Just finished some twilly alpaca woven thing and rushing through photos of it so I can bring it to my dear friend, then snow started coming down, doubling the excitement . . .
By the way, in about a week, Juno will be three, already! Where does the time go?
Another simple check with three big blocks of color shows so well how shades interact and colors multiply, intersections creating new colors and keeps the interest going through the arduous task of managing even edges. Something so basic as three colors can give a lot of gratification when first learning the basics of weaving. I am still a massive fan of check!
In my recent weavings I’ve been reinforcing the selvedges with extra threads and using a temple, which at this early stage of becoming a weaver, I have already come to rely upon. I think every once in a while weaving something without extra selvedge threads or temple, would give me practice keeping the selvedges from drawing inward by keeping the tension even but not too tight, and the weavers’ angle generous. There are many weaving notes and photos left below, in the event that anybody might find them useful, and I am happy to talk about the details further in the comments as well.
♣ Weaving Notes ♣
How could I have escaped the inevitable? The fate that I would want to operate multiple shafts was almost necessary to learn to be a weaver, and so I surrendered to fate. It took me about three days to put together, and it was not without near catastrophic moments, and in the end, it all worked out just fine. It is the largest model, with a 32″ weaving width capacity, and 8 shafts, although I don’t plan on using more than 4 for quite some time. I’ll admit to you though, I am a little afraid of it, for it surely will elevate me beyond mere simple plain weave to perhaps twill, and perhaps with a few hundred more texsolv heddles, I could weave very fine linen. We will see. For now, it is just an inanimate object that needs to have the pulse of creativity brought into it, and so today I intend to begin its very first project, I have made the calculations, with four skeins of alpaca for the warp, it is waiting for the spark of life. Wish the two of us luck.
Calling this one Sunny Skies, as it radiates sun rays and with a little cool stripe of sky blue . . . to be sent off to my youngest niece who is at university in sunny Santa Barbara, a vernal emissary to cheer her up.
Warp stripes of burnt orange, golden yellow, and sky blue, against weft strips of burnt orange and golden yellow; the pattern makes an interesting, elongated check pattern with a thin strip of pale compliment color contrast. A beautiful check improvisation if I may say so, and definitely plan to explore this same pattern again per weaving notes below, the checks are so subtle as is the contrast stripe, that the possibilities are many. Exciting!
♣ Weaving Notes ♣
I finished weaving on Christmas eve, cut off the loom on Christmas day and in a chocolate induced moment of bravery I tossed it in the washing machine to wash, dry, and shrink. The day after Christmas I pressed, cut all the loose ends, hemmed it by hand, and am very pleased with my first tablecloth. I have been working on this cotton-linen table cloth since warping in November, at first not very often, as I had not developed a regular habit of weaving, but then as the weeks went by, and spending half hour of focused weaving several times a day in between chores. I even explored weaving spaces with the loom, having carried it up and down stairs several times, as well as back and forth from the tiny house a couple of times, and even hid it away in a closet out of sight with weaving in progress, while I cleaned up for guests on Thanksgiving Day. Sure a floor loom would be faster, but however slow this big rigid heddle loom is, slow and steady wins the race. I’ve learned how to handle the long stick shuttle while keeping the sheds relatively neat and clear, and to boast, there is less than 16″ of warp waste including tie-on and header, I think amazing given that I calculated perfectly for the fit on the table. All in all, I’m very pleased with this first serious piece of cloth. I really LOVE the simplicity of this loom, and believe its colossal 48″ weaving width is manageable because I’ve learned to weave while standing.
♣ Weaving Notes ♣
A very happy winter solstice, and a walk with Juno to the top of the mountain on this very clear bright morning, with wintery sentiment from the red toyon berries. All the new growth is overtaking the dead trees from the wildfire (now six years since), the old trees still standing appear silver and artfully dignified in their rightful place, here, there, everywhere, in the crisp winter light.
