Happy New Year! Its hard to believe another year is gone - looking forward to a weaverly year ahead. Everyone has been so productive over the last few months - actually all year - good job! Looking forward to all the projects to come in the weeks to come.  Weave on everyone!

Tina

Comments

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 18:17

loomyladi (not verified)

You all are up to some purty projects.  Tien's loom is amazing!  Isn't it wonderful to have such an amazing group of people to share the fiber journey with?  I'm loving it!

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 18:23

loomyladi (not verified)

the last few days ohave been non-productive as I was out playing in the beautiful snow and cold in Ky.  Sitting by the fire on Fri evening I struck up a conversation with a lady who was doodling (zentangle).  during the course of our discourse I found out that it was Pat Miley a COE in Handspinning.  Seems that she has been attending this event for a number of years.  We had a delightful conversation about fiber, weaving, spinning, etc etc.  Another attendee was seen carrying her knitting around, this young lady is a sophmore in college and her friends say that she is ALWAYS knitting something.  Her hands are never idol.  She doesn't spin or weave, yet, but apparently hopes to learn someday.  Today I passed through the studio to pick up some projects to bring home.  The cold makes it unbearable in the studio so I'm going to work on a project on the 8H Tabletop and get some finishing done now that I've cleaned and reorganized the sewing room.

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 18:23

loomyladi (not verified)

the last few days ohave been non-productive as I was out playing in the beautiful snow and cold in Ky.  Sitting by the fire on Fri evening I struck up a conversation with a lady who was doodling (zentangle).  during the course of our discourse I found out that it was Pat Miley a COE in Handspinning.  Seems that she has been attending this event for a number of years.  We had a delightful conversation about fiber, weaving, spinning, etc etc.  Another attendee was seen carrying her knitting around, this young lady is a sophmore in college and her friends say that she is ALWAYS knitting something.  Her hands are never idol.  She doesn't spin or weave, yet, but apparently hopes to learn someday.  Today I passed through the studio to pick up some projects to bring home.  The cold makes it unbearable in the studio so I'm going to work on a project on the 8H Tabletop and get some finishing done now that I've cleaned and reorganized the sewing room.

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 20:41

Erica J

Sally I always fall in love with your work! What structure, draft did you use for the warp closest to the camera? I love the colours and the way it is weaving up.

Endorph, I'm happy to take the blame. I am enjoying seeing more spinning here on Weavolution. I look forward to seeing your yarns. I'm working on thecfirst Spin Off fibre club pack, got it in their sale. I've also joj\ined Wild Craft's Fibre Club and am on the lust for Bee Mice Elf's club! I have to have something easy to go along with the drawloom weaving and brushed mohair!

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 19:32

endorph

with the fisrt tube sock out fo my handspun samples - I'll take a photo when I finish it. I am doing tube sock so I don't have to worry about turning the heel. I don't mind turning heels but since I am working on these at lunch at work a tube sock is nice and mindless! I jsut finished up a pair of slipper sock from the yarn minskeins I received in my Paht Fiber Sampler boxes from Nov and Dec. I was lucky and snagged a couple fo boxes again in this month so will have more samples to play with. I am also part of a Phat Fiber Valentines swap so if will be interesting to see what fiber / yarn I end up with that!

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 20:38

Artistry

Loomyladi, Pat Maley is a guildmate of mine! Small world! Sally, The Weavatorium (sp?)looks exciting and productive ! How do you do it?!
Mon, 01/27/2014 - 21:24

ReedGuy

I've got everything all set and the bugs worked out of the warp for my scrim. I wove an inch with the end feed shuttle, glad I bought. Anyway, have to eat some left over oyster Rockefeller from yesterday. Sure is a nasty bunch of wind with this snow storm, not much accumulation, but sure blows around. Nice and warm in here though, wood furnace fire. Can't beat wood heat, no sir-ree. Hey, I'm just seeing a glimpse of the sun before it sets here on the Atlantic coast, well I guess it's setting in Maine to west. :D

Everyone's projects look awesome. Keep the shuttles flying and the wheels a spinnning.

 

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 21:24

WeavingRose (not verified)

I was glad to find this weaverly bunch! I like the daily check in idea on our weaving this year and I would like to join because I plan to be extra productive this year.  The bitter cold weather is helping me out as I work in education and the school I work at is closed. So I'm weaving!  I love it! (though it would be better for school to be in, honestly) I am working on an throw in the 4 harness Canadian snowflake pattern. 

