Never a dull moment

The rosepath is done! Not cut off the loom yet but the weaving is finished. I decided to use a temple after the first yard or so just to speed things up a bit.


I'm not sure why I hesitate to get the temple out so often - I guess I feel like it's going to slow me down so I'd rather avoid it if possible. I must admit, there's also a sense of guilt, like I ought to be able to weave without one and I'm faulty some how for needing one. Where does that come from, I wonder? At any rate, I got out the temple and that sped things up quite a lot, as I didn't have to fuss so much about draw in, just about beating too hard.

Incidentally, in spite of my hang ups about temples, I have a lot of them and really like them all. The one in the pic is a wooden one from Glimakra that I got along with three or four others from Madelyn Van der Hoogt when I took her Weaving II course (including one for the Centre where I teach). It's the kind I use for delicate fabrics or narrow warps. I've also got two heavy metal Toika temples that I got from The Weaving Works to use on blankets and rugs.

Anyhoo, the rosepath. I realized today that I've been referring to it as "the rosepath" even though it's really bits of point twill on a basket weave ground. The treadling, though - that's rosepath. I like this angle because it shows off the stripes down on the cloth beam. Pretty, huh?


Not sure yet what this fabric will become - depends on what happens in the fulling, really. I'm still thinking some kind of cocoon but it might also be hats or pillows or something else entirely. I'm sure it'll let me know what it wants to be eventually.

I also wove a scarf on Joey this morning, so now there's only one or two left on that warp, too. Haven't posted a pic of that warp yet, so here you are:


I wove some scarves in this palette for the show I did last November and it was quite popular with the gents, so I put it on again. I hardly ever repeat warps like that but hey, rules are meant to be broken, eh wot?


I've also neglected to post pics of the socks-in-progress, so here they are as well:


This is my second time using this sock pattern and the first using my new needles with the more flexible cord - definitely an improvement! I've realized lately that I don't like my socks to come very far up my leg, so I made the tops of this pair shorter than the last. I'm afraid they might be just a bit too short, but this is a learning process. Eventually I'll figure out The Perfect Sock and then I can make loads of them!

I'm anxious to get these done so that I can try a new pattern that my mother's friend Peggy sent me. I used her instructions for Kitchener stitch to graft the toes of the blue and brown pair and they worked a treat, so I'm really eager to try out the entire pattern. I think Peggy's considering selling this pattern but she's given me permission to share it with my local fibrous friends as long as each person who gets it donates a pair of handknit socks to a local charity. Isn't that lovely? :D


In other knitting news, now that I've given away the gift, I can show you pics of the silly doggy shrug I made for my friend Marg and her dog Millie for Christmas:


The only explanation I have for this is that it seemed like a really good idea at 3:00 aye em. I hunted around online for a dog coat pattern that I could make pretty quickly and found this really cute one on knitty.com. Of course, with all those cables and bobbles, it wasn't a quickie so I just figured out the basic outline of her 10 lb dog pattern, did a ridiculously small tension swatch and then cast on what seemed like a reasonable number of stitches and knit a rectangle. I got a bit sneaky and used the casting off to sew up the legs and even used a version of the beaded cast off from splityarn for what I thought was going to be the neck. The legs turned out long enough that I didn't pick up any stitches to knit down cuffs and, in fact, turned up the cuffs a bit to shorten them. Even though the shrug is supposedly exactly the same top and bottom, I think the beads will work better at the bottom edge rather than the neck - maybe the cast off stretched the width?

I didn't have a dog handy to try this out on and our cats all objected strenuously, so I have no idea if it's anything even approximately Millie-shaped. I'm really anxious to learn whether or not it fits her and to see pictures if it does! Are you listening, Marg?

So now I have a date with a roast and the enormous new slow cooker that Ron got me for Christmas but then it's back to the looms - want to get Joey naked ASAP so I can dress him up in crackle (ooo, crackle for rocker upholstery - woot!) and I need to make some design decisions about the blanket for Letitia so that I can get that yarn ordered toot sweet. As I say, never a dull moment!

Endings and beginnings

The rosepath singles are nearly done! Could have stayed up to finish it tonight but decided to leave it until the morning so that I'll be more alert when I go over the yardage for skips or other glitches. I've also gotten the first couple inches of Joey's scarf started, so maybe I'll finish off that warp tomorrow as well. I need to get Joey cleared off so that I can get cracklin! Especially since the crackle's got to come off before the end of the month if I'm really going to do the scarf-a-day in February.

I'm off to tuck myself into bed with The Artist's Way - a glass artisan friend and I have agreed to at least read the book at the same time, though we've made no promises about actually doing any of the exercises. I must admit I'm pretty skeptical but I figure what the heck.

Shark infested waters

Was reading through a few pattern books yesterday when it dawned on me: I thought I'd planned enough warp on this latest experiment to do two projects, one short cocoon thing and one longer coat-like thing, but they need two panels each and i'd forgotten to double the lengths. Ho hum. I guess I get one project! And then as I was tying on last night (at 1:00 aye em, I might add) I realized that the samples I'd woven last year to decide how to set this wool were done in plain weave and my current experiment is twill, so it should have been set closer. Did I set it closer for this project? No, I did not.

However! I am neither dismayed (much) nor deterred! This is simply an opportunity to practice what I preach to my students and tell myself: no one else can see the image you had in mind when you started this project, so they'll never notice the ways in which it isn't like the original plan! They will simply see a lovely piece of weaving and no one will ever know it wasn't what you intended.

Unless, you know, you blab about it to everyone online. Ahem.

Two lessons here: I always think more clearly at 1:00 aye em than at 1:00 pee em, and whenever experiments go absolutely swimmingly, watch for sharks.



As you can see, I went right ahead and started weaving the twill at 10 epi and even though Oh My Goodness I have to beat lightly, I think it'll work. The little zig zags are beginning to appear just as they ought (shark alert?) and I'm hopeful once it's wet finished and all pulls together, it'll be a very light and lovely fabric. There'll be plenty for one cocoon and maybe some leftovers for some of the other things I started cooking up as I laid in bed last night, so who cares about the missing coat that only I know about? Not me!