck studies are finished.

2.7 m warp of Noho yarn produced three runners: first one in huck, second in huck lace, and third in huck boxes. The pattern was taken from the Handwoven Magazine (Nov/Dec 2009).

I miscalculated the length of the first runner and it turned out to be 2 inches less than it should have been. Good thing they are not for sale.

This time I decided to use up the warp as much as possible. Look at it. Last 5 picks I did by hand and hook - my shuttle could not get in. As a result the last 4th 'sample' runner came out the longest.
And the prettiest as I tried to decorate it with stitching.

I love huck lace!

Next time I need to try it with thinner yarn.

This is my second runner on this warp. The first one was in huck, second - in huck lace.

Loopy cloth

One project over - another is on the way.

This time I dressed my rigid heddle loom with cotton/linen blend to make fingertip towels.

It's not exactly weaving but very relaxing.

A Touch of Spring towels ready

My 'A Touch of Spring' towel kit from Cotton Clouds is finished.

Cotton Clouds were generous enough to add some extra yarn for the kit, so I wound a bit longer warp, and this resulted in three towels instead of two.

Two of them are planned 25"x14", and the last one is 20"x14".

For the last towel I also used up all my coloured warp threads and it turned out to be stripy in both directions :).

Can you see squares here?

A Touch of Spring towels

I forgot to take a photo of the kit from Cotton Clouds when I received it but here what is left after measuring the warp.
Natural cottons at the top are for the weft.

One day when I finally learn to dress my loom evenly - I would become the happiest person.

But as for now - I have to put up with loose/tight ends during the weaving.

There is one really bad thing about this kit. It took me two weeks to set the warp (I could do this only for a half day per week - very busy lately). But... it weaves really-really fast. I need to restrain myself from finishing too soon.

And the towels look fabulous!

Cushion top

I cannot believe it took me more than a year to turn my lovely ZoomLoom squares into a cushion top. Cotton/acrylic blend I used is soooo soft and lovely!

Waffle weave

My successful experiment with direct warping on my Ashford table loom resulted in 3 and a half waffle napkins. Now I can see a drawback of the direct warping. Too much work but so few towels.

The weaving was such a pleasure! If I were not so busy I could end weaving in a couple of weeks. Good thing I had a chance to prolong the pleasure.

Every napkin is a bit different.

The first one has a waffle hem, which I changed to tabby on all others.

And the last one is too short, as usual, but I always like the last one more :)

Aren't they pretty!

 

I like the way the right side has colourful waffle lines, and the other side has lines of circles.

Direct warping for waffle weave

I am not a warping girl. Love to weave - hate to warp.
Direct warping  is the reason why I like my rigid-heddle loom.
So, one night I had an idea -  why not use the direct warping method on a table loom.
And I tried.
To make my life at least a bit easier, I used thin 20/2 unmercerised cotton doubled.
Waffle napkins will be in tea-stain colour with a colourful twist.
Below are the colours I used.

Here is the direct warping in practice.

I threaded heddles and reed at the same time.

I thought this will be easier than using a warping board. My mistake!

Regardless all the difficulties and back pain, I have a successful finish. More than that - I managed to finish all the warping without a single mistake and my first 12 picks looked like a real waffle.

And here is my pretty stripes. I decided to make them only at one side of the napkin.