Persistance

 

Last Monday I cut the beige/brown warp off the loom, then spent the next couple of days beaming, threading, sleying and tying on this warp.  It's now Monday again and 5 towels are woven, with about 13 or 14 left to do.  (I also worked on the articles I'm researching/experimenting/writing.)

Each warp does around 18-20 towels, depending on how long each towel is woven.

At the rate of two towels per day (on 'good' days) that means another 7-8 days of weaving until this warp is complete.  (Finer yarns take longer to weave.)

I don't get 'bored' with weaving.  I know a lot of people can't stand to weave more than 1 or possibly 2 things identically.  They don't usually put 20+ yards of warp on their looms, and that's perfectly ok.  We each weave for our own reasons, and mine are not appropriate for someone else.

The more I read of the Pain Project, the more convinced I became that finding a way to keep weaving was important for my body in more ways than I had fully realized.  And I am once again aware and appreciative of how my current health 'team' have rallied behind me in order to help me keep weaving.

While I don't get 'bored' weaving, I do get 'tired', so the current warp was a pleasant switch before I went back to warps that are more muted in colour.  Not that I don't like pale hues, just that sometimes I like to see things a bit brighter.  Something a little bit 'different'.

So for the up-coming towel warps, I did something a bit different.  I ordered four different colours all very close in value.  As I weave each warp, I will change the combinations.

For the first warp I've chosen grey and green.  The next will be two values of blue.   And then I will start switching the combinations.  Pale grey and pale blue.  Green and blue.  And so on.  By keeping the hues very close in value and mixing them 1:1, the warp will have slight variations and will be more 'interesting' visually than a solid colour warp.

I have enough of the white linen to weave at least 5 warps, quite possibly 6.  Once the linen is used up, I will look at what other yarns I have on hand and continue the efforts to reduce my stash.

On the current warp the rest of the white 'mystery' yarn will weave about half of the warp, maybe a bit more.  Then I will work on some cottolin I have on hand and whatever warp is left will likely get woven with the Brassard natural coloured hemp.

I am no longer weaving like the hare, but the tortoise can still get stuff done.  

Don't forget my ko-fi shop BOGO sale ends midnight July 9, 2024.  There are 14 different designs to choose from.

Begin Again

 

It's hard to get a photo of the towels on the loom because the 'right' side is on the underside.  In the photo it looks like there is a change in colour, but that's just the area where the light can shine through the warp, making it look lighter/brighter.

I'm very pleased with this warp.  The towels are quite thick but good for hands, or a good rub down after a long hot tub soak.

The sale on ko-fi is going well.  Several designs are officially sold out.  (Anything with just one towel left has been pulled from the shop.  I can use them for gifts.)

Yesterday I wet finished the beige/brown version of this design so I may post those tomorrow.

We are having a hot spell for the next few days.  I'm glad I don't have anywhere to be until Tuesday, when I see the eye doctor.  The optometrist told me that I have damage to the cornea from the shingles, and as such the eye doctor will likely monitor me for the rest of my life (or until she retires).  However, she told me the baby cataract isn't impinging my vision yet, so I won't likely need surgery for a while.  Since I'm not a big fan of someone poking my eyes with sharp objects, I'm fine with that!

Finished the book The Pain Project today.  It was helpful, informative, and I'm glad I read it.  It's helped me understand what is happening in my body, better.  Given another pain flare last night after several nights of no flare, meant I was more accepting of it happening.  And it will continue to happen.  That's just fact.  

As long as I can keep weaving, I will continue picking away at my rather too large stash, and try to enjoy the process as much as possible.  And if I need an afternoon nap?  So what.  I'm retired.  I can do that.

If I have the spoons today (maybe not given the lack of sleep) I will do the final prep for the first article I'm writing.  I might even start the FA part of the process.

WEFT has surpassed their kickstarter goal and are underway getting the first issue organized.  And I can now tell you I have been asked to contribute.  I really hesitated saying anything in case it all falls through, but...the word is out and my name is on the list, so...

Time for lunch, then back to the loom for the 2nd session. Then see how many spoons I have left.

Instant Gratification

 Well, sort of...

I've been enjoying the (nearly) 'instant' gratification of weaving with thicker yarns AND using up more of my stash, especially that 'mystery' yarn.  I don't know how large/heavy the original cones were, but they were huge.  It looks like when I finish the current warp there will be enough of the mystery yarn to weave most of this next warp.  If there is anything left over, I have some cottonlin that I'll use to weave more towels.

One of the challenges has been knowing if I have enough yarn, so I took my scale, put an empty tube on it and turned the scale on, removed the empty tube then placed one of the tubes with yarn on the scale.

Doing this, the scale automagically subtracts the weight of the empty tube from the weight of the tube with yarn.  This gives a fairly accurate indication of how much yarn is left on the tube.  (Check to see if your scale does the same - it's a great and very useful tool.)

The larger tubes are fine - it was the smaller darker green I was concerned about.  I'll need approximately 560 yards to beam the warp and the smaller tube I weighed has something like 680 yards on it, so there will be plenty.  Whew.  Because I'm quite liking this colour combination.  It speaks of spring and early summer to me.  The colours will be put onto the loom randomly and no effort will be made to put them in any kind of order.  Except if two of the non-green colours are side-by-side, then I'll manipulate them so that they have a green thread between them.

Towels have been very much on my mind for the last, oh, 4 years(!) mainly because I had so much fine cotton yarns I needed to use up.  So, when Robyn Spady asked me to write an article for her Heddlecraft issue on towels, I was delighted.

That issue dropped today, so if you have a subscription, keep an eye out for it.  Looks like lots of great information on making towels.  :)

If you don't have a subscription but would like to purchase this issue, you can do that on the website.

Robyn always does a very thorough examination of each theme issue, so I can say it's well worth the price if you are interested in making towels.

