Saturday, June 30, 2018

Bone-headed move led me back to my wheel

Last night I finished weaving another linen band on the mini Wave.

So today I designed a new warp for the mini Wave.  I have had the urge to do some pickup and I want to see how this loom will handle it.  I modified a draft from Hidegund Hergenhan's 4th notebook Around the Baltic Sea, Lithuania 2.  I actually broke out the graph paper and colored pencils.  I am still weaving linen bands, they have all been woven is shades of greens, oranges, tans, along with black and brown.

The card table for the Singer 301 was perfect for graphing this out since my band basket was sitting.  So I have the warp dressed on the loom, go to start weaving, and figured out that I did not wind enough background ends.  Yeesh, it was like I had never woven before.  Now I have this long, pretty warp on the loom that will not do what I want it to do.  I needed to walk away and think about this.

I went up to the loft, pulled out my Lendrum DT spinning wheel and started spinning.  It has been a long time since I did any serious spinning and since I did join Ravelry's Warped Weavers Tour de Fleece 2018, I figured I should put some time in on the wheel.  It was pleasant, I can still spin!
This fiber is a mixed blend of alpaca, llama, angora, and wool.  I have a number of balls of this fiber from years ago.  I never used it for its original purpose, so I taught myself to spin on the wheel and spindles with it.  I also ended up going through my fleece bin and found some merino and some silk hankies, so I am set.  Should be fun:-)

Friday, June 22, 2018

Tonight I totally trashed the warp on the mini Wave.  I tried to outsmart myself and that never works.  I had a 2 ends dangling that were missed while winding the warp and I thought I could just wind all the warp forward, attach the 2 missed ends, and wind it back on.  Very wrong!  The tension and length of warp ends is all messed up.  I am afraid this one is for the trash can.

I set that mess aside, and went back to weaving of the floor inkle loom.  This one is not giving me any grief so far.


This is a band of dark and lights of each of the colors I have been using.  I really love this Bockens 16/2 linen.

Thursday, June 21, 2018

The start....

This is a travel journal of my wanderings in the tunnels of the rabbit-holes that I keep falling down.  Hopefully there will be some interesting twist and turns as I go.

I am hooked on fiber:  I weave in a variety of ways and have the equipment to do so.  I am now weaving yardage for sewing my own clothing on vintage Singer sewing machines.  Somehow I slipped down the quilting rabbit-hole as well which actually came from picking up a number of vintage Singer sewing machines.  I really love those old black beauties😀  I also enjoy different styles of braiding and have some really cool equipment for that.  Oh and there is a spinning wheel and a few spindles as well.

For going through all the hassles of being treated for breast cancer, I bought myself a kayak.  I have been using the "I survived cancer" justification for the purchase of a lot of toys.  That and preparing for retirement.  This is the time to get what I need to play with in the future.  So with that in mind, I picked up a recreational kayak for playing on rivers and small inland lakes.  My first 'yak is mostly for Lake Michigan.  It can pretty much take anything she decides to throw at me.

So that is what this blog will do, document my explorations in fiber and water.  I hope you enjoy the journeys as well.

What insomnia can lead to!

 A couple of weeks ago I had a very bad case of insomnia.  I was not able to fall asleep, so rather than the torture of tossing and turning,...