The draft was done by Laura Fry.   I am trying a picture, but I'm not sure how it works

Tue, 01/28/2014 - 15:26

sally orgren

Can you take a screen capture of the pattern? (On a MAC, that's apple+shift+4.) A cross hair will appear as your cursor, you drag and draw a box around the area you want to capture, release, and you'll hear a shutter "click". The new file will appear on your desktop and be a .png file (look for file name "Screen Shot").

Ok, someone else is going to have to explain the PC version, and there is a tutorial for loading photos nearby...hopefully someone can fill in the gaps here for WeavingRose.

And Erica, that colorful warp closest to the camera is a demo warp compromised of random point twills, repeated at an interval I now forget. (Maybe 10 pattern repeats across the warp?) Then just pick lively colors, and place the most intense colors in relation to the most dynamic or dramatic parts of the pattern (the biggest points in the twill line, for instance). That's a formula that typically works. 

Oh. And have lots of little cones in lots of colors and sizes! ;-)

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 22:10

WeavingRose (not verified)

I have a chrome book.  I will try again!

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 22:14

WeavingRose (not verified)

 

well maybe not.  doen't have the knack yet!

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 22:15

ReedGuy

PC version is Ctrl-PrtSc and open your photo software, File/New then Paste (or Ctrl-V) and Crop it to pertain to the subject of the photo.

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 22:20

ReedGuy

Looks like thumbnails, let see if this works.

A little bigger. :D

Mon, 01/27/2014 - 23:21

endorph

we are always happy to welcome new members to our jolly little band of weaverliness. Looking forward to seeing what you have to show us! Feel free to share, complain, commisserate - pretty much anything goes in here!

Tue, 01/28/2014 - 00:43

tien (not verified)

Sally wrote:

> Tien, how did Alfred like weaving?

LOL! He staggered back in after about an hour and a half and said, "Wow...if I were a smoker, I would totally need a cigarette right now. Forty shafts of pure weaving pleasure!"

Alfred's a hoot. I totally love him. :-)

Tue, 01/28/2014 - 00:52

tien (not verified)

Emmy is now fully debugged and ready to go! Tonight I plan to finish weaving samples for my sample exchange (due Feb 15) and tomorrow I will get started on two projects for Handwoven magazine.

 

Here is a 2-minute video of me weaving on Emmy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QL9491vAnoY - it shows her from all angles, too, even the e-Lift at work!

 

The other really exciting thing: I just shipped a load of exotic wood off to Bluster Bay Woodworks! I had asked Terry if he would be willing to make me an end-feed shuttle from something exotic (I was thinking curly koa), and he said yes! (Not sure if it was because he thinks he owes me a favor for something I did a few months ago, or just because he's an awesome guy. Maybe both!)

 

Anyway, Terry was having trouble finding the right wood, so I took matters into my own hands and bought some pieces of exotic woods to send to him. So now two pieces of amboyna burl, a piece of buckeye burl, some chechen wood, and some pink fiddleback eucalyptus are headed his way. My friend Alfred (of "I need a cigarette now" fame) threw in some pink ivory and boxwood, too. Terry should be getting it towards the end of the week, at which point I'll know more about which woods are usable and which are not. I'm so looking forward to getting a magical Bluster Bay shuttle in an even more gorgeous wood!

Tue, 01/28/2014 - 01:26

ReedGuy

ROTFLOL haha to Alfred. Don't be to hard him Tien. Beats shoveling snow into the wind. LOL!!

Gotta love wood. You should have an awesome endfeed out of all that mix of wood. :)

And a jolly little band of weavers we are. :D

Tue, 01/28/2014 - 14:57

MMs-and-OOs-Ha…

Like the video, especially when you smile at the end, yes it's working! What an accomplishment, to buy the loom, ship it, and get it all going. I can see how the E-lift slows you down but I guess there isn't much that can be done there. Still loving my rotary temples and thinking about buying another set for my 60"er. I think it makes more difference in the quality of my weaving than the auto-advance. The 60" came with the old-style auto-advance not installed. It requires major surgery to the beam, holes drilled etc. due to the age of my loom. Someday ....
Tue, 01/28/2014 - 15:20

theresasc

It was neat seeing all those shafts in action, but all of those texsolv heddles gave me the willies - I am still not comfortable threading texsolv.  It is one of the things that stops me from being totally in love with my Cranbrook.

