Coming down to the 'end' of the current spate of tea towels, and this one is showing some promise. I'm going to tweak the treadling, I think, see if I can 'counter change' (checker board) the motifs. But even if I can't, I think I'll weave this, just to see how it turns out.
After a small snow dump yesterday (about 8" or 20 cm) we woke to a brilliant sunny day today. It's still 'cold', but a 'normal' temperature, not the extreme cold we had over the weekend. Still, I'm just as glad I don't have to leave the house.
My goal today is to finish the warp currently on the loom. I am also in the midst of sorting through my bobbin lace supplies. I have decided to downsize my bobbin lace 'stash', in part because I truly do not need that many pillows. I will keep two - my two 'favourite' pillows, and try to sell the rest.
I'm still sorting through my bobbins, but there are plenty to make beginner 'kits' - pillow with x number of bobbins. IF I can find anyone local who is interested in learning.
I also have someone who will look at the large wall piece Water Sparkling Falls, and I *may* have a 'home' for it. If not, I'm not sure what to do with it. In the end, it's just cloth, but cloth woven for a very specific purpose and not really suitable for anything else. Unless I can find another artist who might see potential in it for...something. TBD.
Sorting through the bobbin lace stuff has been a lot more emotional than I hoped. The vast majority of my bobbins were made by a friend, who died in 2018. Many of them are personalized for me - in celebration of my birthday, and such. Her husband turned the bobbins, then she painted them with things like the provincial flowers, or for xmas, easter, and such.
I found the book I wanted to use to make small birds, which I'll include in my xmas cards this year - or donate to the guild to sell. I also 'found' the card blanks with cut outs and envelopes to fit the tri-fold card stock. I did a bunch of these little birds a long time ago and included them in my xmas cards that year. What I do not want to do is begin a big lace project. So I will do smaller items, maybe put hanging threads on them so they can be hung on an xmas tree or dangle in a window. Small indulgences.
We all need a little 'pretty' in our lives. With a small amount of effort, some work with a creaky brain, and a little bit of thread, I could make some small pretties to give to my friends. One nice thing about bobbin lace is that it's pretty flexible and if you go 'wrong' sometimes it's really hard to tell. And if it can't be fixed, well its a few pennies of thread to toss. And goodness knows, I have thread aplenty, given I kept all my mom's quilting thread.
I have also promised myself I am going to tackle the loom's little quirk of tossing heddles off the end of some of the shafts. I've tried a variety of things and none of them stop it from happening. So I checked the loom and I *think* I can add a 'keeper' string, like is used on Scandinavian loom style shafts. It's a simple 'fix' and if it works, it will be a relief. I may be the only person on the planet to have a Megado that keeps tossing heddles off the ends of the shafts, but TexSolv heddles are expensive and I'm tired of tossing heddle bits away. Because the only solution is to cut them off once they fall off and become entangled. I have some 'extra' heddles I can add to one of the shafts that needed me to tie in 'repair' heddles in order to weave the current warp, but I don't have enough for all of the 3 shafts that are low (because they keep tossing their heddles off!) So I may have to buy more. But I can add some to the one that is lowest, and tie the keeper string onto the top of the shaft and see if that works. If it does, I may invest in two more bundles and add those to the two other shafts low on heddles. And then do ALL of the shafts, just because I'm tired of getting the loom all set up and then, when I go to start weaving, oops, the loom has a big mess out of sight and I need to cut the tangled heddles off before I can continue.
The problem is, tying those strings to the shafts is fiddly and awkward. So I will likely do the worst offenders to begin with, and then maybe one or two at a time until all the shafts (16) are done. I don't have a lot of tolerance for doing fiddly jobs in awkward positions.
Anyway, the sun today is very welcome. As is the snow that fell yesterday, even though the roads are crappy. We desperately need the moisture.
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4 comments:
My Megado also tosses off heddles if left to its own devices. So far, I’ve managed to get them back on again. How about taping the end heddles to their shafts? Haven’t done that myself, but have taped the ends of shafts that kept popping their end wires and found it effective.
I think the keeper string will be the most effective, because I'm tired of trying everything else but. :) I have one more towel to weave on this warp and then I'll add the heddles to shaft 9, tie the string on and see how it goes. Since Europeans have been doing this for centuries, I'm pretty sure it will work. It's just fiddly so I tried other things first.
The end metal wires are fine, it's just the cables that slide out of the slot and then the heddles drop like flies.
my megado has also dropped heddles but I have put a short piece of bamboo skewer in the gap at the end of the shaft at the top, which is easily accessible and this has completely solved the problem.
Sounds like it would work. I had seine twine on hand, no bamboo skewers. :D If it keeps happening, though, I will keep your suggestion in mind. Always like to have more than one solution to a problem...
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