((click 1st image to go to slide show))
The batts were simply lifted off of the carder and split into strips, wrapped into nests, and then photographed. They spun up perfectly, and I think I have arrived at my method of methods for a fast and uniquely interesting way to make yarn. In this color mix I chose solid tones that were already dominant in the hand-dyed braid, which end up creating a very subtle contrast of tweedy colors, if any at all, more like enhancing the hand-dyed braid. From the camera’s eye, the presence of color changes from the dyed braid are practically unnoticeable. I spun up as close to worsted/aran weight as I could, short draw and single ply, calming the twist energy with a scalding finish bath, thwack, and hang dry. This spinning method absolutely is the easiest I’ve ever done, and I was hanging the spun skeins dry before I could even blink. For the quick and easy way I prepared the wool, see tech notes in Tweed Chronicles: Speed Tweed #2 , and stay tuned, there will be more of the speed tweed experiments in the territory ahead!
Almost mid Decembrrr, the days marching through the last stretch of Autumn, and the last page of the calendar. The trees rapidly losing their foliage now, the maples already bare, with only a few remaining black oak leaves hanging on, the ones always the last to fall. I haven’t been out photographing my favorite season this year, but it is ever as beautiful as I long for it to be, ever as calming, and nurturing, and as these last leaves break free in the breeze, they land as a surprising finale. And then it is time for nature’s sleepy yawn as soon it will bed down for winter, and with knitting to be done!
At last, I have cast on! Three hours before an obligatory early December Christmas party, knowing that without my knitting I will languish surrounded by people I don’t know, so a quick knitting project would give me much company, and … Continue reading
In a recent post I began my Speed Tweed experiments, combining an earthy mossy sage toned dyed braid along with undyed wool rovings, attempting to simplify the steps in creating a varied tweedy yarn (which is spun by the way, more on that project is forthcoming). I’m loving the drum carder and speed tweed so much I am racing on to Speed Tweed #2, blending hand pulled tufts off the end of three roving in equal amounts, placed into the carder, and I really love this color combination so much! Its gotten to the point where I just walk down to the tiny (wool) house, make coffee, and get to blending on the new drum carder, for no other reason than I’m in a wool carding mood. I’ll show off these blended batts in another separate photo wool nests and the spun yarn in another post.
♣ ♣ ♣
Techy stuff for Speed Tweed #2:
Spinning finally finished, a few weeks ago, and My Summer Fields project has thus far taken me through the summer well into autumn since the resident drum carder arrived. All that work messing with raw fleece, then giving up on it because I couldn’t get the strong smell of sheep out of it (and imbedded into my new drum carder) then changing course and instead using yards of undyed merino-corriedale Wool Of The Andes roving I had in my stash, I finally worked out the batts, and I drafted almost 600g of rolags ready to spin. On and on I spun a little here and there, then as I ended up spinning it a little too fine (my new default it seems), I decided to try a 3ply yarn. But the more one cards, drafts, spins, and plies the careful color variegations in the wool, the more the colors all diffuse! Unfortunately, a lot of work for that sad reality. However, I am pleased enough with it, but it is slow tweed for sure. I wanted to knit a sweater out of this, but am distracted by the looms in my life, and the holidays are now upon us with the new year coming just around the corner. So perhaps this would best be knit up in the calm mid-winter months. Oh, and I’ve had a chance to gauge the weight: 135y = 100g. I am thinking a bulky weight which will probably be 14-16 sts = 4 inches with US9-10 [5.5-6mm] needles.
The carded wool from Speed Tweed #1 has been spun and I have some observations. In this experiment I chose the ” layered batt ” for my first speed tweed experiment, as the colors & fibers will be least blended of all, and yet one can at the point of lifting the batt off the carder, begin spinning. These skeins were spun single ply, aran-worsted weight, short draw, soaked in super hot water, and hang dried, completely relaxing the twist. I’m finding that it really doesn’t get much speedier than that!
Above are samples of the first run through the carder (left), the second run through (middle), and the third (right), each time the colors homogenizing more. The most dramatic tweedy splashes of color happen in the first sample . . .