Now I know what I'll be doing 'next', time to get back to the loom and weave a couple more towels on the current warp.  

Simple

 

Yesterday I shared this draft online, referring to it as 'simple'.  Several people commented that it didn't look 'simple' (I paraphrase).

But here's the thing.  You can make something 'simple' look 'fancy' - if you have enough shafts, and understand how the weave structure(s) work.

If you look closely at the threading, you can see that the progression is a V and an inverted V - with 'bumps'.

The straight line up and down the shafts advances with reverses - point progressions within the larger point of shaft 1-16-1 then flipped over 16-1-16.  No further modification was done to make something truly 'fancy'.

The motif is just 67 ends, flipped to create the opposite version for another 67 ends, and those two repeat across the width of the cloth with some straight draw at the borders to make up the rest of the width of the cloth, providing 'borders' at the selvedge.  The towel will be woven with a hem area of straight progression treadling to mirror the threading.

The tie-up is also 'simple' - a twill consisting of 1:3:1:3:2:2:3:1 and then doing the thing that twill does - move over and up by one step.  The treadling for the towel body is 'woven as drawn in' (or woven in the same progression as the threading).

I did almost no thinking for this draft (unlike the matrix series which required megawatts of thinking!), just following the twill lines and let them resolve in the simplest way possible.

The cloth is not 'balanced' insofar as you will see more warp on one side of the cloth and more weft on the other.  When I do this, I weave it with the weft side up so that I lift the fewest number of shafts.  The other side of the cloth will look like this:

In this particular cloth, there won't be a dramatic difference - the warp is a combination of various shades of very pale blue/grey/slightly darker blue, and the weft will be white.

This is my first 2/8 cotton warp in well over a year - maybe two!  And I'd forgotten how much faster working with a 'fatter' yarn goes.  

Yesterday I beamed the warp (about 24 yards) then started threading and managed to nearly finish threading before I ran out of steam.  Just 5" left to do (about 100 threads)

It has been a nice reprieve before I go back to 2/16 cotton and that very fine linen.  For that I will be playing with more 'fancy' twills again.  The linen is thinner than the 2/16 and I'm going to stick with 36 epi, which means the tie up will have plain weave in it to help stabilize the cloth.  

The beginning of this warp will be woven for samples - in plain weave - so I needed a draft that would produce a plain weave cloth.  Whatever is left over will get woven in this design using that mystery yarn I posted about a while ago.  Given the mystery yarn is slightly thicker than 2/8 cotton, and stiffer, giving the cloth a hard press during wet finishing will be critical.  The towels will be thicker than what I would call 'tea towel' quality, but they will still dry hands - and even pots - not so much smaller items like glasses.

I may need to put another 2/8 cotton warp into the loom to weave the rest of the samples for the second article I'm working on, but I have enough yarn to do that without needing to order more in.  I will make up my mind once I'm done researching article 1 and can then give my full attention to article 2.  But I have an Oct. 1, 2024 deadline, so I need to get going on this part - the part that takes the most time - the research part (or in the modern parlance, the FAFO part).

I'm looking forward to faffing around and finding out what happens when I do this, then that, then think about my results.  Then moving to the next step.  The actual writing will take a lot less time than the thinking about and then doing the FAFO part.

Hunkering Down

 

This photo is from a few years ago, but shows some of the accumulation that we can expect as 'normal'.

The weather forecast for the next few days is...snow.  I'm not particularly bothered by it because I don't really need to leave the house for the next few days.  After a flurry of activity (and stress) the past while, the coming week is supposed to be quiet.

I have one last box of Olds homework to mark, and I'm nearing the end of the current warp.  I will be using up one more colour on this warp and have the draft for the next ready to go.  

The next warp will be the 'last' dark blue at 36 epi and should see me able to use up the last of the mercerized cotton.  There are half a dozen or so partial tubes of navy and then some black.  Whatever the 'last' warp uses up will be the 'end' of that particular yarn.  Anything left will be too little to weave with so it will go into my bobbin lace stash.

When I'm done with that warp, there will be enough of the dark blues to do one warp at 32 epi and I have yet to decide which of the 2/16 colours will get used first.  I have some 2/16 navy, but also other colours that I 'found' when I did the deep clean of the clean storage area.

And then I will have a new warp colour to play with.  Brassard has already shipped the yarns for that.  No danger of me running out of yarn.  (HA!)

In the meantime the BOGO sale is going well on ko-fi, plus I'm hoping people are interested enough in the cotton/linen spa towels to buy - they are priced way below what they should be.

Someone complained about a can of paint costing 3/4's of their daily wage.  Well, it takes me several hours to weave a tea towel, and linen isn't cheap, so each towel warp represents several weeks of my labour, plus the materials, plus, plus, plus...  So I understand that some people can't stretch their budget to purchase something like one of my towels.  OTOH, I have bills to pay, too, and I have never ever managed to achieve even minimum wage by weaving.

So, why do I do it?  Because I must.  I worked 8-4 jobs and grew to hate them, every single one.  So I chose to do an 'antique' craft and earn way less money than I could have done, just to be able to keep my sanity.  And I always priced my things so that more people could afford them, which put me way down at the bottom of the pay pyramid.

But again - my choice.  

