New Kromski Rigid Heddle Loom

I got a Kromski Rigid Heddle Harp Loom for Christmas - well actually, I got it a couple of weeks early, which was good because my David loom had the transparency warp on it and I wanted to weave a scarf for my grandson's girlfriend, Bri.
I wove it out of a merino/silk blend that I had spun up previously. It came out beautifully, and she is the type of person who really appreciates something that is handmade.

I thought it might be handy to have a little bag which would hold my stick shuttles, warping pegs and a scissors, etc, so I took some wool yardage that I had woven years ago, and I sewed this little bag with pockets. The Kromski stand has holes you can put the warping pegs into, which is really handy, but it seemed like they would just catch dust and dog hair in my house, so I made the bottom pocket deep enough for the pegs. It has a little bow to adjust how tight the top of the pocket is. 

The middle pocket holds the heddle hook, warp assist, and clamps. The upper pocket is a place for little scissors and I can just tuck a needle into the fabric to use when needed. I'm happy with the way it turned out. 

I twisted some of the same yarn on my fringe twister (which is really a battery operated hair braid twister!) to use to tie it onto the loom so it can be removed when folding up for travel. 

I have several days off for the holidays and am really looking forward to having time to weave, sew and get some organizing done! 

I hope you all have a peaceful, joyful holiday season!!!

Lou  -  the wolfmoonweaver

Transparency Progress

I haven't posted in a while. Time seems to go by so quickly. Now that all the preparation and cleanup from Thanksgiving is done, I am taking today to weave. Oh my gosh - yes, really weave! I'm putzing along on my first transparency and hope to make some real progress on it today. I'm winging it. I did make a pattern and print it out to use. You can see it under the warp in the picture. Since I no longer have a plotter and did not feel like driving to the other end of town to get it printed, I printed it out in tiles and then taped them together.
The only info I had to go on was what I gleaned from internet sources, so I am not an expert or even have any experience with this. My previous tapestry work has come in helpful though. To me, the inlay is much like tapestry except you can still see the warp and background weft.

I have the cartoon rolled up and held in a roll by a paperclip at each end. It's held close to the weaving area by a pin on each side at the bottom. I can just unroll it as I go.

And a little dog interest - here's my 2 dogs on a rug I wove years ago out of Pendleton selvedges. I have washed it a few times in the washer so it is nice and fulled - very thick and cushy and the older dog especially likes to lie on it.

Fall Days

This time of year can be so gloomy in this part of the country. It seems like the sun rarely shows itself and we have days at a stretch of grey, cloudy weather. All the colors of the fall leaves help to make up for it though. From my back door, I can see the burning bush in all it's glory, so I went out and took a picture of it, and a few other pictures, just to bring a little light into my day.

As you can see, we haven't raked up the leaves yet, but they make a colorful ground cover for now.
This is a maple tree down the street from us. It is always gorgeous this time of year. My phone's camera is making these lighter and pinker than they are in real life.

And this is our maple tree last week, before it dropped all of it's leaves.

I also picked one of the last roses of the year, to keep me company while I work at my desk. 

And today, the clouds are gone and the sun is coming up. It's going to be a beautiful day!

My first transparency

The linen came in yesterday, so I wove up a little sample on a piece of cardboard to get an idea of what sett to use, and what size yarn to use for the pattern weft. I've never worked with linen before and I'm going to enjoy weaving these. The weaving will be more consistent on my big loom, but this little sample gives me an idea of where to start. I taped this on a window to see how it would look.

I have a lot of 2 ply wool which I'd like to use, so I tried that first, then split it into a single ply, which works better. The single ply is at the top. Now, I just have to wind this warp and get it on the loom!

The Treasure of Friendship

I usually don't spin very much. Not because I don't enjoy it, but because there just aren't enough minutes in the day to do all of the things that I'd like to do! I started spinning up the merino/silk blend that I bought the other day and I just love it. Spinning and weaving are both very meditative, relaxing ways to spend my time.

Louanne is a dear friend of mine. I met her when I moved to Arizona and she taught me so much. I answered her ad in the local paper about spinning lessons and from there, our friendship grew.

