Tag Archives: Weaving

Friday Night Musings

Knoontime Knitting

I was chatting with a friend online this evening and shared a picture of my pin loom weaving box and realized I hadn’t shared it on here. I haven’t shared much on here recently at all, really.

As we collectively learn to navigate our catastrophically changed reality with COVID, it’s important I think to realize the collective stress we are under. It’s attractive to fantasize about all the “things” we’ll get done in this new in-between-time, but the reality is that stress seeps into everything like poison into a creek. Particularly for us here in the States, that new reality is horrific: as of this writing, over 150,000 dead and 5 million infected.

I find it hard to focus. I am, though, keeping up with crafts. Oddly, I haven’t been pin loom weaving this month but knitting – I’ll post some pics of that at another time. What I wanted to share for now is a glimpse into my pin loom weaving because it’s something I can do when my body is too stressed, my hands too sore from stress, and my brain unable to count for lace repeats.

As I shared the pics with my friend today, I remembered that I’d started weaving for a purse to replace one that my mother crocheted. It’s a project bag and it got so ratty and falling apart but I didn’t want to get rid of it. It wasn’t out of a pleasant sentimentality, since my mother was a horrible child abuser, but I still held onto it out of emotional attachment. I finally decided that’s goofy, I don’t want to drag around such negativity with me – particularly with my art.

And thus the idea for a knitting bag was born. The weavies are done, and next up is to sew the pieces together.

On the rigid heddle weaving front, we’re getting ready to start our weavealong in the Yarnworker School of Rigid Heddle Weaving. (If you’re a weaver, why not join us? More info here.) I’m so excited because I’m experimenting with some endangered wool called Churro. I’ll post pics of that at another time. But I was noodling about my weaving tonight and recalled reading about Morse code weaving in the Inventive Weaving on a Little Loom by Syne Mitchell. I decided to look it up again and there’s a Morse code translator! Check it out, here.

I thought it might be fun to try weaving a poem, and I even have one picked out to play with. I’ll keep noodling it and if it comes about, I’ll share pictures with you.

What are you up to these days, Dear Reader?

Playing With My Pin Loom

Knoontime Knitting

Today I took some time for Sunday crafting while I was watching and participating in the BotanicWise Allies for Plants and People Symposium. This year, the Pin Loom Weaving Support Group held a Weavealong hosted by TexasGabbi of Turtle Looms. The weavelong ran for six weeks and, though I did not finish on time due to the stress of the global pandemic, I’m still plugging away at it. I made all the weavies called for in the weavealong, but I used to be intimidated by sewing the weavies together – part of the weavealong instructions.

I’m happy to say that I no longer am intimidated by this process! I’ve successfully sewn Week 1, Week 2a, and Week 2b weavies together. And today, I worked on the extra project for Week 2, embroidering a weavie.

This caused me some consternation, because my very first textile art was embroidery. I could not settle on a design I liked. I dithered and hemmed and hawed, and overthought, and finally, today, decided I’d had it: JUST DO IT, as Nike says. Right? Right.

Only problem was, when I started to embroider on a finished weavie, I couldn’t get it under tension. It was flopping all over the place because the weavies are such loose-weave fabric, and I don’t have a small enough embroidery hoop. A friend suggested putting the weavie back on the Zoom Loom, and thereby under tension. I tried that, but fabric off a loom settles and it’s next to impossible to get it back to its former state.

Then it hit me: why not make a new weavie?

Voila.

This time, I switched back to my main color, a lovely charcoal grey marino wool blend. Then I used my CC3 color (contrast color #3), which is a light grey variegated color, also a marino blend. I used a detail of a pattern from Alice Starmore’s book, Celtic Needlepoint (if you haven’t checked out her work before, you owe it to yourself to visit her site that she shares with her talented daughter Jade Starmore, Virtual Yarns). I added the year and then took it off the loom. I’m really pleased with the final look of it. When it came off the loom, the threads relaxed and came together, so the needlepoint really pops.

