One thing led to another…

Of course nothing can go as planned…  That would be too simple….

I got up early this morning to continue re-upholstering the rocker.  Of course there were numerous interruptions, my son’s friends were hanging about, and my daughter and husband were here, and there was some lovely Sunday morning conversation happening, but alas, not much opportunity to work on the rocker.  That would be anti-social?

Eventually everyone went off to do their thing, and I settled down to work on the rocker.  I got the base fabric on, and I’m so happy with how it looks.  The corners are tricky to cut, I always struggled with the corner cuts, even in upholstery class, but I managed to do a pretty good job.  When I got to the back of the chair, I started with the muslin cover first, but as I hammered in the tacks, the lower part of the back frame split in a serious way, requiring much glue and overnight clamping.  And I’m running out of upholstery tacks.

So, since I can’t do anymore work on the rocker, I decided to visit my attic stash, and my daughter who is always up for an adventure, decided to come with me.  So we pulled down the attic stairs, and ventured up above into the rafters, stepping carefully, and located my box of decorator trims and braids.  Most of what I have is the simple gimp braid, leftover from other upholstery jobs, none of it in the right color, and lots of trim with galloons and tassels, which aren’t really suitable for the trim on the rocker.

Now I have two choices.  I can take a trip to Calico Corners, and see what trims they sell, or, I can see what kind of inkle trim I can concoct.  🙂  The second choice immediately appealed to me, since it was Sunday afternoon, and it was much more fun to design something in the studio than get in the car and drive to a store…

First off, I didn’t have a free inkle loom, and I wanted one of the small ones, the Inklette by Ashford.  I want this to be really portable since I’ll probably have to weave 8-10 yards, I don’t want to drag the full size inkle loom around.  Which meant that I had to clear one of my inkle looms before I could embark on another project.  Fortunately I was really close to the end of the Splash yarn band I’d been weaving, and I set about to finish off that band.  It is really pretty, and the supplemental cotton cable yarn added a lovely dimension to the piece.

Meanwhile, my daughter at 16 still likes to hang out wherever I am in the house, especially when I’m in my studio.  She is preparing to give a talk to our weaving guild on Wednesday night, on the Lucet, a Victorian braiding technique, and she is scrounging through my studio to find interesting yarns to use on her larger inkle loom for dog leashes, shoe laces, and anything else she might be able to sell at the guild sale.

While I’m trying to finish off the Splash band, she is tearing apart my studio, rearranging my bins, and ooohhhhing and aaaahhhhing at every ball of yarn she pulled out.  Brianna is attired in a total clash of pinks today, so she was quite the sight amidst all those balls of color!

Once I finished off the inkle loom band, I started to hunt around for yarns that might work for trim for the rocker.  I grabbed a stiff card to try some wraps.  I needed the trim to end up about 1/2″ wide.

I tried a couple of different combinations, rayons, silks, and a gorgeous skein of Linen.

I warped the loom pretty quickly, about 20 minutes to warp a couple of yards, and I started to weave.  The first few inches looked a little tweedy, and not very interesting, so I tried playing with a pick-up pattern.  I wanted to create more of a diamond effect to coordinate with the diamonds in the upholstery fabric.

Once I settled on the design, this trim wove up pretty quickly.   I’ll take my little loom down to my neighbor’s house for our weekly viewing of Desperate Housewives, a neighborhood tradition, and I’ll see if I can’t get a couple of yards done while I’m watching TV.

If you live in the Northern NJ area, and are interested in a class in inkle weaving, I’m teaching a one day class next Sunday at the Newark Museum.  They have looms there, and I’ll have a couple of the Inklette’s for sale, it isn’t too late to sign up, and it is a small class so you’ll get lots of attention.

Inkle Loom Weaving
with Daryl Lancaster
The inkle loom is portable, easy to warp, easy to weave off,
and makes beautiful belts and bands. Starting with a Power-
Point presentation, participants learn to make heddles for
the loom, follow a draft and warp the loom. Proper techniques
for weaving a tight even band with good selvedges
will be explained. Participants can finish a small project by
the end of the day. Inkle looms provided or you may bring
your own. All levels
Sunday, November 8, 10 am–4 pm
Member: $72, Non-Member: $80, Materials: $15