 She was raised on a ranch in southern Arizona and she learned about all of the things that I knew nothing about, having grown up in the Chicago suburbs. She's the one that got me started with sheep. I remember bringing home a Targhee ewe and her lamb in an extra large dog crate in the back of our minivan! What a trip that was. Soon after, we traded in the minivan for a pickup. She taught me how to milk my new Nubian goat, sold me my first French Angora rabbits. Together we went on my first road trip to buy looms and yarn from someone who was selling their weaving stuff. She keeps a shotgun by the back door, bakes her own bread, makes her own soap and takes care of her extended family.

Friends are the glue that helps us to hold our lives together, the cheerleaders that inspire us, and keep us sane life takes a crazy turn!

I appreciate each and every one of you!

Something to spin . . .

I went up to "The Fold" in Marengo, IL to purchase some roving to spin.

Toni has so much stock there, yarns, wheels, roving, and more.

 I had one specific dyed roving in mind, but really liked a merino/silk blend even more. She has a huge inventory and I had fun checking out all of it! My granddaughter and DIL came too, and really enjoyed it.
This is the roving that I chose. I'm going to spin it up for warp to weave a ruana.

I've also ordered linen yarn from the Yarn Barn in Kansas to start on the transparencies. I have lots of wool to use for the inlay and will also use some specialty yarns for accents. As soon as that arrives, I can warp up the David and get started!

Ideas bursting out all over

Fall always brings the urge to spin, weave more, and knit. With the onset of cooler weather, my thoughts turn away from the garden and outside and to more "wintry" tasks. 

We are remodeling the dining room in our Craftsman style house. Bill is in the process of adding a coffered ceiling and when that is finished, he'll put new headers on the windows and refinish the oak floor. 

I wanted to do something different for window treatments for the bay window but hadn't come up with exactly what I wanted. Right now, I have temporary shades in there and I don't want to put the white lace curtains back up. When the sun shines through one of the windows, I love the shadows on the shade from the butterfly bush right outside. 

As I was admiring that shadow effect again today, it hit me. I'm going to weave transparencies for those windows. Not a top to bottom one, but a panel for the bottom half of each window and use botanical shadows as the pattern for the inlays. 

Here's the shadow inspiration:

I'll start sampling tonight, as soon as I am done with work, and research the internet for information on what fibers work best for this idea. 

We do need shades of some type, and I'm tempted to use the old fashioned roll type shade. I can hide them behind a very short matching panel at the top of the window. To hang the panel, I'm thinking that I can use a narrow diameter brass rod that stays within the interior of the window frame, so that the oak trim won't be covered at all and possibly add another thin rod in the hem of the panel, to weight it down so that it hangs straight and flat. 

I'm headed up to "The Fold" in Marengo sometime this week too, to find some merino or merino/silk roving to spin up for a ruana. I purchased Sarah Lamb's video on Spinning to Weave and watched it this past weekend, so am inspired to do some spinning!

I'd rather be weaving

Kyrie hates when I am working at my "real" job. She doesn't bother me when I'm weaving, reading, or anything else. Maybe she knows that I'd rather be weaving! But, I don't want to wish that work slows down because the $$ from that pays for my weaving toys and yarns!

I'm almost done with the infinity wrap, which is a good thing, because I plan on wearing it to a wedding this weekend! I had some outpatient surgery last week and it slowed me down a little. But I should finish weaving it tonight.

I love my horizontal warping mill

I just love when a tool makes my life easier. I have arthritis in both feet, and winding a warp on a warping board hurts my feet. It's something about the swaying slightly back and forth that really does it. So, I bought a used horizontal warping mill and I love it. I'm winding a warp now for the infinity wrap and I can do it sitting down.Wonderful!

The Big 6-0

Yesterday was my 60th birthday! I'm old. I'm a crone. Officially. I love it! Reaching 60 was a huge milestone for me. My mother didn't live that long. I feel an incredible sense of relief that I am still here and that the future now holds endless possibilities since my time no longer feels like there is a big glass boundary.