Next time, I’ll share some of my herbal adventures. I have some lemon mint infusion steeping on my counter overnight and tomorrow, I plan to make a mint syrup.

What about you, Dear Reader? What are you making?

Slow Craft

Knoontime Knitting

Image of pin loom woven squares.

Fast. 5G. Upload speeds. Download speeds. Streaming. Faster cell service. 24/7 news cycle. Always-on. Technostress is stress induced by computer use. “Its symptoms include aggravation, hostility toward humans, impatience, and fatigue. According to experts, humans working continuously with computers come to expect other humans and human institutions to behave like computers, providing instant responses, attentiveness, and an absence of emotion.” (1)

I don’t know about you, but I find that all exhausting. I use technology and have done since I was a teenager. But I find myself called to slow down in my craft pursuits. Take weaving, for instance. I enjoy pin loom weaving, which is what the picture above features. Popular in the 1920’s through the 1940’s, pin looms can be used to make clothing, housewares, toys, and other useful items. The standard size is a four inch square, though makers have created pin looms in a variety of sizes to satisfy inquisitive weavers.

What is it about slow craft that’s calling to us? There are now craft revolutions all over the U.S. and around the world, such as Seattle’s Urban Craft Uprising. Makerspaces are independent and now even part of public libraries. People are merging craft with technology, bringing new ways to old.

And for many of us, slow craft is the antidote to fast culture. We sit and chat, or watch streaming shows or listen to audiobooks. We meditate using fiber or wood. We dream on the canvas or with words on the page. We journal and take pictures with our smartphones. There are even classes on how to be a better photographer using your cell phone. All of which is designed to help us to slow down, stop running, and be in the moment.

The act of creation is a radical act. It’s saying to the world, this didn’t exist before but I’ve made it so. It is rule-breaking, not rule-following. It’s not necessarily rebellious, it’s simply outside the known. Sometimes it comments on the known and sometimes it finds the known irrelevant.

During pandemic, I’ve found myself returning to my pin loom. It calms me in ways that even my knitting can’t – it turns out I can’t count during times of high stress. I don’t have to count to weave a pin loom square. My pin loom group is on Facebook (fast technology meets slow craft) and hosted a Mystery Weavealong that went for seven weeks. It was such a relief to get off work, wander over to my nest on the lounger, and weave squares. Not because I had to, or because I had something in mind – the mystery part of the weavealong meant that I literally didn’t know what I was weaving until the very end – but because the act of making squares settled my mind and let me feel productive but not pushed to finish any particular project. Just make a square. Which color? The instructions told me. And through that practice, my mind calmed.

 

Resources

(1) Laudon, Kenneth C and Jane P Laudon: Management Information Systems: Managing the Digital Firm, c2007, Chapter 4, pg 156.

W Is For… Weaving!

Knoontime Knitting

2015-04-27 Pic 1

Weaving is one of the oldest textile arts in the world. The most complicated looms, like the huge one featured in the movie Wanted, are the same in principle to the simple back looms used in the mountains of Peru for centuries.  The idea is you use something to put the warp under tension.  Shown above is my simple Cricket Loom, with the warp threaded and some of the weft worked.

The thing I find interesting about weaving is that it’s more complex, at least to my brain, than knitting.  I have to make peace with winding on the warp, and with the mechanics of the loom itself.  The process of actually weaving, meaning putting the shuttle back and forth, is relatively straightforward.  But, as my weaving teacher Natalie Boyett of the Chicago Weaving School pointed out, half of weaving is winding on the warp.  Accepting that, embracing it, helps one enjoy the process of weaving even more.

What about you, Dear Reader?
What unexpected thing has your crafting taught you?

I Is For… Inkle Weaving

Knoontime Knitting

IEver wonder where things like reins for bridles, belts, pet collars, and trim come from?  If they’re not leather, they’re most likely woven (though there are many other ways, for example, spool knitting, but I digress).  The type of loom used can vary, but here’s what I find interesting.

