A bonus day in the studio......

A weekend of cold rain and a first little dusting of snow kept us indoors.  Feeling just too cozy, Patrick and I did not finish the fall clean-up as we had planned.  It is a task that really needs to be finished before serious snow flies but the weather was not cooperating.  The bonus, of course, was that I took advantage of the wet weather on Saturday to spend the afternoon in the weaving studio.  

I had a set of log cabin placemats waiting to go onto the loom.  This is one of my long time favorite patterns which I have used many, many times.  I have made runners, both long and short, placemats, coasters and even some rugs.  Sometimes I use rags for the weft filler like this runner above, but these new placemats will be woven with a creamy, white cotton rug filler - very Scandinavian looking!

This very traditional warp-faced threading is 30 ends per inch and can be laid out in varying width blocks in the warp and weft to create endless variations.  These mats will be patterned with a stripe and block border along both the ends and the sides, creating a solid color block in the center.  The bonus of log cabin weaving is that the colors are reversed on the back side giving you two different colorways!  I will post photos of these when they are complete.

Threading 30 ends of yarn per inch through 12 inches of heddles and a 15 dent reed in the beater can be a daunting task.  My neck and shoulders get sore and my tri-focals are a focusing tricky- wicket!!  So I have learned to break up the task with filling the shuttle spindles, winding the cotton filler onto the boat shuttles and a coffee break or two.  But it is, oh, so satisfying to get a warp like this tied onto the loom, ready to weave.  What a great afternoon!

I did also have a little time to play around with some paper collage - some fun stickers.  And the never-ending, always intriguing boxes . . . . .more map paper cut to size for folding, black and white recycled envelope paper cut for the "take-to-work bag" to fold at lunch breaks.  Then I put together white cardboard trays for the box sets and made an adorable "Cheerios" tray that just screams to become the first of a graduated size set!  Yes.

Not a bad day's work!    Garden clean-up . . . . . . another day.

Today, stringing the loom . . . .

I love my loom. I have been weaving on it for almost thirty years. We know each other well. Many different projects have been completed on this loom, everything from very involved double weaves to many things as simple as this cotton scarf.

Last weekend I warped this project and it had to wait until today, to make it onto the loom. I prefer to string this loom during the daylight hours as the lighting just works so much better for me.

The one inch bundles tied into the warp make the spacing and preparation very easy. I wind the warp onto the loom from the front onto the back beam and I use a raddle. This one is a short homemade one, simple finish nails every half inch in an oak board.

All the yarns are neatly arranged across the width of the project and ready for the winding process. The tension is adjusted as you wind to keep all the threads evenly taut around the back beam.

In this picture you can see the lease sticks. They are maintaining the cross in the yarns and help to apply some tension as you wind.

All wound and ready to be threaded through the heddles. I will be using 4 harnesses and weaving this in a plain weave so it will be a simple threading process.

Now to remove the raddle and adjust the heddles for threading.

I just love the way the threads look when they are wound so neatly.

The threading went very nicely. Although I must need to have my eyes checked and have my glasses adjusted. It is getting difficult to find the right distance to see well! Thank goodness for tri-focals!

All threads in a heddle! Hopefully all threads in the correct heddle!

Next remove the lease sticks as they have served their purpose.

I like tying the yarn bundles onto the front cloth beam rod - adjust the tension, pat each bundle and adjust again until they are all just right.

Ready to weave. Hopefully, I will have the time and energy to work on this scarf during the evenings this week. This is a one scarf warp so it will weave up quickly once I have a block of time to devote to it.

A lace weave warp is ready to go on this loom next, so I mustn't dillydally too much!

Happy weaving . . . . .