I had a great day. I worked most of the day but had lunch with my best friend Theresa and for dinner, my son and his family surprised me at our favorite Chinese restaurant for dinner. I am blessed with great sons, wonderful grandchildren, and a very thoughtful daughter-in-law. I wish Bill could have been here, but he was out on the road and won't get back til today. That's ok. Life is wonderful and I'll take every day I can get.

On the weaving front, I am in the middle of weaving the second bath towel out of cotton chenille. I have to hurry and get that finished because I am weaving a project out of the last (I think) Handwoven magazine to wear at a wedding we are going to the end of September.

My family makes me smile.

What a week

What a week this has been!
Last Wednesday, my computer locked up - I'm pretty sure it was either the motherboard or the CPU, so had to order a new one. It got here on Monday and after talking to tech support, they said I could install my old hard drive into this computer with a few changes to the BIOS. Long story short, it did not work, it goofed up my hard drive and the new hard drive, so now it won't boot up and had to drive into the suburbs to buy another computer and am sending this one back. I'm the only CAD drafter at the company that I work for, so the pressure has really been on to get me up and running again.

I downloaded Office 2013 last year, but could not get the file again to reinstall and ended up talking to a great Microsoft tech support guy in India named Syed. He got it installed and while we were talking, I found out his mother is a weaver too! I asked him to give her my email address so that I could meet her and also told him about the Fibernuts group on Google+ and asked him to tell her about it. I really hope to hear from her and lear about what she weaves.

Over the weekend, Bill and I went to an arboretum in Rockford with my brother and SIL.

We had a great time and I saw this beautiful canna. It was nice to get out and walk around with lots of trees - I love being in a forest. Then we headed to Olive Garden for lunch.








Here is my dog Kyrie. She is fascinated with watching TV, and has now started watching the computers too, especially, since my grandson showed her some dog videos on YouTube. When he left his room for a few minutes, she ran in there and jumped on his bed to watch his computer.

And now, I'm having trouble with my backup server, trying to get back 2 critical files. I love computers, BUT!

Finding other fiber artists near me

The tapestry loom is situated and was already warped when I bought it. I think I'll let my granddaughters do some weaving on it until I am done working on the towels on my other loom. I just have to get to my wool yarn stash in the back of a closet! I've had one of my granddaughters staying for the summer in that bedroom, and had to push all my stuff to the back to make room.

Two of my other granddaughters are coming over today and we'll try to dye some yarn. Again, first I have to get to my dyes, and then get the big campstove out of the garage, which is currently storing some of my son's furniture, I don't know if it's doable or not!

I was reading an article in our local newspaper the other day about a yarn bombed tree in DeKalb, and found out there is a fiber arts collective that meets once a week at our local Barnes and Noble store. They are mostly knitters and crocheters, with a few spinners. I found the group on Ravelry and joined, and realized that there is a fiber arts festival down in Franklin Grove this weekend. It's less than an hour from here and if the girls aren't busy, we'll all head out to the fiber festival.

I get so caught up in the day to day grind, that I lose track of all of the wonderful events that are out there, and opportunities to meet other fiber artists.

Road trip

Bill and I went on a short trip over the weekend to buy 2 looms. One to keep (the tapestry loom) and one to sell. I started out weaving tapestry. Wow, it has been over 20 years ago. Then I moved into weaving primarily on floor looms, either various fabrics and shawls, etc, or saddle blankets. Now I'll be able to work on tapestries again. Though I have no idea where I'll have enough time. But, eventually, I will!

I'm winding a warp on the David loom for 2 large bath towels. I'm using the pattern from Halcyon yarn. The warp is 5/2 cotton and the weft is bulky cotton chenille. These are woven about 35" wide, and my rolls of kraft paper were only 30" wide, so I bought a cheap 36" wide mini-blind and took it apart to use the slats when winding the warp. They're easy to add when winding the warp and I saved the box that the blinds came in with the top panel removed to use under the loom to catch the slats as the fall while weaving. 