My weaving instructor, Natalie Boyett of the Chicago Weaving School, (and if you’re here in the city, or visiting, and have ever thought about maybe learning to weave, go there.  She’s hands-down one of the best instructors I’ve ever had), showed me that weaving is one of the oldest textile arts.  Here’s a brain-bender –  all looms are fundamentally the same:  they are designed to put tension on the warp (the length-wise threads) so that the craftsperson can put the weft (the cross-wise threads) in between them.  In this way, fabric is created.

So what’s an inkle loom?  It’s a small, usually portable, loom that allows you to wind on a continuous warp, which means it can be really, really long.  The weaving surface isn’t very wide, usually only a few inches, because the idea is to weave narrow fabric.  There’s an example of one here.

What about you, Dear Reader?
What would you want to make if you could wave a magic wand and know how to use an inkle loom?

 

Weaver’s Journal – The Fringe of Weaving

Knoontime Knitting

I’m working on the fringe for the Belii Shawl and wanted to do a laticework effect with the beads.  Since the image I’m using is from a book to which I don’t have the rights, (I almost typed, “writes,”) I drew it for you here by hand:

The top picture is straight fringe; the bottom one is the lattice effect that I wanted to try to achieve.  I used a fringe winder to ply the fringe together.  What that means is, you take the yarns that are the fringe and figure out direction they are spun.  All yarn has a natural direction of spin.  One direction spins it further, creating more energy in the twist; the other direction essentially unspins the yarn (and with looser yarns can cause them to fuzz up).

When you ply fringe, you take two or more of the fringe yarns and twist them further in the direction of their natural twist, and then tie a knot.  When you release the yarns, after they’re knotted, they roll together creating a pretty, and more stable, fringe that will not knot up when you wash it, for example.

What my hope was, was that by taking yarns adjacent to each other and plying them together, I could create a lattice effect like I’ve drawn, above.  What happened was that in plying the second row of fringe, it increased the twist of the fringes above it and when I released the yarns after the second knot, they twisted together, creating a mess and not a pretty, flat lattice.  I’ll show you what I mean, and what I did instead.

This is the second side of fringe; the yarn ends are longer on this side (meaning, the fringe is longer).  The fringe on the right has the first row of plying and beading done; as you can see, the beads are held in the middle of the twist by the energy of the plying.  (They’re not so tightly in there that they cannot move; I suspect when I wash it, for example, I’ll have to push them back into place.)

The tackle box is there to provide weight on the main body of the weaving.  By doing so, the fringe has something to pull against when you ply it.

This is the first row of fringe all done.  The fringe will be trimmed at the end, but I’ll wait until I have the beads in place, (three rows in total).  The finished length will be between six and eight inches.

In this view, you can see both sides of fringe as well as the main body of the shawl.  The loose threads on the body of the shawl will be snipped after its first wash.  I don’t want to wash it until the fringe is done, otherwise the threads will knot with each other and make a mess.

These are the tools I’m using.  Clockwise from top left:  fringe winder tool, gold beads, scissors, COFFEE mug (if you don’t think this is an essential tool at Knoontime Knitting, you haven’t been paying attention), fringe comb, extra yarn, and purple beads.

This is the first attempt at the latticed fringe.  As you can see, the second row of beading just causes the whole thing to twist up on itself.

We tried again, this time with my instructor holding the yarns under tension.  It didn’t help; as soon as we released the tension, they twisted together.  I need a sound-effect, like FOOP!  Foop, they twisted together.

I put the tackle box on the first row of beading and made the second row of plies on the same ply as the first.  On the first row, I plied it 13 times; the second row didn’t need that many because of residual twist; so I used seven twists instead.

Detail of both rows.