OTOH, someone else's pinched budget is not my problem to solve.  So I will continue to sell my textiles at a price that I feel is as fair as I can make it.  And from time to time I will offer 'special' pricing on certain items.  (i.e. the BOGO sale, the current spa towels)

The same with my books.  When I wrote Magic, it was because resources on wet finishing were sparse, and I felt I could contribute to the general knowledge in the weaving community by presenting that information in a way that was helpful.  Hence the before and after samples.  It was horrendously expensive to produce, so my labour (and that of Doug) was largely unpaid.  When I announced the price there was a hue and cry about my price gouging, especially on my shipping charge.  For a book that weighed about 5 pounds, and no book rate in Canada, I had to pay parcel rates and international shipping - because the vast majority of people wanting the book were not in Canada.  Not to mention all the tipped in samples - which were not postage stamp size.  But I held firm, and now?  People are not only getting their purchase price back when they sell it, the book (with actual samples) frequently sells for *more* than what I charged initially.  If I could have got that price when I published it, I would not have had to finance the publishing for nearly 10 years...

With The Intentional Weaver, I had to weigh the cost of the printing with what I felt people would be willing to pay for a 'textbook'.  Because that is what it is.  By self-publishing I actually get more per copy than if I'd gone the traditional publishing route.  BUT, I have to do all the marketing myself. 

Ditto Stories from the Matrix.

The *value* in my books is the information being conveyed, not in the cost of the paper and ink that holds that information.

If you want a copy of my books, they will remain available at blurb.com where you can purchase all three books (well, Magic is a 'magazine' format) or signed copies should be available at Sweet Georgia again.

But winter is definitely here, and it is time to hunker down...

More Inventory

 

shades of blue/grey with accents of pink/purple

shades of beige including peach

Just uploaded three more towels to my ko-fi shop.

One of them is a towel I had listed previously, but still have some left - the cotton/hemp weft towels.  The other two have never been listed in my shop before.

I am asking for less that what they are worth, simply because I am trying to move some inventory, and I figure people are wanting 'good buys' right now, given the rate of inflation.  Remember that my ko-fi shop prices include shipping, which is now running about $20 per small packet - up from last year's price of $10.  

If I were still in business, thinking of making more of these towels, I would be paying a whole lot more to replace the linen, and I'm not even sure I *could* replace the cotton/hemp.

But my goal right now is to reduce my stash - and that means finished inventory as well as yarn.

None of these towels has a 'soft' handle.  The linen is stiff and those two towels would make great sauna/spa rubdown towels.  The cotton/hemp towel is thinner and more supple, probably more gentle on the skin, but should still give a decent rubdown.

I had my first 'real' sauna in Finland in 1977.  We had the whole experience - including the birch branches to gently 'flog' our backs, which turned out to be surprisingly soothing after hours of weaving.  But the piece de resistance was the run out of the sauna, across the 'lawn', down the pier and the jump into the glacial (feeling) lake.  Yes, naked.  When in Rome, and all...

It was...bracing.  I did the plunge a second time, just to make sure the water really was as icy cold as it felt the first time, and after I confirmed it was, indeed, frigid, I concluded that I really didn't need to do it a third time.  So I went back into the sauna to warm up again, then showered, towelled off - with a towel similar to these, and decided I had reached peak Finnish experience.

The local guild is having an in-room guild sale the first two weekends of December.  I may pull all of the BOGO and the bargain priced towels to put into that sale, so if you are interested, buy now.  First come, first served.

Economies

 

Set up, ready for beaming

Last week I was trying to get prepared for the days after the SI joint injection.  I was nearing the end of the current warp, trying to figure out if I would/could get it done in time to beam the next warp before the injection.

As the days counted down I became convinced that I probably could get the warp off, especially when I realized what was left on the beam was, very likely, less than what I needed for one more towel.

The beam on the Megado is just 14.5" in circumference, and my towels generally require between 40 and 44 inches of warp.  By the time I factor in take up, dimensional loss during wet finishing, and the hems, I need that much to get a towel about 30-32" in length.

Doubtful there was that much left on the loom, I cut the warp off.

Yes, I could have woven until I couldn't and wound up with a towel that was shorter than I wanted, but why?

I took 20 towels off the loom - I didn't need an 'orphan' that was off size.  Goodness knows, WE have plenty of towels, and I have lots ready for sale.  My seconds get given away to friends, and yes, I could have woven that last bit of warp and then given it away.

OR, I could do what I did - cut the warp off, which then gave me time to beam the next warp before the injection.

Because I don't like playing yarn chicken and running out, nor do I like spending my time making something that is just going to be given away, when I can invest my time in producing a new warp where I can make things I *can* sell.  (I make enough oopsies that I already give plenty of stuff away - I don't need to be making more just to give it away because it isn't sale-able.)

The yarn I would have 'wasted' by trying to get one more towel out of that warp plus my time, seemed like a poor way to spend both my money and my time.

Out of curiosity, I weighed the thrums and there were 3.75 ounces of yarn that went into the recycle bin.  (I give my thrums to another craftsperson - they don't go into the landfill.)

I don't remember the current price I pay for Brassard cotton, but I think it's around $8 for 8 ounces.

So, what I threw into the bin was about $3.75.  About the cost of a fancy coffee at Starbucks.

And yet?  People urged me to not 'waste' that yarn, but weave it down, whatever I made could be used for something.

Yes, indeed, it could.

But I would have spent my time doing it while instead I now have a new warp beamed, ready to be threaded, as soon as I feel able to do so.

As weavers we need to be aware of where we spend the coin of our time, not just what is in our bank account.  I learned a very long time ago that I could always earn more money, but once my time had been 'spent', there was no getting it back.  During these twilight years of my life it has become even more obvious that my time is limited.  I don't want to 'waste' my time doing stuff that I don't enjoy, just so that I don't 'throw away' a few dollars of yarn.  I need to preserve my time AND my energy, both of which are in short supply these days, and can never be recovered once spent.

That said, I DO still need to sell my stuff.  Which is why I have a ko-fi account where I can list things for sale.

I cannot explain how much it means to me that other weavers continue to buy my textiles.  It is a great compliment and I treasure it.

My first weaving instructor would buy towels from me.  At a craft fair one year, she was purchasing some towels and one of the other guild members came by and expressed astonishment that our teacher would buy towels from me when she could make them herself.