Smoky Mountain Trip

I really enjoyed our "truck-cation" as Bill dubbed our trip. Because it was a working trip, I didn't have time to check go to any of the places I would have liked, but it was beautiful to drive through the Smoky Mountains. As we drove down there, I realized I felt like "myself" more and more. Not someone's mom or someone's grandma, but actually me. I had forgotten what that feels like.
When we drove past Berea, Kentucky, I saw the signs for the Arts and Crafts Center, but it also said "no trucks", so stopping there was not a possibility, but I would like to go back sometime and see it. They had a lot of rain in that area - some torrential downpours that we drive through, but I love the mountains and it was still beautiful.

Also on my list of things to do, would be to check out the area near Hendersonville. Next time . . . .

On The Road

Since I have a few days off work for the holiday, I'm going on the road with my husband in his semi this afternoon. We'll be going to South Carolina, but the real attraction for me is to see the area around Hendersonville and Asheville, NC. I think if I was going to make a big move when I retire, that's where I'd want to go. There is such a rich history and culture of weaving in that area - lots of weavers, suppliers, etc. Add to that, the mountains, and it seems like a place I would love. I've only seen the area on Google Earth, and now I get to see it in person! Unfortunately, we won't have the time to actually do anything there, but I get to have a peek at least!

My son has nicely offered to take care of the dogs, even the elderly one who needs to be watched to make sure she eats enough.

New Project!

My replacement part is now on the David loom and the yarn I ordered  from Halcyon is due to be delivered today! That means I'll have some time to warp the loom and start weaving.

I ordered bulky cotton chenille and 5/2 cotton to make the bath sheets that they have shown in their catalog. I'm anxious to see how they turn out. They sound like they will be wonderful!

On the Way

The replacement part for my David loom is on it's way and last night, I used naval jelly to remove the rust from the 10 dent reed that came with the loom. Most of the rust was removed, but I'll do it one more time to remove the rest.  As I mentioned before, I don't think the loom was kept with much care before, but it is looking better.

My 8 year old DGD, Kendall, wants to weave a scarf for her mother while she is staying with me this summer, so she picked out some yarn at Hobby Lobby and I wove a little sample on a piece of cardboard to determine the sett. I'll have her wind the warp tonight or tomorrow and we can get the warp wound on the beam and through the heddles while we wait for the beater piece.

Last summer, all of my granddaughters used my little Easy Weaver loom to weave themselves winter scarves. The David loom is compact enough and they are all tall enough now that they can reach the treadles and will be able to learn how to weave on a floor loom if they want to.

Patience

Kyrie (Valkyrie) stares at me patiently waiting until I will stop working on the computer and take her for her walk. 

Not Weaving Yet

I was looking forward to weaving on the David loom over the long weekend, but it's not going to happen. When I finished cleaning up the loom, I noticed that the beater was hanging at an angle - one side of the beater was closer to the front of the loom than the other. (This is a used David and I don't think it had the best of care for several years). After disassembling the hanging beater, I found that the bottom wood support had twisted which caused the problem. I ordered a new one from Louet and I had to wait a while because it was coming over in their next container. It arrived Friday, but it was the bottom piece of their new style beater, not the old one. I called Dave at Louet and they are arranging a pickup for this piece and will get me the correct one, but it will probably be a little while since it will be shipped from overseas.

To be honest, I don't weave nearly as much as I used to, or I would like to now. I used to weave for a living - mostly saddle blankets and rugs, but also custom ordered fabrics and shawls, but several years ago, I decided to go back to school and get a degree in CAD drafting and now I have a "real" job. I'm lucky, because I get to work at home. But I miss all of the weaving that I used to do. We decided last fall (well, I decided and my wonderfully supportive husband Bill, went along with it) that having a dining room that was only used a few days a year for holidays was a waste of space when it could be better used for weaving space! Bill travels during the week and is only home a day or two on weekends so the rehab is moving slowly. We had torn up the carpet, and the oak floors underneath will need to be refinished, and we are putting in a coffered ceiling but it is going to be great when it is done.

I'll be able to get a bigger countermarche loom which I'm very happy about because I would like to start doing some rugs again. In addition to the David loom, I also have a a Toika Norjaana loom which fits neatly in the corner of the living room, but it is not as large as I will now be able to have. When I get around to it, I'll take photos of the Norjaana and put it up for sale to make way for a larger Toika Eeva. I really like Toika looms, and especially like the worm drive on the warp beam.