Final view showing the whole side.  I’m really curious to see what it looks like when it’s done and washed.  The fabric right now is thick and dense; it’s mercerized (perle) cotton and it softens up after washing; I’m curious what the hand of the shawl will be like once it’s all done.

Sunday Weaver’s Journal: The Belii Shawl

Knoontime Knitting

My beloved street-rescue cat Belii died last year after a prolonged battle with kidney failure.  I decided to weave something in his memory, inspired by him and his place in my life.  It feels a little silly to admit that out loud, that my artistic inspiration is my cat, (Am I becoming a Cat Lady?), but we shared a household for 16 years.  If you have pets, you’ll understand.  If you don’t have pets and aren’t a “pet person,” it won’t make sense – and I feel just a little sorry for you.

From the time he was a kitten, Belii was the most affectionate cat I’ve ever known.  His favorite spot was on your chest – whether he knew you well or not.  I used to hand guests a wash cloth to put on their shirt so that he wouldn’t kneed their skin.  That’s the other thing he did all his life – kneed with his claws.  I think it was a holdover from living on the street.  I’ve read that it’s a way for cats to get the milk to come when they’re nursing, and that makes sense.  But he took it one step further – he would actually curl his paw around your finger and hold on.  If he couldn’t sit on you, he’d sit next to you, as in the picture above.

His name, Belii, is the Russian word for “white.”  When he first adopted me, he was white – all white.  I took him in, got him healthy (he had a slew of stuff that the vet needed to take care of; he was the most expensive “free” cat I’ve ever gotten), and fed him.

He turned orange.

As you can see in the photograph above, his ears are the darkest part.  I looked it up; he’s got some Siamese in him and there’s a rare colorway called “peach point” that I’ve decided is Belii.  It sounds cool, doesn’t it?  I have a Peach-Point Siamese.  La-tee-da.  Folks don’t need to know he was homeless in Las Vegas when I found him, eh?

The design challenge is how to represent his colors in fabric.  I suspect this won’t be the first project where I attempt it, since I have some yarn in my stash that I bought with the idea of knitting something.  But for now, my focus is weaving and creating, in cloth, a piece of art inspired by my orange white cat.

Oh, why didn’t I change his name?  The Russian word for “orange” is оранжевый, or oranzhevyy in transliteration.  Not nearly as pretty-sounding to my American ear as Belii.

I love the pattern I made for the kimono and I talk about using that warp to thread the new warp, in a Sunday Weaver’s Journal earlier this year.  I’ve been working on the project and have pictures but not had time, because of our move, to post anything.  Today, I’m here to remedy that.  So, without further ado, here’s some photos:

My pattern is called “Twill Complication,” from A Handweaver’s Pattern Book by Marguerite P. Davison, page 46 (Marguerite P. Davison, Publisher, Swarthmore, PA, 1994).  I took the treadling pattern and put it in an excel spreadsheet so I could mark off where I am on the pattern.  The wrap is nine feet long in total, so that’s a lot of pattern repeats!

We realized that there were a couple boo-boos in the threading once I started weaving.  In between the time I finished the kimono and started the wrap, one of the assistant instructors thought I was done with the loom and started taking the old warp off.  When she realized I was intending on tying the new warp to it, she re-threaded everything.  We’re not sure if the boo-boo happened then or when I originally threaded it, so her suggestion was to do one entire pattern repeat in a highly-contrasting thread so we could evaluate what to do.

The options:  keep going anyway, even with the mistake, (if it wasn’t too visible); cut the warp thread(s) that could be safely eliminated without changing the design; or take the treading out and start over – which I did not, frankly, want to do.

Here’s an example of the entire repeat.  There were three problem spots, which aren’t greatly visible here, but are visible enough that they would cause a problem in the finished design.

After conferring with Natalie Boyett, we decided to just cut three of the warp threads and let the rest go – primarily because I didn’t want to rethread everything.