She turned to the other weaver and said (and I paraphrase) "Yes, I *could* weave them, but look at them!  I'll never work with 2/20 mercerized cotton like this!  So, yes, I'm buying Laura's towels."

It was a message I took to heart.  We don't have to do everything ourselves.  We can work with what we want to work with, while still appreciating (and supporting) the work of other weavers.

So for those weavers who DO like to play yarn chicken and use up every inch of warp?  Go you!  Do what you want to do.  Find your joy.  Do what brings you pleasure.  But you can also change your mind if and when circumstances change.  Because as time goes by, sometimes our priorities need to change, too.  And it's ok to change, to prioritize something else.

As far as the injection goes - I was warned the pain could be 'worse' after the lidocaine wore off, so not to be surprised if I had higher pain today.  So, I'm not surprised, but I am a bit disappointed that I do have more pain today.  However, I have a load of towels ready to be pressed.  I will try threading again, see how it goes.  But I will try really hard to NOT stress my back and if it takes me all weekend to get the warp threaded, so be it.

Teenager

stack of towels, hot off the press

One towel, back and front - similar but not the same

 I have a love/hate relationship with technology.   For the past few years I have found work arounds for things that keep getting...improved...to the point of not working.  So I have been taking photos with my iPad, then emailing them to myself so I can save them to the desktop.  Today?  The email app on the iPad is not working.

Now I'm not sure if this is a permanent thing or a one day glitch.  Several websites seemed to be having difficulty over the past few days, so hopefully my email will start working again on my iPad.  If not, I'll have to work on another work around.

I did finally get the photos uploaded to ko-fi so I could list these towels in my shop.  I finally made the effort to get them pressed.  I'm pretty pleased with them, even though the linen is pretty rustic - coarse and stiff with chaff in it.  Having used the yarn previously, I know that with time and use they will improve and become quite nice.  But they will always be a little...rustic.

The yarn is a lower quality tow linen, but it is linen for all that.

There are 16 of the tow linen towels, and right at the top of the stack, 4 woven with a quite good quality of hemp.  Those are already feeling quite nice although they, too, will improve with age/use.  They are not yet listed in my ko-fi account though and when they do, they will be listed for the half linen price.

If you are interested in a half linen towel at cotton pricing, go to my ko-fi website (link to the bottom left of your screen) and click on my Shop.  Just 12 of these lovely teenaged half linen towels.  

They are a bit of a bargain.  :)

Currently reading Looking for the Mother Tree by Suzanne Simard.  I'm only a few pages into it and already completely taken by the beauty of her words.

Thinking, Thinking

 

I return to this graphic (our plans vs reality) a lot as a reminder that I need to have the plan but also need to be flexible enough to make my way through whatever obstacles I encounter along the way.

So I continue to pick away at what I'm working on while allowing my back burner to simmer, cooking, hopefully bringing any issues I need to anticipate to the surface so I can make plans for them and not be thrown off my path when they try to knock me off my carefully constructed plan.

A friend and I have discussed 'executive functioning skills' a few times and I really wonder if that is what weaving is all about.  Figuring out what you want - in life, in weaving (knitting, whatever) and then making a plan but preparing for distractions and even (god forfend) the occasional disaster.  I need to read up on 'executive functioning skills' and find out more about them.

The warp currently on the loom is a prime example.

The weaving draft was simple enough and I'd worked with it several times already so it was familiar.  But when I got to the 'end' of my ends, I had two left over.  That had never happened with the previous warps, so I *knew* I'd made a mistake somewhere.  

Instead of going back and checking thread by thread, I continued and started to sley the warp.  And very quickly discovered the problem.  Very near the beginning I had somehow managed to leave two heddles empty.  Oh they were there - just...no end in them.

The fix was easy enough.  I grabbed two spools off the spool rack and simply threaded them in where they were supposed to be, then continued sleying.

But it means I am dealing with a couple of spools hanging off the warping valet (bar mounted to ceiling at the back of the loom).  The bar is high enough that I can easily let down enough length to weave a towel, so my routine now includes, weave a towel, adjust the hanging spools, take a break, weave a towel, let down the spools.

It also means I have two 'extra' threads at the left selvedge.  I could have tossed them off the back beam, but then I would have had to deal with those loose ends and frankly no one will ever notice.  

Today I will finish the last of the tow linen - and it looks like I will have just exactly enough to weave two more towels.   Whatever is left over will get stripped and tossed.  

The rest of the warp will get woven off with a hemp yarn that I suddenly remembered yesterday while I was weaving, thinking about the yarn I had intended to use - cottolin.  But I wasn't liking that option much and was casting my mind around for something else.  I could have used 2/8 cotton, that would have been fine.  But this warp is a good one to use up some of that hemp, so that's what I'll use.

Yesterday as part of my 'end of the day' I wound off one cone of the hemp onto bobbins and got it into a humidor.  When I finish emptying the bobbins with the tow linen, I'll wind more of the hemp and get it steeping too.  Hemp is so similar to linen that I tend to treat it exactly the same and getting the moisture content  higher in the fibre will make it more co-operative and it will weave off easily.  Since I don't like 'fighting' with my equipment or yarns, it's easy enough to do.

Plastic tub with a small amount of water in it, another smaller tub floating on the water, bobbins are wound and stacked inside the small tub and the lid covers it.  The yarn can ten absorb moisture out of the higher humidity air inside the humidor.  High density yarn such as linen and hemp have the bobbins wound just about level with the bobbin flanges.  Any fuller than that the bobbin begins to weigh enough that the selvedges can become stressed and either pull in too much or even break.  Depends on the yarn, but it's just easier to fill them less full than chance breaking selvedges...

July 2021

 

From the bin to the spool rack, the next warp is in the works.