This summer has been a little crazy so far. One of my sons is staying with us for a few months with his 2 daughters and their little dog Jack. That's in addition to the three of us and our 2 dogs.

But I am hopeful that someday the dining room will be finished, I'll find exactly the used Eeva that I want and by fall and winter, my "real" job will slow down a little and I will be able to weave again!

When I started this blog I thought it would be filled with all of my weaving adventures, but there hasn't been much to write about. I'm looking forward to getting some of my ideas turn into reality and I'll have more to write about!

Lou

Louet David!

I brought home a new (to me) loom this weekend, a Louet David 90. I had a smaller David several years ago and really loved using it. It's a great loom with extremely light treadling. It also folds up so it doesn't take up much room when not being used. By looking at how much the color of the wood has darkened, I would say that the loom is possibly 20 years old.

It did need quite a bit of cleanup. I removed all of the texsolv heddles and tieups and washed them, which removed the dinginess from them. I also wiped down the entire loom with a damp cloth and made some adjustments to the texsolv and the harnesses which are hanging perfectly now. The springs had lost a little of their resistence, so I tightened all of the spring connections - I hooked them one loop over in the Texsolv. The reed that came with it is rusty and I haven't started on that yet to see if it can be cleaned, or if it will be beyond hope. The rod for locking the harnesses was missing, but I had another rod that fit perfectly. I had to replace a few screws that were rusty, and I need to replace the 2 little eye hooks in the back that hold the lease sticks, but that is easily done.

As soon as I wind the warp for my Vikings scarf, I'll use the David instead of the Toika Norjaana for this project and see how it's working. I'm using a snowflake twill for the scarf and Jaggerspun Zephyr wool/silk for the yarn.

We have another snowstorm on the way, but since I work at home, I can't get a "snow" day to play with my new loom! Unless we lose electricity, which almost never happens, because then I can't work on the computer. I will probably have to wait until next weekend to warp the loom! Darn.

Weaving my way through life . . .

It occurred to me this morning that my byline, "Weaving my way through life" had more meaning than I realized when I first wrote it.
When weaving, the weft is sometimes up, sometimes down, but still works its way across the warp, back and forth, over and under, like my journey through life. And the more ups and downs as I go, the stronger the fabric (life) that I weave. If there is a break in the warp, it gets repaired and if there is a little loop on the edge of the warp, the fabric is still strong and true. Maybe not perfect, but wonderfully strong nonetheless and full of the uniqueness that is me.

Finished scarf

I finished the wool scarf for my husband. I really like the Harrisville yarn that I used and will use more in upcoming projects. 

I am one step closer to taking over the dining room for my weaving space. We sold the big dining room table today! Now, we only have to paint the walls and ceiling, refinish the hardwood floor, put in the cabinetry, and it will be done. But that will take a while with the small amount of time we usually have to work on it every week. But it is still progress!
The weather is turning very cold tomorrow, so it will be a good day to have dinner in the crockpot and spend the day weaving and watching football.

Team Spirit

I am a Minnesota Vikings fan. My husband (and grandson) are Packer fans. This makes for some interesting Sunday afternoons around our house and on Sundays, when the Vikings play the Packers, it is not unheard of for me to go into another room to watch the game. :)
It seems a little ironic, that later today, the Vikings and Packers meet in the first round of the playoffs and this morning I am threading my loom with gold and green for my DH's wool scarf.  There will be 13 white stripes, 1 for every championship they've won, and 4 silver threads - 1 for each Super Bowl win.
Is this going to jinx my Vikings, or am I adding to the "good karma" bank by magnanimously weaving a dreaded Packers scarf? Or maybe, by weaving a specific number of white stripes, this will "hold them back" and prevent them from another win? Who's to say, but I guess we'll see tonight what will happen!

Yarn For the Next Project!

The yarn for the next project has arrived! This will be for a wool scarf for my DH who is a Green Bay Packers fan. There will be one strand of silver for each Super Bowl that they have won. Hopefully, I will get the warp wound tonight.