Progress and an Announcement

towel showing hem area between towels and beginning of second

Got one tea towel woven this morning, and started on the second. It's hard to see the pattern, but the light stripes are threaded straight twill draw, the darker stripes point twill. I'm weaving point twill so the towel will have a nice texture with the little diamonds in the mostly dark green areas.

My "Announcement" is that it looks like I've got the Ashford dealership. No official word yet, but I understand the distributor is extremely busy filling back orders of the Joy spinning wheel, and with the holidays coming up I'm sure he's wanting to get all the orders filled before then.

However, I have been added to the email bulk mailing for dealers, so I'm taking that as acceptance of my application.

Since deciding to apply for the dealership Doug and I have talked a lot about what that means, and how this will affect our lives. Doug will be able to officially retire in about two years, and since he's happy to help me doing shows we are looking at expanding retail operations.

Until now I've mostly sold yarn that I either dye myself or get another dyer to do for me (mainly because I don't really like using fibre reactive dyes, and I don't have room here to set up a dye studio. I've been using the guild room because they have a stove and big laundry tubs and that works fine for acid dyeing.) Plus some commercially dyed solids to go with the hand dyed yarns.

If I'm going to become an Ashford dealer - Ashford are mainly famous for their spinning wheels - it makes sense to take on a fibre dealership, too. While Ashford has some fibres, there are other options. So I will be applying to take on another dealership that has fibres and commercially spun yarns which will also make it possible for me to expand my hand dyed yarn offerings.

The bad news in this decision is that adding all of this to my already crammed and cramped home based business is that I need some significant storage space. :( So my determination to reduce my current stash has just kicked into high gear and I will be weaving as much of my current inventory as I possibly can, given I have just 3 months to get ready for my first retail yarn show of the year.

Well, I've been wondering what direction to go with my weaving career - it looks like a path has dropped into my lap. :D

So in celebration of my new pathway and looking at a new year just round the corner I've decided to celebrate with a give-away.

I have a number of tee-shirts with "I (heart) weaving" logo on the front. They are Hanes brand 100% cotton, size XL. They don't shrink much (I have several I use as weaving shirts).

So if you'd like a chance to win a tee-shirt, make a comment to this post and I'll draw a name out of the hat. You've got until Monday as I'll draw a name Monday morning and hope to put the shirt into the mail that afternoon (if you give me your contact info in the form of name at server dot com as part of your comment I'll email you for a mailing address). Hopefully you'll get it in time for Christmas, but if not you should have it to celebrate the new year.




currently reading Shadow Man by James D. Doss

Ready to Thread

Here is the warp in all it's colourful glory. You can clearly see the gaps where the varigated yarns will go.

In order to transfer the ends of the warp to just behind the heddles, I cover the second beam with some plastic. The 6 bouts of varigated yarns have already been transferred behind the heddles, leaving the rest of the colours taped to the beam, ready to be cut in as soon as the first two afghans are woven.



Since there were only 6 bouts of the varigated, I didn't hang the second stick but transferred the six bouts of varigated to the stick with the main warp. In this photo I've already done the 3 bouts on the far side and am about to do the last three.

The empty stick was removed after the transfer just to get it out of the way.

While I can thread from two sticks, the top one isn't as stable because it's hung from cords so it will make threading somewhat easier (and therefore faster) to consolidate all the bouts on one stick and tape it firmly to the loom behind the heddles.

I'm not sure where today has gotten to - I had great intentions for getting a bunch of stuff done this morning, but seem to have frittered it away on various and sundry distractions. Like reading through the paperwork to apply for an Ashford dealership. :}

I've been saying for years I want to cut back on all the stuff I do, but the opportunity presented itself to take over a dealership so Doug and I talked about it and since he wants to retire in a couple or three years we decided to go this route and see how it works out.

He likes messing with the equipment involved in spinning and weaving, and he's much more comfortable at being a salesperson than I am so we've been looking at doing more shows. Having him come along to share the driving and set up/tear down will take a huge load off of me, doing it all by myself. Adding an Ashford dealership would help expand our offerings. Doug talked with the distributor this morning and now I just need to get the info to him and hope for a favourable result.




In the meantime I did finish weaving the placemat warp and worked out a simple stripe sequence for a tea towel warp. Here are the first 6 inches of the warp wound onto the warping board.

There is a meeting I need to attend tonight so I think rather than start threading the AVL I am going to continue winding the tea towel warp so that I can get it into the loom tomorrow. That way I can do my daily 45-60 minutes of 'therapy' weaving. My bp is still throwing small spikes, although it's been much better for the last week or so. Since exercise still seems to be the most effective way to calm a spike down, there is high incentive for me to keep at least one loom weave-able at all times. :)