After much thought, I decided to not use that bleached white for weft.  I should do a burn test on it to confirm it is, in fact, cotton, but if so it is mercerized cotton and fairly 'stiff'.

5/2 mercerized cotton (or Perle if it is DMC brand cotton) was engineered for embroidery.  Therefore it is dense due to the fibres being aligned parallel, then firmly twisted.  As such, it has less bend or drape to it, and - most importantly for a towel - less absorbency.

In a rummage in my yarn stash I was reminded that I have four cones (about 1 pound each) of 16/2 cotton of the right shade of turquoise.  

This yarn is thinner than the warp, but 2 strands of 16/2 cotton plied together will be about the same thickness as the 2/8 cotton, and I have a spinning wheel, so...

Right now we are in the  middle of an extreme heat event.  This is more serious than a 'wave' and high  temp records are being shattered up and down the west coast of North America, all the way up into the Arctic.  Not just on North America, either, but in the north on the other side of the globe.

Fortunately my studio is in the basement and I'm able to go down and get some relief from the heat.  Yesterday I reached the end of the last warp and got set up to beam the next.  I'm playing a bit of yarn chicken with this warp.  I'm pretty sure I have enough of the main colour to wind the warp, but I won't know until I actually do it.  So I'm thinking of reducing the length a bit, which will mean one less towel.  However, since I'm not entirely sure I will have enough of the 8/2 and 16/2 yarn to do 16 towels, one less might just be good planning.  Or a lucky happenstance.  

Beaming the next warp today is a lucky happenstance because today is supposed to be even hotter here than yesterday, but the forecast says the heat dome we are living under will begin deteriorating and the temperature begin to go down tomorrow.

So today I will begin beaming and maybe even threading.  I may not start weaving until Thursday though when the temps are supposed to be merely hot instead of extreme.

Currently reading The Fabric of Civilization by Virginia Potrel  (need to check the spelling of her name) while I wait for my next library book.  I'm finding the book dense with information and I tend to read it in short bits so I can think about what she is saying.  Just now reading about mathematics and weaving, and seeing familiar names - Carrie Brezine, Tien Chiu - and getting a little frisson of delight at nuggets of information.  Yes, I will do a 'proper' review but I'm only at about page 55 or 60 with a lot more to come.  Lovely!

Not Set in Stone

 

Posted the Birthday Bash details yesterday.  Today there are just two of the pale green towels shown in the above photo left.  Most of the colours have lots, but some are low numbers, in part because I was using up yarn stash and just made as many as I had yarn.

This morning as I sat and had my 'jitter juice' (as a cartoonist labelled it recently) I thought about the next warp.

Initially I thought I would have plenty of the dark variegated yarn, but as I near the end of the current warp, so am I nearing the end of that yarn.  There won't likely be enough to weave on the next warp, so I have been looking at alternatives.

I have a giant tube of what I think is a 5/2 mercerized cotton in bleached white and had thought I could use that on the next warp.  But the more I think about it, the less inclined I am to use it.  5/2 Perle cotton is quite stiff and thicker than 8/2, so the towels wouldn't be great.  Probably that yarn should be used for table runners or something that doesn't need absorbency or drape.

There is a partial cone of a solid turquoise 8/2 cotton in the right shade, but that will only weave a few towels.  What should I do for the rest of the warp?

I have a bunch of cones of 16/2 cotton in the correct colour, but it's finer than I want to use on these towels.

But ah-ha, I have a spinning wheel.  Instead of using a doubling stand, which would work but be a bit of a pain, I can ply two strands of the 16/2 together.

We talked about how much fibre dust that would create in the house and instead - since it's summer and no rain to speak of in the forecast after highs of 40+C on Mon-Tues, the temps are supposed to go down to the mid-30s.  Which, while hotter than I like, is at least do-able to be outside.

Most of the pollen should be over by then as well, so Doug will set up a table in the carport to protect me from the sun and I'll spend some time outside plying yarn.  I have 6 bobbins for the Device and plan to just go straight from the spinning wheel bobbin to the weaving bobbin so it should go fairly quickly once I get going.  And, doing the plying outside, the fibre dust would be kept as low as possible.  While weaving I have a fan with a filter on it next to the loom to help remove dust from the air.

I've woven enough of my cotton yarn stash that I'm having to carefully consider my options.  I think that's a 'win' in the stash reduction olympics.

A Work In Progress

 

Yesterday I reached the estimated halfway point of the current warp, cut off what had been woven, separated the towels and got them into the washing machine.

With such a dark hue, I tossed a couple of Colour Catchers into the machine and after the first wash (with 'extra' rinse) noticed they had turned every bit as dark as the towels.

Back into the washing machine for another wash cycle (with extra rinse) and more Colour Catchers.  This time they were about half the value of the previous two, so I left those in the machine, added two more and ran just the rinse cycle.

After that, the two new ones were just 'blush' so I deemed the web 'done'.

About 20 or so minutes in the dryer left the towels a little bit more damp than I usually aim for, but the afternoon was shot and I didn't feel like weaving so I went ahead and pressed them.  In the end they weren't all that damp and pressed up fine.

The transformation was interesting.  The cloth is mostly plain weave with fine 'lines' of 2:2 twill running through to make a medallion design.  After wet finishing the cloth developed a nice texture and I'm pretty sure these will work well as towels.

Tonight there will be hemming to do.  One of the reasons I wanted to get these done now is that we are still having light well into the evening and they will be easier to see to hem.  

Here is the draft for the current warp.

I have more of the 8/2 cotton so my next warp will be set up with the same draft.  Hopefully next week.

Back in the 1980s I installed house a/c because at the time I was earning my income from weaving and couldn't weave once it reached 90F or so.  Once the studio warmed up, there was no way I could keep going.  Now we are facing 100+F temperatures early next week with 90+F temps either side of those record breaking days.