Not much weaving out of me, elbow is acting up again so I mostly stayed away from my looms, maybe try some this week.  I am enjoying all the projects that are on them, so having to stay away is frustrating.

Tue, 01/28/2014 - 15:25

sally orgren

And thanks for the enlargment, ReedGuy. The lupe didn't work well with a digital image — all I saw was pixels ;-)

Cathie, I can only explain my flurry of weaving activity to house elves. We must be having an infestation due to the abnormally cold weather.

Tue, 01/28/2014 - 18:19

HarleyWeaver

Tien, your video was awesome!! How did you setup your loom to weave the design and is this something that can be modified to do with a 2 heddle knitters loom? I'm a beginner weaver and I'm just in awe at the beautiful weaving work peeople have on display on this site. I hope one day to be able to weave some of the projects shown on this site. Right now I'm trying to start slow and learn, but I'm just curious in understanding what you are doing. :)
Tue, 01/28/2014 - 18:19

HarleyWeaver

Tien, your video was awesome!! How did you setup your loom to weave the design and is this something that can be modified to do with a 2 heddle knitters loom? I'm a beginner weaver and I'm just in awe at the beautiful weaving work peeople have on display on this site. I hope one day to be able to weave some of the projects shown on this site. Right now I'm trying to start slow and learn, but I'm just curious in understanding what you are doing. :)
Wed, 01/29/2014 - 01:09

Artistry

Funny Sally ! Weaving Rose, Very pretty. Another shout out to ReedGuy for enlarging the photo. Brand new carpet in my studio so we can start moving my looms back in , yay!
Thu, 01/30/2014 - 14:29

sally orgren

My frist crimp cloth came off the sample loom, was steamed and dryed. Okay, so I achieved "wrinkly," but I was looking for "organized pleating".

I am not sure about the rest of it. I liked the 16/2 warp (lighter overall weight fabric) but I not sure about the texture yet. You have to use polyester for the memory to hold the pleats/crimp, and I may just not be a poly-kind of gal.

And the biggest dissapointment—the pull threads bled onto the fabric during the steaming process. Hard to see in this photo, but definitely evident in the green stripes.

So, I made some notes and wrote down some questions, and I will try sample #2 this weekend.

Thu, 01/30/2014 - 21:52

Artistry

Even though the disappointments, I think it looks pretty cool. I wonder if there are other synthetics that would work too, if you don't like poly?
Thu, 01/30/2014 - 22:11

ReedGuy

I'm experimenting with warp pile today. Just getting the yarn threaded now for facecloth with warp, 11".

Cathie made me do it. Blame her. :D

Fri, 01/31/2014 - 03:01

endorph

handspun slipper sock #2 - I will post a photo when finished. Will do some weaving on the RH this weekend and am planning out a towel warp for the mighty wolf - now to get the energy to actually wind the warp and hem the stack of towels sitting next to the sewing machine!

Edited to add photo:

 

Fri, 01/31/2014 - 08:50

Artistry

ReedGuy, ROFL, oh, I'm such a mover and shaker :) Ha!Ha! Have Fun! Tina, Some socks! I love them!
Sat, 02/01/2014 - 01:15

tien (not verified)

Hi HarleyWeaver,

Unfortunately, I don't think this specific draft is feasible on a rigid heddle loom - but with two heddles and a pickup stick, you can certainly do imagery on a rigid heddle loom. Do you have a copy of the Weaver's Idea Book? It's got a lot of good ideas for rigid heddle weaving.

Sat, 02/01/2014 - 01:28

tien (not verified)

My final bit of weaverliness for January is actually a good dye job, about which I am still smug:

Color matched yarns

The cone of crimson yarn and the hank of brown yarn I dyed myself. The two snippets of yarn are the colors I was trying to match - two yarns from Treenway Silks. I think I did a pretty good job!

 

Why was I trying to match Treenway's colors? Because I work mostly with mill ends (I dye all my own yarns), but I'm working on an article for a Certain Weaving Periodical that needs commercial equivalents in order to accept a project. Rather than ordering yet more yarn, I decided to use what I had on hand and just dye it to match a commercial color. The color match isn't totally perfect, but it's pretty darn close.