I am working on a Glimakra loom from Sweden.  It’s taken a while to get used to, because the shed (the part where you run the shuttle back and forth) is a lot narrower than on American looms.  It does, however, make for much neater edges, which is something I struggle with.

After using the loom for the last almost nine months now, I’m really liking it.  We’ve had some challenges, most notably when the twin holding the heddles in place snapped, but Natalie was able to fix it and it works smoothly now.  The most important part, how the weaving looks, is something I’m really happy with.

Here is a the first repeat of the actual pattern.  I decided to use alternating peach and ivory repeats of the pattern, because I loved how the contrasting yarn looked in the header.

Here is a detail of the pattern.  I love the way it looks beaded.  You can see a comparison with the kimono fabric in the Weaver’s Journal post here.

This is a view of the loom in its entirety except for the castle.  It’s a nice width for me and I love how the fabric is turning out.

Oh, contrary to popular belief, the Russian word for “scarf” isn’t “babushka,” it’s шарф, or “sharf” in transliteration.  A “babushka” is a grandmother.

Stay tuned for more Weaver’s Journals coming soon.

Friday Weaver’s Journal – The End Is Nigh!

Knoontime Knitting
I’m at the end!  I’m at the end!  I can’t turn the weaving any more than it is.  I’m so excited!

This is prior to the end, where you can see the dowel rod.  It’s supposed to be straight.  o.O…  It doesn’t appear to have affected the weaving negatively, thank the gods.

This is a shot from farther away, after I’ve moved the dowel off the back beam and then moved farther.

Isn’t this pattern awesome?  I’m so excited.  It looks awesome.  I’m looking forward to using the next colorway to begin the Belii Shawl.

This is the last little bit of the warp.  We’ll cut the fabric off the loom and then tie the new yarn to it and pull it through.
This shot is taken from some distance so you can see the fabric’s sheen.

Here’s the fabric.  I didn’t take it off the beam because I finished just as class ended, and I didn’t want to have to rush.  So, next week, we’ll have the fabric reveal and start sewing. o.O…

—
“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”
– E.E. Cummings

My links: Blog | Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads | Amazon | LinkedIn | Pandora
Knoontime Knitting: Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Ravelry
Noon and Wilder links: Blog | Website | Facebook
The Writer Zen Garden: The Writers Retreat Blog | Forum | Facebook | Twitter
Team Blogs: Nightlight | Nightlight FB Page | Beyond the Veil | BtV FB Page | LGBT Fantasy Fans and Writers | LGBTFFW FB Page
Publishers: Samhain Publishing | Torquere Press

Check out BURNING BRIGHT, available from Samhain Publishing.
Check out EMERALD FIRE, available from Torquere Books.
Check out “Taking a Chance“, part of the Charity Sips 2012 to benefit NOH8, available from Torquere Books.
Watch for TIGER TIGER, coming July, 2013, from Samhain Publishing.

Happy Stashbusting New Year!

Knoontime Knitting

Welcome to 2013!  365 days to knit, crochet, weave, or play with your favorite craft; 52 weeks of inspired ideas; 12 months of possibility; 4 seasons filled with opportunities for enjoyment; it’s a brand new year, kids, and we ain’t gettin’ any younger!  So LET’S GET BIZZY!

My theme for this year is Completion.  Here’s my plan of attack:

  • Define the parameters (i.e. what is my stash, exactly?)
  • Define the weaponry (i.e. what tools do I have, and what, if any, are needed?)
  • Easy wins (what’s already started or nearly done?)
  • Planned Campaigns (what’s already planned but not yet executed?)
  • Contingencies (what can we come up with that’s new?)
There’s a lot of play to do this year.  Today I’m finishing the Celebration of Light and Color Shawl (it just needs to be washed and blocked), and working on the diamond wrap.  Weaving class is Thursday and Michael and I are planning our next item for the Wardrobe of 2013.
What about you?  What yearnings have you got buried in your little crafty heart?  Trust that today is the day, and this is the year.  Craft on!