Staying home in the cool of the a/c, working in the studio, sounds like a plan to me.

Changing Plans

 

After working out that the dark variegated yarn would only do one warp, I had to re-think the next warp.

I found a cone of 8/2 turquoise the same (or close enough) to the main turquoise colour, but it was nowhere near enough to weave the entire warp.  Then I took a look at a gigantic cone of bleached white and it was also an ?/2 something, maybe 6?  Slightly thicker, but I could make it work on the same warp.

But then some of the accent yarns I had were deemed to be 'too dark' for the paler weft colours and in the end all of those came out and several more mid-range colours were chosen.  And then I realized that with the lighter value weft I could even use the baby mix variegated as the paler values would play ok with the rest of the yarns.

With the darker warp now beamed and threaded, it should not take too long to weave that off, and then I'll put this one into the loom.

The down side of weaving with the softer spun weft is that it sheds a great deal of lint.  And, because cotton is a fairly light fibre, that fibre tends to float around in the air which can then be breathed in.  So I cleared off the bins in front of the square fan that was installed precisely to filter fibre dust out and will run it when I weave these two warps.  I'm already dealing with sinusitis (adverse reaction to medication I take to keep myself alive) and seasonal allergies, so I don't need to further stress my body by breathing in fibre.

I'm really reaching into the 'bottom of the barrel' in terms of my cotton stash.  But I've done so well with using up a big chunk of that part of my stash there is huge incentive to keep going.  There is enough cotton woven up that I'm eyeing the stash of linen, but some of it is so fine I'll need to buy more yarn, OR finally decide to pair that fine linen with 2/20 mercerized cotton.  Which ought to make a nice quality of tea towel.

But we'll see.  It's best not to get too locked into a plan because sometimes you need to make changes.  Do the best you can.  When you know better, do better.  Weaving is a constant lesson in learning from the choices we make, then - hopefully - making better choices.

Making Progress

 

Yesterday I started weaving the last(?) of this series of towels.  The cotton flake is going down quickly and I'm not a fan of playing yarn chicken, so I expect that this warp will be the last of this design.

Overall I'm pleased on several fronts.  I've gotten practiced enough at doing it that it hardly seems to take any time at all to set up the loom.  AND the last tweak I made to the tension box filling seems to have worked and there are practically no areas of concern re: tension with this warp.  The couple of very slight tension difference areas is truly not really distinguishable now that I'm four towels in.

I wanted to show the 'right' side of the cloth because the back side is predominantly white.  The 'right' side is much more interesting and I'm pleased with it.  Must be time to move on, right????

This afternoon I had some more technology issues, with Power Point this time, but managed to punch enough buttons in the correct order, or something, and was finally able to save the file to a thumb drive in order to transfer it to the laptop.  Now that I have the password changed, and carefully recorded, I'm hoping I won't have any more problems.  Time will tell!

I also poked around in Zoom and figured out what a few more of the tools are for, which answered my need for a 'pointer' of some sort.  Turns out I have two to choose from, and I can even change their colours.  

But my deadlines keep rolling.  This Sunday - two hour Zoom, next Sunday 1 hour Zoom, the following Saturday and Sunday, back to 2 hour Zooms.  The content for the rest of the Zoom study groups needs to be finished and now I seem to have Power Point working again, maybe I can get them done.

But folks, I gotta tell ya, I'm tired.  I'm going to put the idea for the short video clips on hold for a while and take some of the pressure off of me.  If and when I feel up to doing any, I can record and caption them, then save to You Tube for future release dates.  When I'm already pouring so much energy into the long form presentations, I just don't seem to have any energy left over to do the short form.

Plus I'm trying to get towels posted to ko-fi for July.  

The weather has been too grey, too wet, too...much...going from chilly to hot, then thunder and buckets of rain.  Yesterday it was almost literally - don't like the weather? - wait 15 minutes.  I didn't feel up to walking.  Today the breaks in between the buckets of rain have been longer, and I finally got a short walk in after doing the two towels and finishing the set up for tomorrow's Zoom.

And I'm delighted, intrigued, and challenged by The Fabric of Civilization by Virginia Postrel.  More on that book when I'm further into it.

Persistence

 https://www.youtube.com/user/LauraAnnFry1/videos

Persistence

There are times when I hit a pot hole in life and I just kind of...fall in.  The world, as they say, has been too much with me.

Yesterday I came to the realization that part of my problem with working on short form video clip 'lessons' is that I can't produce them to the quality I would like them to have.

On the other hand, I started doing video clips a number of years ago, have 24 on my You Tube channel some of which have over 30,000 views.

So why am I having such a hard time now?  

The past week I worried away at Zoom and felt totally inadequate to the task.  Then other things happened in the world and my way of coping was to try to ignore as much of it as I could and keep on weaving.  I have this artsy-fartsy notion that if I can just keep pouring creative energy into the world, that I can keep trying to add positivity to counter what is happening.  

I can't solve the pandemic.  I can't solve racism.  I can't solve the crumbling politics, or the poverty, or...anything.  My power, if you will, is to keep being creative, keep trying to educate those who want it.  But it all got more than a little overwhelming.

We have also had a string of grey rainy days which hasn't helped my mood.  The rain has meant that the bush has been kept from drying out, which is A Good Thing, because our snow levels here were below average.  And if it goes dry, there could be severe wildfires again this year.

Yesterday I cut the latest warp off the loom and wet finished the 8 towels.  They will get pressed today and then I'll begin beaming the next warp.  I'm still not happy with how I'm getting warps onto the Megado, so after 10 warps I will tweak my process again and see if I can get better results.

And that's the thing about life.  To live it without getting stuck in a pot hole.  Especially one of one's own devising.

