38 weeks. My friends, this is no illusion. And I still have 2 weeks to go. Amazing, yes?
Weaving content coming up -- if you do not wish to start weaving, you may want to look away from all of the woven pr0n. Incoming....
Two nights ago after putting the children in bed, I opened up the Cricket manual and figured out how to warp it. As it turns out, it's crazy easy. So easy, that I wove off an entire scarf that night (Sparky's). The next morning, the boys were chomping at the bit for me to weave off a scarf for Max too, so I let them help me warp.
This is the single-peg method described in the materials supplied, and it's seriously so simple that I was able to keep things straight while being "helped" extensively. They thought that it was great fun to race across the kitchen and put the loops of yarn over the warping peg (next to Sparky's hand -- kind of blends in with the background here). There was a bit of fighting ("it's MY turn to run!!!"), but overall it was fun. And I didn't loose my brain. And we actually managed to warp the thing. Pretty incredible, let me tell you.
By bedtime last night, I had completed weaving Max's scarf as well. I wet-finished them both (I was amazed by how much of a difference a soak in some Eucalan-infused water did for the finished item!), and we had two little drapy, soft scarves this morning. The boys have been running around the house with them since, but I managed to confiscate them for a (brief) photo shoot.
Sparky's Little Man Scarf: 57" long, 4-1/4" wide.
I had spun this yarn using the Fractile Stripe method, and it was very interesting to see it all organized in a woven fabric.
Max's Little Man Scarf: 53" long, 4" wide.
You might remember that this started out as a multi-layered batt. I spun the colors at random with no distinct patterning. Once again, I love seeing it in the woven fabric.
I warped the loom for both scarves using a complimentary color of KnitPicks Palette fingering weight yarn. I used the 12 dent reed so that it would be a weft-faced fabric (unlike the balanced weave of my grandma's light blue scarf). Weft-faced fabric is one in which the weft (yarn going back and forth across) is mostly all that you see in the finished product.
Upon completing these two projects in such quick succession, I can assure you that practice does indeed benefit the weaver. My selvedges have been cleaning up more and more as I'm mindful of the edge warp threads. I have noticed that I need to leave a tiny bit more slack when I'm right in the middle, but pull it just a little tighter when I'm close to the back-beam and then again when I'm nearing the heddle.
Now that those are done, my boys are asking "Where's Daisy's scarf?" She's been running around with my grandma's scarf, so I knew that I needed to get right on it (sets of 3, sets of 3. Soon it will be everything in sets of 4... does this mean that I should be working on another Sheldon?)
Someone on Ravelry was wondering how lap-weaving was working out for me with my greatly decreased lap, so these pictures are for her:
(Spunky Eclectic Romney in Eclipse being spun in the foreground -- more on that in a future post)
As you can see, I've "created" a shelf to work on by putting my feet up on something under the desk, and hooking the back end of the loom over my keyboard drawer (since I have a laptop and don't use it anyway).
Oh, and...yeah, I've never shown my house in such dissaray. However, when my husband is here, he hates to have all of my stuff encroaching on the computer area, so I only have a tiny bit longer to enjoy the Desk Disaster. This means that you, my friends, have a rare "real" glimpse of me in my natural habitat. =)
As soon as I finish Daisy's scarf, it's back to the Central Park Hoodie. I've picked up the stitches for the hood, and I really want to finally wear it!!
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