Down to the Wire…

The year just got away from me.  That would be the guild year, you know, starts in September, ends in June.  Like next week June.  The assigned challenge/exchange happens in September, and the final results are due in June.  No sweat.  Right.  So why am I sweating?  Because my exchange piece is due next Wednesday night, and it has been 95 degrees here for the past couple of days, I refuse to turn on the airconditioning because it is suppose to cool off, which it actually has, after last night’s big thunderstorm, but weaving mohair in 95 degree heat isn’t my idea of fun.  So why did I wait so long?  I didn’t think the fabric, which I designed back in April, would give me this much grief, and because I am constantly changing shuttles, it is weaving painfully slow…  And I’m using a temple, to maintain width, which is also very slow as it has to be moved every inch or so.

You see, each of the guild exchange participants put yarn in a bag, and the bags were exchanged.  You are required to weave (or whatever fiber technique floats your boat), something for the person whose yarn you picked, and obviously you don’t get to choose what’s in the bag you pick.  I got a combination of some very odd things, and I blogged about the yarns, and what I planned to do with them back in April (In a post titled oddly enough,  “Rested” !).

So here I am, struggling through this warp, on my new to me loom, my 36″ Tools of the Trade, (circa 1985) that I bought back in April.  I have to say first off, I adore this loom.  It feels like an old friend, since I have four other Tools of the Trade looms, the size and weight is perfect for my aging body.  And it is handling this very problematic fabric with extreme bravery.  First off, this fabric is primarily a very hairy very sticky fine kid mohair.  Since the original design called for three shafts in the block with the mohair, there are 24 ends per inch spread over three shafts and if you are a handweaver you know this means major sticking when trying to change sheds.  The first six inches or so of this warp were really painful.  I haven’t had this much grief over a warp in years.  I just couldn’t build any speed.

I resorted to every trick I’ve ever had to use as an experienced weaver, after all, I got my start weaving production mohair yardage, and I found a can of Niagara Spray Starch in my laundry cabinet.  That was the first thing.  Spray Starch tends to have silicon in it to help the iron glide, and it helped control the hairyness of the mohair.  The next step was to redesign the block, which I wanted to do anyway since I didn’t like the appearance of the original design.  I worked out a pattern that only required one shaft to be lifted at a time.  In the case where one of the picks required two shafts at a time, I spread them out over two treadles, so I’d be lifting only one at a time.  The shed on this loom is fabulous, and the shafts themselves heavy, so I’m getting good clearance once the threads do separate.  Still, this is a painfully slow warp.

The other trick I resorted to, was to dig out my temple, that bar with teeth that digs into the selvedges and spreads the warp so there is no draw in, which had been substantial on this warp.  By keeping the fabric at full width, I’m getting weft coverage and maintaining the 24 ends per inch.  If I were to weave this again, (which I won’t) I would probably try setting it at 20 epi instead of 24.  I know that sounds funny coming from someone who plans to have on her tombstone the words, “Should have been sett denser…”  In this case, the blocks aren’t weaving completely square, and I’m not resleying it at this point.  

So my trusty loom and I are plodding along with an eye on the clock, yes I shouldn’t be blogging, and I shouldn’t be spending the mornings weeding the yard, and I shouldn’t be spending afternoons in lunch dates and paperwork, but honestly I’m not enjoying this yardage.

BUT, I am damn proud of what I have in front of me.  The fabric is really beautiful, and I am really pleased at what I came up with given the odd array of yarns in my bag.  I’m not making anything from the yardage, like some of the other guild members, since the person who will get this yardage is a fabulous sewer (I know the word now is sewist, but that’s irritating, I’m a sewer and proud of it.)

Meanwhile, my daughter, who definitely waited too long to start her project for the guild exchange, is frantically trying to get hers on the loom, and hitting just as many road blocks.  She did an excellent job of calculations to see what she could get from the five cones she was given, (Unlike the rest of us, she adores math) and she is planning a tartan like plaid from the colors, a gorgeous palette.

She finished winding yesterday after school, and last night set to sleying the reed.  She partitioned off the reed, since there are multiple ends in each dent, and then started sleying.  She finished up and I heard a screech and a curse word that shouldn’t come out of the mouth of a 17 year old, and I went over and she was in despair because she was one dent short in the reed.  She had started too far in on the right side.  So she sucked it up, and resleyed the entire reed, moving everything over by a couple of dents, and finished up a second time.  She has a half day today because of the holiday weekend, and will try to get the loom threaded by tonight.

Oh, and here is a tip, I don’t normally use standard warp beams, my three other floor looms have sectional pegs, so no packing paper is necessary with the warp.  But my new loom, though it has two warp beams, does not have sectional pegs, it is a standard beam, requiring packing.  I found a roll of sturdy white paper from Staples, the regular craft paper rolls weren’t wide enough.  I attached the end of the paper roll when I started beaming the warp, and the paper just unrolled as the warp beamed.

There was still a lot of paper left on the roll, and I didn’t really want to cut it off, and thought of a way to self rewind the paper as I wove the fabric.

By tying the paper roll, suspended from the warp beam, with two pieces of string, the roll is actually rewinding as I advance the warp.  I’m pretty impressed with myself.

OK, back to weaving…