So back to the short video clips.  I need to understand why all of a sudden I am holding myself to a higher standard than previously.  That I need to accept that my clips won't be 'perfect', and that ultimately, it won't much matter so long as I can get the information out there.  I had estimated that I might have content ready for my birthday in July.  Well, it's June now.  If I'm going to do this, I need to climb out of that pot hole and get started.

I have managed to post towels to my ko-fi account shop, so if anyone is interested they can use the link (on my monitor it appears in the lower left corner) and browse.  My plan right now is to offer the current run of towels between July 1-9 at a special birthday offering.  I should have at least 11 warps completed by then, which might be the total number of warps in this series, and I will post one colour per day.  Or at least, that's the plan.  Which all too often gang aft aglay...

This Sunday is another Zoom meeting, and the Sunday after that the next Sunday Seminar.  At some point I need to put my thinking cap on and start working on the short video clips.  And see how awful they wind up once I hit 'record'.  Or if I'm just being far too hard on myself.

In the meantime I've gotten my hands on The Fabric of Civilization by Virginia Postrel.  I got it through the library, and decided I needed my very own copy, and voila, the local indy bookstore had a copy on their shelf.  It now has my name on it and I'll pick it up tomorrow.  Barely 20 pages in (if that) and already glad I bought the book.  I'll do a proper book review when I'm further into it.

Halfway

 

Yesterday I got to the halfway point of the current warp.  Crossing the grey/blue warp with white means that one side of the cloth is predominantly white, the other shows more of the warp.  The warp colours are very similar in value so the effect is more subtle.  Quiet.  

The variegated yarn has white/blue/pink mostly and is 1/4 of the yarns.  There are also two ends of a brighter blue, slightly deeper value than the rest.

Today I will begin the 2nd half of the warp and since, wonder of wonders, I have no Zoom meetings on Sunday, the goal is to be cutting the rest of this warp off the loom on Tuesday.

The cotton flake is going down nicely.  There are two full cones, about 2 pounds each, plus a little bit left on the current one.  Last night I wound enough bobbins for 2+ towels and it looks like enough for two more towels before I need to begin a new cone.  

I have the yarns pulled for a somewhat darker blue warp, also with the same variegated (Baby Mix).  After that warp, I will work on something different in an effort to use up more of my 'odd' yarns in the stash.  Since I will have some flake left, plus those cones of cotton boucle, I'll do something in plain weave, I think.  The flake works well in plain weave, too.  The towel in my ensuite is one of that quality - 2/8 cotton warp at 20 epi, woven in plain weave with the flake.  It's not as absorbent as something with warp/weft floats, but over the years it has broken in and works fine.

And that's the thing with textiles.  Sometimes they need to experience a bit of life, a bit of 'wear' before they truly begin to shine.

Not unlike human beings...

Currently reading Dark Sky by C. J. Box

Staying 'Motivated'

 

shelves of hand woven textiles

My 'inventory' has grown over the past year plus, in no small part due to the pandemic and the closure of shops and other sales events.  My woven textile stock is now about four times this, and grows daily if I can manage my two towels per day goal.

It doesn't seem like much, but two towels a day?  Add up.  

Not every day, of course not.  When a warp runs out, I have to set up the next one, but each current warp produces 16 towels.  So every two weeks or so, another 16 towels hit the shelves.  Averaging 8 towels a week for 52 weeks of the year?  That's over 400 towels a year.

Sometimes people ask me how I can stay motivated.   Well, I have too much yarn.  I also find that getting to the loom daily helps my mental health.  If I can manage to do something in the studio, I feel as though I have accomplished something positive that day.  Even if that 'positive' is just emptying another tube or cone of yarn.

But I've never been too bothered about instant gratification.  I couldn't and be a weaver.  Because nothing about any hand craft is 'instant'.  Making things take time, effort and yes, a degree of skill.  

The other thing about weaving is that I'm moving, even if I am sitting while doing so.  I know I need to get up onto my feet more, but advancing age means my feet aren't terribly happy with me, for reasons.  Nor my hips, truth be told.  So far my knees aren't too bad.  But I also know that I need to keep my legs working because that will help reduce falls.  OTOH, the weather has been variable and the rest of this week rain is in the forecast.  And I'm still not a fan of walking in inclement weather.  Something I should work on getting over.

The Zoom meetings keep me occupied as well.  Currently finalizing the Power Point for lecture #7 on Colour.  Not a deep dive, but basic info.  Deep dives are provided by Tien Chiu and Janet Dawson as well as Jane Stafford.  Not everyone has time for a full blown class and sometimes all they need is a few pointers.  Sot that's the approach I'm taking.  Focusing on the principles.

Still wrestling with the technology, I have another Zoom practice booked for this afternoon.  In the end, it will be what it will be and people will accept or not.  Not every teacher is a good fit for every student.

Wayne Dyer used to talk about the stages of life and that elders needed to mentor younger folk.  A few years ago I decided to embrace my 'elder' status and try to help others who wanted it.  I stay motivated by trying to pass on my knowledge to others.  And weave down my stash.  And try to sell my completed weavings, in a desultory way.  But it is obvious that I need to do a push to find new homes for some of my cloth.  One benefit is that woven cloth takes up less space than tubes/cones of yarn.  But still.  There are now four shelving units cheek by jowl with handwoven towels, table runners and scarves.  Time to move some of them out of here and into other people's hands.  Check my ko-fi account for my 'shop' as I continue to list a new towel on Mondays.

Am I Blue?

 

how it started...

how it's going...

Yesterday I had personal maintenance, but managed to get going in the morning and weave the first towel on the mostly blue warp.

The photo doesn't do it justice, and of course the view is of the 'back' side of the cloth.  I set it up to weave by raising 7 shafts per shed instead of 9.