In summary, this fiber preparation was very easy, laying the layers down in one go, no hand-mix, just one trip through the carder. However, I think the process I’ve prepared the wool in Speed Tweed #2 may be the speediest preparation of all, requiring least number of steps, and in one carding its done, ready to spin. Got to spin that up and wrap up the speed tweed series.
I am experimenting on simplifying spinning the carding process as much as possible, so that eventually I may have a recipe, so to speak, to spin in the tweed style much like the Donegal mills spin that I love so much. Since my last big spinning project I have wanted to liberate myself from so many tedious steps, and so speeding up the process is what I’m after in “speed tweed” series.
This experiment starts with a very simple layered batt of a colored hand-dyed braid and one or two solids, then spun quickly to an aran weight single ply. I am working on my drum carder this time, however blending boards or even hand carders are going to be the same process, just on a smaller scale. The drum carder of course, now that I have one, offers the most fiber volume with fewer steps, a blending board a few more, and hand carders will take many.
I chose a multi-colored combed top braid from my small collection of indie dyer braids, and I admit, this is the most significant shortcut, for to take advantage of so many beautifully hand-dyed and multi-colored rovings available these days — so many — having the colors already blended is the biggest time-saver, and so very easy to find them too! I usually prefer subdued color, so for this experiment I have sandwiched the colored roving in-between two neutral solids.
Additionally, I plan to spin in a very simple time-saving way, in a short draw worsted technique. That is, working with the combed top, trying to keep the fibers aligned, then keeping the alignment of the wool as much as possible by splitting strips off of the batt — no rolags, no dizzing, no further prep, just loosely put into little nests to photograph them — okay, so now its time to lose myself in some spinning.
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Techy stuff for Speed Tweed #1:
An Ashford 48-inch rigid heddle loom has shown up here, and I am broadening my weaving experience. I waxed it and put it together some time ago, and it happens to fit excellently in my closet squirrelled away when not in use, because it is actually a very simplistic streamline idea in loom design. But now I’ve set it up here for its first test weave, sacrificing all the cottolin thread I had on hand in order to learn the scope of it, and have worked only about a third of the warp through the reed, all to show for about three hours of set up; calculating basics, measuring and placing the tables for the pegs, which I’ve got spread out to section the warp, and actual warping, all which is so uncomplicated and easy compared to conventional warping. The direct warping method is brilliant, a loop thread is drawn from the spool, through the dent slot in the reed and around the pegs, which creates two threads, one which is often rethreaded later through the heddle hole, creating one thread in the slot, and one in the hole. However on this project I’m doubling up on threads which makes it even easier, although twice the initial threading through the reed to the peg, for then all the threading will be finished as soon as I make it across the full forty-eight inch reed (12.5 dent), with no additional threading after I reel the warp on to the back beam. Honestly, this is the method of methods, and I’m going to explore it extensively (a conversation with Bea comes to mind, about doubling up the threads in the reed.) : waves to Bea : Oh, and obviously the colors are much too bright for the room, and now that I photograph the set up in the house I realize now that I am going to need to get shade cards and be much more subdued with my color choices, but I am weaving this test run with all that I have on hand, and it is going to apparently consume a lot more yarn/thread than my Ashford Knitters Loom, which I fully expected proportionally. Its going to be so wonderful to have it around when I want to weave larger things, like table cloths, small blankets, curtains, etc . . . and besides, it is just the natural progression of things around here, pushing for new perspectives and experiences. In closing I’ll say that I have learned to weave standing, so working the stick shuttle through the shed, although going to take some wrestling with the reed, will be taken in stride, literally.
Number three of Donegal Tweed neckwear pieces, last week I reeled off the loom , and now it is finished, and this one warped with the help of Juno who’s colorway is so similar that I’m naming the colorway “Juno” . . .
I’ve woven this one with a larger dent reed on my Ashford Knitters loom than the last two, a 12.5 dent reed, and think I’ve decided that it is the perfect size for this single ply fingering/lace weight yarn. Now three finished, no more Donegal Tweed and so on to the rest of the yarn in my drawers.
♣ Weaving Notes ♣