Pompom for the Finish

My CH60 Saori loom came with a 6m long black cotton warp. I wove it all off within a short time, mostly just as handwoven yardage to be used at some later date. 

For one section of the warp I used an unlabeled black bouclè yarn.

After seaming and then gathering the woven piece and creating a turned back a cuff, it went into my knitting basket were it lingered waiting for the addition of a hand knit, ribbed band.

Today a pompom that matches the ribbed band was added.

I quite like the look!

Draculaura Would Love It

This recently completed cowl and hat set reminds me of the colours worn by Monster High's Draculaura. I shall refrain from naming it that though since I don't want to invite licencing related law suits.

I had been babysitting my 7 year old granddaughter one day and after a lengthy session of "Monster High", where I was assigned the Draculaura doll, I had had enough and just needed a quiet evening weaving. As a child I happily played Barbie's for hours on end. My tolerance as an adult is considerably less.  

As supper cooked I wound a warp. In the early evening I got the warp threaded and sleyed and then later transferred to the loom and beamed, tied on, and tensioned. 

It wasn't until I had woven a few inches that I suddenly realized what the warp was reminding me of!

Draculaura of course! Her default outfit is raspberry pink and black. D'oh! 

Despite my initial aversion I carried on, and I must say I am very pleased with the result.

The hat and cowl are listed separately at my Etsy shop, Wovenflame.

Gaining weight

The thrum ball is gaining weight and girth.

When it has bulked up considerably it will go into a "thrift" weaving as yet to be determined. In the meantime "growing the thrum ball" has become a project unto itself.

Several Months Later

I have finally finished the work on a couple of hats I wove back in November.

These are from the same warp as the "Stupendous" cowl which was sold at the Chilliwack Christmas Craft Fair.

                                     

The two hats are quite similar, both having come from the same warp, but their brims are different shades of blue. 

                         

The hats weren't ready at the time of the sale. They needed their knitted brims done and a few ends sewn in here and there.

                                    

I was getting a cowl and 2 hats from each 6 metre warp. I've since shortened this type of warp so that it makes a cowl and just one hat.

                              

A Tale of Two Scarves

As promised, the tale of two scarves. If you read my post yesterday you may recall I was experimenting with purposely pooling a palindrome dyed skein of "Socks That Rock". 

From a distance the first scarf actually looks pretty good. The drape is fantastic and the colours remained vibrant and eye catching. 

I quite like it and will most likely get some wear out of it -- but --

If you look closely at the above picture, and the one immediately below, you will see how badly the thread weft "wandered". Initially my beat was very even and straight, but after the scarf was taken from the loom, and the warp relaxed overnight, the weft drifted all over the place, making it have squiggly lines in places. 

Despite the squiggles it still looks good when worn, if you don't get up too close and all analytical.

I'm much happier with the second try on the same warp. This time I used 10/2 mercerized cotton as weft and had no problem with the weft wandering. The playful Saori side of me came to the forefront with this one too, and threw in stripes of various colours and widths, thrum inclusions with dangling tails, 

and a few inlay shapes. 

The loop shape makes it easy to wear too. No fear of it falling off! I think it would be great under a blazer.

M'eh. Could've Been Better

My first attempt with a palindrone skein was a bit of a flop. I'm glad I didn't pick my favourite of the three skeins for my initial experimenting!





First off, my attempt to get the colours to pool was less than perfect because my path on the warping board was not the perfect length. Next time I'll use a hybrid of methods and prepare a warp for the Saori loom using pegs, like would be done for a rigid heddle loom. That way I can adjust the length of the warp to the finest degree and get it exactly right -- but still take the warp to my preferred loom when I'm done.




My next mistake was choosing to use sewing thread as weft. In theory it seemed like a good idea. Nice fine weft allowed the pretty warp colours to show. It also gave the scarf an incredibly luscious drape. The finished scarf drapes more like silk or tencel than the merino wool that is is. So, what was the problem?



Well --- it's not visible here in a photo taken while it was still on the loom, but that thread weft drifted terribly! It didn't even wait for its "wet finishing" bath. As the merino warp relaxed overnight the weft started travelling all over the place. Very disappointing!

I did get a second, small project off the same warp, and it was more successful because I used 10/2 mercerized cotton. I'll try to get photos of both the disappointing scarf and its more successful sidekick tomorrow.

The Path for Palindrone

A palindrone, hand dyed skein can make for an interesting warp with a faux Ikat effect. I think most often they are done on rigid heddle looms. The reason being that with direct warping it is a relatively simple matter of adjusting the distance to the peg to get the warp colours to line up and "pool". I do have a rigid heddle loom -- two in fact -- but I so much prefer using my Saori loom that I wanted to wind a warp for that instead.

It's a little trickier to find a warping board path that will be a perfect multiple of the original skein length, thereby getting the pooling just so. Here is my first attempt. I decided the "Carnival" colourway would be a sacrifice to the initial attempt.



It's pooling, and rather effectively I think, but not quite in the way is usually intended, which is with the colours more or less in softly blending stripes across the warp rather than sharply contrasting ones along the warp's length as this one is doing. I'm not certain but I think it's because my warp path is ever so slightly longer than the actual skein's length, doubled.

Here's a photo of the exact path the warp takes on my Saori warping board. It's ever so slightly longer than 4m. The skein was 2m.



For this type of pooling to work on a warping board you have to have a circular path, rather than one that goes down and then back up as a warp is normally wound. Syne Mitchell of weavezine.com has an article that explains how to wind a palindrome skein on a warping board, for effective faux ikat.

If you are interested in trying this, Nancy, Ravelry user name "MeasuredThreads", has a great explanation of how to evaluate a palindrome skein to create a faux Ikat scarf in her post on a rigid heddle loom forum on Ravelry.

I experimented with a few different colours and weights of weft threads and have decided to weave this one with sewing thread as weft so that the warp colours are all that is really noticed once the scarf is wet finished.

Beginnings

2017 is off to a great start. I've made some important commitments to better health and one week in it is going well and I am feeling very positive about the improvements I'm making.

I've had a birthday since my last blog post. Among other things I received some wonderful yarny goodness as gifts. This huge ball of "Crazy Zauberball" was a most generous gift from my sister-in-law. It will likely find it's way into a special weaving. I haven't yet decided exactly what. It is too precious to waste so I will put some thought into where I'll go with that one.




The next three items are all skeins of "Socks That Rock" yarn hand dyed in a palindrome manner. These were a birthday gift from my husband.  I will use all three to weave scarves in a Faux Ikat fashion. I spent some time today preparing the first skein for the loom.



It requires some special handling to get the colours to pool and mimic IKAT dyeing. More on that in a future post.