 

So I am Smug today. Color matching is not easy, but I did it! :-)

Sat, 02/01/2014 - 02:11

Artistry

Good for you Tien, matching the color! You're right it's not easy! I took Karren Brito's course Predictable Color where we learned how to match colors and I remember going through so many color runs to get the color I wanted! You have every reason to feel smug, Congrats !
Sat, 02/01/2014 - 18:31

HarleyWeaver

H

Hi Tien, Thank you for responding. Yes, I have the Weaver's Idea Book. I was just wondering if I could do something similar. What you are weaving is really cool!! I'm weaving one of the patterns from this book now with the current project I'm doing.
Thu, 02/27/2014 - 22:04

Hersheyl

I would like to use crackle weave without tabby on a project using 3/2 mercerized cotton in warp and weft. I would prefer a block pattern but need to understand what the weave will look like without tabby and how to design the draft. Can someone help me?
Thu, 02/27/2014 - 23:07

sally orgren

3/2 is a larger fiber, and not using tabby means you will have longer floats. A float should be no longer than 1/4 of an inch. So you may be setting an impossible challenge for yourself.

Why don't you look at crackle patterns and create a draft of the one you want to weave, and then see if everyone can help you refine that?

By the way, why don't you want to weave tabby? What if you wove the tabby weft with a very fine thread, and treadled the pattern wefts in your 3/2, so the stability of the cloth was maintained, but the tabby did not "dilute" the pattern visually?

Thu, 02/27/2014 - 23:23

ReedGuy

With no tabby ground you will end up with a weak cloth with very long floats. I do not think it will be all that desirable. The tabby is a binder.
Thu, 02/27/2014 - 23:45

Hersheyl

Hello,

I am using a 3/2 mercerized cotton in the warp and weft on a four harness jack loom to make a small cover in crackle weave.  I don't want to use a tabby between picks. How do I draft a pattern without the tabby weft?

thanks,

Leah (hersheyl)

Thu, 02/27/2014 - 23:45

Hersheyl

Hello,

I am using a 3/2 mercerized cotton in the warp and weft on a four harness jack loom to make a small cover in crackle weave.  I don't want to use a tabby between picks. How do I draft a pattern without the tabby weft?

thanks,

Leah (hersheyl)

Fri, 02/28/2014 - 00:53

ReedGuy

The tabby isn't part of the pattern, it's what binds everything to stabilize and give strength to the cloth. To draw up a pattern it is easiest to use a program like WeaveDesign which is free. But the number of blocks to a pattern correspond to the number of shafts used. With four blocks, two blocks are opposite to the other two. If your only going to use 4 treadles, I would suggest you are actually attempting Halvdrall, but still requires tabby typically using a weft that is half the size of the pattern weft as in oversjot and crackle. The tie-up is pretty much like this.

 

OOXX

OXOX

XOXO

XXOO

On a jack loom O is shaft down, X is shaft up.

Ignoring the fact that tabby is part of the weave structure, is not going to magically make good cloth. 3/2 is pretty heavy yarn for a coverlet.

Fri, 02/28/2014 - 19:32

warpology

 With Susan Wilson's book in front of me, Yes you can weave crackle without the tabby. It is one of the treadling variations she shows in her book and I wove a bit of them on my long sample peice. It can be treadles as: Point twill, twill, rosepath, M & Os, and advancing twill. Lace is woven with one weft and she has several drafts in the book.  Boundweave can also be done without tabby.  So many variations I wish I'd had this book years ago. Couldn't make heads or tails out of the monograph I had!   Have fun Hersheyl

New studio too cold still, in NC. Had a furnace man here today, Fingers crossed.   Lois at Warpology 

Fri, 02/28/2014 - 19:44

warpology

PS: Read back a ways and the variations I mentioned from the book have no long floats.

Fri, 02/28/2014 - 20:43

ReedGuy

From your photos it looks like a twill block with a tabby ground. You have the typical squared grid effect of tabby ground cloth.

something smilar to this tie up

     ↓↓ ↓↓---twill block

OXXOOX

XOOOXX

OXOXXO

XOXXOO

^^----tabby

I couldn't make heads or tails of your draft, but I do see tabby structure in that cloth that is binding the twill blocks.

Wed, 08/06/2014 - 01:10

spindycindy

  I am new to weaving, but I love the style, size of these looms...I hear they are hard to come by...does anyone know the best place to look for one here in the USA?

 

Thanks,

Cindy

Wed, 08/06/2014 - 21:50

sally orgren

Fingers crossed!

An image of a quilted tractor from our state fair should appear.

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