Overall I'm pleased with how it is turning out.  It looks like there is enough of the darker blue flake to produce 7 towels, so I'll cut off and re-tie at that point, then finish the warp with white.

The white shrinks more than the blue, in part because it hasn't been dyed (I think) so those towels are turning out a bit narrower than the ones with the dyed weft.  So I've been using white 2/8 cotton for the hem weft when I use the white flake.  The hems 'flare' a bit because of plain weave and twill differentials, but not enough that I can't make it work.

And that's really the point.  While I always work towards perfection, I never lose sight of the fact that the cloth must perform the function it was intended for.  If I hit 'perfect' that's great.  But ultimately, my primary goal is to make it functional.  And I will settle for 'close'.

After several days of rain, today dawned sunny.  Unfortunately that didn't last long and the clouds have moved in again, with a promise of more rain this afternoon.  If I was virtuous, I'd go get dressed and go for a walk now, but mornings are not meant for rushing, so I probably won't.  

My goal for today is to weave two towels, maybe do some more fibre prep.  I haven't touched that for several days (for reasons).  But I'm very close to finishing the braid I'm blending into the grey and I'm looking forward to the next combo.  Probably with a dark blue base and one of the other dyed braids in my stash.

But I also have a very long book to read and I'm quite enjoying learning more about life (and war) in Outremer in the 1100s.  The more things change, the more they stay the same, when it comes to human beings.  But I also know that the author, Sharon Kay Penman, did good research, so I'm pretty sure what she is writing about happened - she has just fleshed it out by imagining the interactions between the characters.  And for me, that makes history a lot more interesting than a dry recitation of dates and campaign movements.  But during the time I have been picking my way through the nearly 700 pages, I have been receiving more of my library requests, and I really do want to read them, too!  So I am going to have to give myself permission to just sit and read for a while.  

A New Month

 

Yesterday I got this far by 4:30 pm and called it a day.  There are a couple of minor tweaks but otherwise it's ready as soon as I get some bobbins wound for weft.  I was going to do that last night but by the time I got downstairs I was too tired so left it for morning.

We are almost through another month with a fresh one beginning.  May is a difficult month sometimes.  It's no longer winter, although not quite spring.  We are still having freezing nights so gardeners generally wait until the May long weekend to set plants outside.  Even then, it's a good idea to keep an eye on the overnight temps and be prepared to cover plants.

One year ago BC was in the midst of what people were calling a 'lockdown', although it wasn't really.  We were still free to leave our houses but because many businesses were closed there wasn't much incentive to go anywhere.

And that was the point - to NOT gather in groups, spreading the virus.  Our town was still quite safe as covid hadn't really arrived yet.  But it had in other towns. 

I focused on doing what I needed to be doing, and that was mostly staying home and weaving.

My goal of weaving down my stash remains.  Only difference is I'm now working on the 2/8 cotton and flake yarns.  I'm moderately pleased that those are going down.  The shelves of yarn are beginning to empty, replaced by woven cloth.

Eventually I may need to replace some yarn, but for now I'm not buying more, just working from my stash.

Tien Chiu and Janet Dawson have teamed up to bring on line opportunities for learning to weavers.  They currently have a stash busting Weave A Long happening.  If someone is looking for a community and a project, this might pique your interest.  And may give you some creative ideas to apply to your own stash.

When I hit the wall yesterday, my first inclination was to go back to the studio and ignore the internet.  That time of pause was helpful - indeed, it was therapeutic.  But I also came to the realization that I was tired.  Plus, my semi-annual review with the cancer clinic is in about two weeks and while I don't think the cancer is active enough to warrant concern, there is always that niggling of doubt.  And right now, in the midst of a pandemic, other things don't stop and getting any kind of medical treatment right now is problematic.  So there is that concern niggling away at me.

This blue warp will take about two weeks to weave off, and then there is another paler blue ready to go into the loom.  Once that is done, I'll look at another beige warp and then another blue one.  And then see how much of the white flake is left.  Then I'll have to see what else I can do.  I'm pretty sure there is more than enough to plan beyond what I've been working on.  But I won't know for sure until I get this warp and the three cooking on the back burner done.

With about two weeks per warp, I have enough yarn to see me through the summer and another few dozen towels.  Once those are done, it will be scarf making time.  I probably have about 20 years worth of fine yarns for scarves.  

I usually run a 'birthday' sale the beginning of July.  Since I have been unable to face taking photos and posting to my ko-fi shop, I may concentrate on a gigantic sale in July.  We'll see.

Not Bored

 

As expected, I got four towels each from the peach and the rose.

The peach is a lighter value than the rose and the towels look quite different.  On the peach towel, where all the colours are approximately the same value, the overall look is more subdued with slight differences in hue giving the cloth some extra interest.

The rose was a darker value and therefore the warp is showing in greater contrast and most people would be hard pressed to tell these towels had been woven on the same warp.

I am about to begin the beige, which is an even lighter value than the peach, and then finish whatever warp is left with white, also much lighter value.  

People sometimes wonder how I can weave the 'same' thing over and over again.  I enjoy it.  I have the technical stuff (width in reed, epi, tieup/treadling, dimensions) all figured out.  All I need concern myself with is choosing the colours and then watch the cloth grow on the loom.  I'm not constantly looking for more stimulation, so I can stay in the present moment and just keep weaving more and more of the same quality of cloth, playing with different colour combinations.  

I could change things, but I'm happy with the quality of cloth that is being made, so I'm content to stay in a comfortable 'rut' and keep weaving down my stash.

There may come a time when I decide that I want to design something new and completely different every time I go to the loom.  But for now?  Now is not that time.

Thing is, whatever you do?  If you are happy, keep doing that thing.

If it brings joy, keep it.  If it doesn't, get rid of it.  I suspect Marie Kondo has it right.