The Learning Curve

I’m finding out that there’s a pretty steep learning curve with weaving.  The Genius seems to be having less trouble with it than I am.  I’m struggling with picking out yarns to use.  They look great in my head, but in real life, they’re lacking.  I’m also having trouble figuring out the tabby, selvage thing.  My brain is tired.

Over Christmas, I gave up and took my project off the loom.  I’d call it a failure, but it isn’t, because I learned a lot. There are some long floats.  My width went wonky right from the start.  Warping Noro yarn is not for a beginner.  And I’m not even showing my selvages.

Yep!  Fringe is a wonderful thing.  It makes a so so project look pretty decent.

I warped that loom last night.  I’ll update soon.  I’m not sure if it will be a win or a fail.

In a previous post, I mentioned that The Genius was converting my Glimakra to a countermarch loom.  Here is the fabric she wove to test it.

Not bad for a new weaver, huh?  We call her The Genius for a reason.  Neither one of us has these colors in our homes. She was just using up some cotton that I inherited with a loom.  What is true red in this photo is really burgundy, which is my very least favorite color.

So…..I had a brilliant idea.

I made two knitting project bags with the fabric.  She spent countless hours over Christmas working on my loom.  It was the least I could do to thank her.  This way we both have the memory of her contribution to my weaving.

There is quilting going on as well.  I’ve found out that with a new puppy, I just park myself in my sewing room.  She’s easy to contain that way.  A few minutes ago the words, “Lola, don’t eat the sewing machine,” came out of my mouth. She was ready to chew on the pedal for the foot cord.   She’s now sound asleep in her kennel.

If you’re really curious about what I do every day, there is a link to my Instagram at the top right of the page.  I post a photo almost every day.

And now I get to pick out fabric to test some quilts!!!

 

 

Post Christmas Chill Out

Whew!  We survived Christmas.  I could tell you all about the parties, food, and all the stuff we did over Christmas, but my brain is fried!  We ate a lot.  We had fun with family.  We got on each others nerves. We opened presents.  We laughed a lot.  Mostly at Frankie.

And now we’re all chilling.  The boys have been ice fishing.  The girls are just hanging out.  The Genius and I are on a crafting binge.  I finished a bunch of mug rugs, and got several of them ready to go out in the mail today.

I saw a photo on pinterest and decided I needed to make one or ten.  I cut one strip of white fabric and ended up with 10 squares, so that’s how many I made.  So scientific of me, huh?  I made a stop at Pier 1 before Christmas to find snowman mugs.

You’ll have to excuse my late night photography.  This is one of those projects that I’m really pleased with, but they were kind of a pain.  They’re six inches square, and binding the silly things took forever!  Anyway, I actually executed a plan, and finished them!  It seems like it usually takes me about 3 years to finish a Christmas project.

The Genius has taken on a HUGE project for me.  She converted my big loom to a new system and this is her test project.

Yes, she is a moron.  It’s her 4th weaving project ever, and it’s on a different loom.  I’m proud to say she inherited the moron gene from her mother!!!  I’ll tell you more about this project soon!

I’ve done very little knitting, as I seem to be back in a quilting mood.  The Genius has also done very little knitting, as she’s found out that playing X-box with her little brother is more fun.

And now that it’s 1:30 AM, I should head to bed.  I’m sitting here listening to a bear snoring in the next room.  I think I’ll wander around the house and find an empty bed somewhere.

Another First!!!

I have my first project off the monster loom.  I posted about the big loom I purchased here.  I’ve been so busy, I haven’t taken time to do much weaving.  I started a rug in October.  It should have taken about a day, but then life got busy.

A couple of days ago, I headed for the sewing room to sew together more strips of fabric for the rug.  I’ve been weaving just a little bit each day.  Last night I decided it was time to stick to it and get it done.  I finished weaving, cut it off the loom, hemmed it, and washed and dried it.

Yep, that’s a nice mistake you see right in the middle.  Oh, well!  I think the reason I wasn’t very excited about finishing it was that I have nowhere to put it.  The warp is cream and pink and the strips of fabric I used for the weft is lavender.  I chose this fabric because I had an entire bolt of it that I’d tried and failed to sell multiple times on ebay.

Now that I know what I’m doing, I can definitely see the possibilities of rugs I’d actually use.  It ended up being over 5 feet long.  I wish I’d measured it before I threw it in the wash, so I knew what I was dealing with for shrinkage.

I really like the way the hem looks.  That probably makes me the most happy.

I had to get this project done, because I’m converting the loom to a countermarch system.  Don’t feel bad.  I don’t know what that means either.  Yet!  The Genius is going to be home in a few days, and I’m counting on her to be the brains in this operation.

And now I’m off to finish a spinning project.  The Genius needs a spinning wheel to use.  It really is the only way some of us stay sane in this crazy household!

I’m Officially a Weaver!

I’ve been wanting to take a weaving class forever!  I looked back through the blog, and found a post from May of 2010 about my desire to learn to weave.  Well….last week I was finally able to take a class.  And oh, was it worth the wait!

The Weavers Guild of Minnesota has an amazing class list!  I’ve been trying forever to schedule a beginning class.  The problems was that the classes for beginners are either a Monday thru Friday class or a Friday thru Sunday class.  It just never worked to carve out that much time to be away.  So, as you saw in my last post, the timing finally worked.  And I’m totally and completely fascinated with weaving.

In the past, every time I mentioned wanting to learn to weave, my readers suggested buying a Cricket loom.  I know me.  And I know I’ll go crazy.  Go big or go home is my motto!  More on that later.  I had in my mind that I wanted a new cherry Mighty Wolf with an 8 harness.  As the class progressed, I started to rethink what I wanted.  Yes!  That’s exactly why I waited to take a class before I purchased anything.

I got home on Friday and on Saturday, I headed over to visit a high school friend.  She had a loom she wanted to sell.  It turned out it is a Mighty Wolf, although its only a 4 harness.  To make a long story short, I now have a loom…..in our bedroom.

In the photo it looks like cherry, but we’re trying to figure out what it is.  It’s too light to be cherry and too dark to be maple.  Whatever!  I love it.  By Saturday night, I had it warped and by Monday morning, I had my first official done-all-by-myself finished project.  I made every rookie mistake there was to make, but I figured out how to fix stuff and here it is!

Just a simple project with two colors of perle cotton.  I’m sure you’d like to see more, right?

And I did take all of your suggestions to check Craigslist, and on Sunday night I bought another loom.  It’s huge and beautiful and scary and fun!  And I spent less on both looms than I would have if I’d made my original purchase.

And now, I’m off to thread the big loom for the first time.  Wish me luck!  I’ll be back to tell you how it went.