Posted by Peg in South Carolina
Check it out and let me know what you think. Of course, I should be weaving instead of fiddling with my blog………
"New Year Look for my Blog” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 30, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
"Handspun Scarf Modelled” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 27, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
I had intended taking the photo of the scarf on me. Time, however, prevented me from learning how to use the delay timer on my camera.
Merry Christmas!
"Finished Handspun Scarf” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 22, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
After discussing it with my husband, I had decided to sign up for the Complex Weavers’ Summer workshop being held in Albuquerque this summer. Then I learned that it had filled up within something like five days of registration having opened. My husband wanted me to get on the waiting list. But I figured that the waiting list was already pretty long.
Undaunted, I checked summer workshops in the area where I live. Not only did I find one. I found one that I would rather enroll in than Complex Weavers!
It is being held at the J.C. Campbell Folk School. Here is the description of the workshop:
Warp It! Paint It! Weave It!
June 6-12, 2010
Instructor: Kathie Roig
Want the beauty of a hand-painted warp but don't have the space, time, or equipment? Explore different methods of painting your warp (and perhaps the weft) using fabric paints, spontaneously adding color to yarn for functional or art pieces. Be ready to experiment with color, texture, and weave structure. Students must know how to dress a floor loom. Limited instruction will be given on warping, specific to the warp-painting process.
Does this sound heretical for someone who dyes her yarns? Actually, I have no intention of stopping dyeing or substituting painting for dyeing. What I do want to be able to do is to add painting to the dyeing. There are fabric paints that can do things that dyes cannot do.
I have been thinking about trying this for a long time. In fact, sitting on my loom right now is a small jar of gold Setacolor by Pebeo that I purchased recently in Asheville, NC. It is on top of my loom because I am thinking of trying to use it on my upcoming silk crackle piece.
I am now registered for the workshop.
"Summer Workshop” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 21, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
I followed the same procedure as I did for the sample. I fulled it a tiny bit more so it was both a tiny bit narrower and shorter than predicted.
Final Width: 6”
Final Length: 65”
I let it dry and then steamed it with lots and lots of hot steam. Never touched the iron to the fabric. I simply used my hand to gently press at the just steamed areas. It is lovely.
Will trim the fringes and get a picture up next week. I want to learn how to use the delay timer on my camera.
"Wet Finishing the Handspun Scarf” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 14, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
WET FINISHED BY HAND
In the first set of images, the sample has been soaked for one hour in hot soapy (Johnson’s Baby Shampoo) for one hour, then massaged or otherwise tortured by hand for about three minutes. The second image is a detail view.
The width has stayed the same: 7”
The length has shrunk from 15” to 12”
The sample has lost some of the fragility it had when it first came off the loom. But it is still quite delicate and soft. Very feminine in its delicacy. It needs to be washed again since this is to be a present for a man.
WET FINISHED IN THE WASHING MACHINE
The next set of images shows the sample after it has been washed by machine in hot water with Johnson’s Baby Shampoo for four minutes. I put it in a nylon lingerie bag.
The width has now drawn in to 6.25”
The length has shrunk down to 10.75”
The sample is still a bit delicate, but not at all fragile. The fulling process has thickened it up just as bit, as well as softened the fabric. I would be tempted to try fulling it just a bit more, but then I think it might start getting thicker than I want. Plus it would be getting way too narrow.
Based on the on loom measurements (7” x 15”), this represents a widthwise loss of roughly 10% and a lengthwise loss of approximately 22%. This means that, should I wash the scarf itself for the same amount of time, its length would shrink from from 88” (measurement on the loom) to roughly 68.5”.
The lengthwise shrinkage is in reality not that much. The drop of 3” in length of the warp represents simply that the yarn was stretchy and stretched quite a bit as I beamed it on. Likewise the length of the scarf off the loom went from 88” to 78”.
I had anticipated this kind of shrinkage from the beginning. Even when I wound the yarn on the warping board, it snapped back probably about 5” after I removed each bout.
Related Post: Winding the Handspun Warp
"Sample Wet Finished” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 13, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
Mended but not washed.
Actually, there was no real mending to be done. Simply trimming off the ends left from changing bobbins. I will trim the fringe after wet finishing.
Measurements:
Width: 7.25” (same as on loom)
Length: 78” (on loom, 88” = approximately 11% loss)
Dave Daniels commented on my last post:
FOURTEEN? Wow, good for you for getting that much extra out of it. Amazing!
The reason I could weave so close is that I have a big loom. It is a Nilus II LeClerc with rear-hinged treadles and from front beam to back beam measures 47”.
The longer warp length also reduces stress on the warp ends. That is why I can weave under high tension with little or no warp breakage.
Small looms are wonderful for little spaces and for travelling. But nothing beats weaving on a larger loom.
"Handspun Scarf Off Loom” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 12, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
Waste at back: 17" x 98 ends = 1,666" ÷36" = 46 yards
Is this too much? In this case, no, because I had more than enough handspun. Still 46 yards of plied handspun seems like a lot to me. But the fact that I could weave as far as I could on the warp will cause me to think carefully next time as to whether or not I will use a dummy warp.
And here is a close up that shows just how close the rod came to the heddles.
The amazing thing was that this last bit of weaving created a great deal of tension on the warp because the warp ends, when sheds were created created terribly great angles when a shed was made. But not a broken thread in the bunch.
And no floating shafts! Why do I have trouble with floating shafts in my complex crackles and no floating shafts in plain twill? It does not happen because of unequal distribution of warp ends on the shafts. Give or take one end, there are always the same number on each shaft.
Related Posts:
Floating Shafts
Handspun and Dummy Warps
"Handspun Scarf: End of the Line” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 11, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Here is the scarf, still on the loom. On the loom, it is 88” long and the width is 7.25 inches (the width at the reed is 8.0 inches.
I wonder how long I will be able to make the end-of-the warp sample I would like to have for testing wet-finishing?Posted by Peg in South Carolina
I have woven 80 inches so far. I plan on weaving only six more inches. That may (or may not) give me space to weave a short piece that I could use for sampling the finishing.
I have decided, by the way, that I like the sheds I get better with the raddle off the back beam. So for the next warp, I will remove the raddle after I am done threading. Then, of course, I will leave the lease sticks in.
Related Post: Finished
"Almost Done Weaving the Handspun” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 9, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
I am working at getting 12 picks per inch. What I had intended to do was to use my right angle rectangle to place against the fabric to check the angle of the twill. But this fabric is so busy with all its nubs that I cannot see the angle. At least not when I am looking straight down at the fabric. For all anyone might care, this reads simply as plain weave.
But I wanted to weave twill, because the twill structure, even though the fabric does not read as twill, will allow the fabric to hang nicely around the neck.
I discovered quite by accident that if I looked at the woven fabric on the loom from a certain angle, I could clearly see the twill line. So I tried to get it on a photograph. After many failed attempts, I finally got this one. If you look at the left side of the fabric, the twill line is visible.
"Twill Line” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 8, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
When I beat, I am used to slamming the beater into the fell. Indeed, I have equipped this beater with a weight to take some of the work off my arms. Adding the weight really goes back to my early years of weaving rugs. I keep the weight on because it helps very much in beating my fine silk pieces.
But this is neither a rug nor a 60/2 silk piece. Instead of using the beater to beat the weft into the fell, I use it to gently place the weft where it needs to be. This is a two-step process for me:
1. I raise the shed, throw the weft, and bring the beater a couple of inches away from the fell.
2. I change to the next shed and carefully bring the beater towards me to place the weft where my eye tells me it needs to be.
Actually, “bringing the beater towards me” is usually not quite accurate. Because the beater is generally tipping more or less towards me (and remember that the beater is weighted), I am actually holding the beater away from the fell and then allowing it to go to the place I want it to go by resisting the force its weight is trying to exert.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
I have decided to weave this piece with a temple. I think the selvedges will look better. I think the whole piece will look better. Despite the fact that I move the temple after 8 shots……. I’m getting used to it, though.
If you go to the related post on temples, you will see that when I wrote that—in July of 2007—I said that I had never used a temple on my handspun, only on silk warps or wide warps that needed to be beaten very tightly. A girl can change her mind…….
Related Post: Temples
"Weaving Finally Begun on Handspun Warp” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 4, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
After I had spun the yarn, I soaked it in hot soapy water for 30 minutes, rinsed it well and let it dry. The yarn did not “bloom” though the textured bits did. So I think I need to treat this as a worsted rather than a woolen spun yarn. But I still need to account for the texture.
I once again used Asenhurst’s formula to figure out the maximum sett for twill and I got 10.72. Well, I’m throwing Asenhurst out. What I see on my loom does not support this sett at all. So I am going to go for 12 epi.
And here is what it looks like sleyed at 12 epi.
The blue mohair is woven in plain weave and I have made no attempt to get the picks per inch correct. I wanted only to get the selvedges pulled in the right amount and to see how the warp spacing looked. This looks like a twill treadling is going to work very well.
Related Posts:
Handspun Sett Still Too Open
Interlude
"Resleying the Handspun” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 3, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
Looking at what was happening, namely how easily this was going to become a weft-faced piece, I began having second thoughts about the sett. Then I looked, really looked, at the warp. Clearly, clearly, these ends were still too far apart from each other. Even taking into consideration the textured bumps in the warp.
So, time to pull out all those blue threads and get to work on resleying.
Related Posts:
Determining Sett for Handspun Scarf
Handspun Sett Change
"Handspun Sett Still Too Open” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 2, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
Posted by Peg in South Carolina
Sitting on my triple balance scale in the kitchen are the three latest skeins of 60/2 silk I have wound for dyeing. Each skein consists of 1200 yards. Together, They weigh 109 grams. Divided by three, that means each skein weighs 36.3 grams, which, for practical purposes I will round off to 36 grams.
Why not weigh each skein individually? I think I might get more accurate results this way. At any rate, it is just simpler.
"Weighing the Skeins” was written by Margaret Carpenter for Talking about Weaving and was originally posted on December 1, 2009. ©2009 Margaret Carpenter aka Peg in South Carolina.
