Fibonacci Sequence Scarf

The past couple of weeks I have been playing with message drafts and Fibonacci sequences. The scarf here is the result. If you aren’t familiar with the Fibonacci Sequence there is an excellent description on Leigh’s Fiber Journal.

I wanted to used different shades of the same yarn and happened to have a bag of yarn that I picked up our annual knitting retreat garage sale (thanks Katie). The bag had several greens, yellows and burgundies yarns. These colors were perfect for this project as I was also looking for a project that would remind me of the fabulous fall colors we saw in North Carolina last fall. The texture of the yarn wasn’t as soft as I usually use for my scarves so I washed a sample to see if it would bleed and soften. It didn’t bleed and it did get softer. I’m mostly happy with how it turned out. I did have a boo-boo in the home stretch, but as my DH points out – only I know it’s a boo-boo and not a design feature.

I’ve always been interested in name and message drafts but found getting a good sequence with the word or message I wanted was a little challenging. I tend to want to use just short 4-letter words (no, not that kind of 4-letter word!) which could be my problem. I did get a workable pattern using some of Ralph Griswold’s sequences and used one of those in the scarf shown here. This is the one I used for Fibonacci scarf.

But for the next scarf that I want to do, using Mr. Griswold’s sequences just didn’t work very well. So I decided to strike out on my own using an online sequence generator. I had the generator give me a list of numbers between 1 and 26 in a random order and with no repeats. In Excel, with the alphabet in column one, I pasted the numbers from the sequence generator in the next column and then in the third column I assigned shafts. The results were:
# 1 x l k u d r c
# 2 y o w e s q
#3 m h b a z i
#4 j v p f t n g

I added a point twill threading (I think) in between the word as I repeated it across. The draft I ended up with is very similar to other drafts that I have seen but I didn’t expect anything no one else had ever thought. I just wanted something to reflect the word I had in mind and for me to be the only one who knows :-).

Right now I am slowly putting the warp for a laprug on my floor loom, have the warp for the above scarf ready to slap on my 8 harness table loom, am winding the warp for a summer and winter project to go on my 4 harness table loom and am patiently waiting for DH to finished getting the rust of the reeds for my other floor loom. And it has lots of other work that needs to be done on it!

Happy Weaving!

Fore and Aft Scarf -- Off the Loom

My double weave scarf (Fore and Aft Scarf, Handwoven, J/F 1998, page 59) is off the loom and finished. The weaving went along without any problems so I really regret not using yarns that have more personality and zing.

The only tricky part is cutting the warp and using it as the weft. The bottom warp becomes the top weft and the top warp becomes the bottom weft and that connects the two layers along one side.

The tension on the warp gets a little wonky the closer you get to the end as you can see from the photo. You just have to trust that it works. I was actually fretting about it a lot ahead of time and had a dream about it -- in the dream it worked and I saw how it worked. So my subconscious was way ahead of me on this project.

Here are some photos of it finished and hanging on Headless Harriet. I did overdye it with some blue dye in my stash of dyes and I like the colors a lot better now. The back does lay flat, it's just the two different colors on each side that makes it seem like it isn't flat. If I do it again, I would like to nuke the fringe along the back.

I used my Louet W30 table loom for this project so that I raised the harnesses independently and could really get an understanding of how double weave works. The beater in my little Louet can be very wobbly and I've heard others have this same problem. I fixed it, mostly, by jamming long knitting needles on both sides of the reed housing. The photos are below.

My looms are naked again but I have some warp really to slap on them; I just have to decide on a pattern. I'm also doing an online summer and winter weave along on Ravelry so I will be experimenting with that.

Happy New Year and Happy Weaving!

Adventures in Double Weave

When I took my beginning weaving class in the ‘90s we did a week on double weave. At the time, I thought it was quite interesting so one of my goals for 2009 is to do some double weave projects.

Finding my looms all naked this week, I decided to start one before the new year. After cruising through piles of back issues of Handwoven, I picked the “Fore-And-Aft Scarf,” Handwoven, J/F 1998, page 59. (Photo on right.)

The pattern calls for silks and cotton but since this was my first real double weave project, I decided to use some Berroco Ultra Alpaca from my stash – some blue for the bottom layer and gray for the top layer, then use blue for the weft with the gray and vice versa. This yarn is easily replaced so if I messed up I wouldn’t be really upset.

I had some trouble figuring out how to position the shuttles as I changed between layers so that I wouldn’t connect the layers on the side…but once I had the treadling correct (I was reading it wrong) that fell into place. Taking the advice of some of the articles I read, I’m doing this project on my Louet w-30 table loom with direct tie up since direct tie does make it easier to understand what’s going on.

So far, it slow and rather boring since I don’t really have any interplay of color and design to entertain me as I shuttle along. The pattern has you weave along in plain weave for 36 inches. Then the fun begins – weaving the point. The instructions call for cutting two warp threads at the back of the loom and then you bring them forward, pulling them from the reed and using them as your weft threads. You weave the warp end from the top layer across the bottom and warp end from the bottom layer across the top layer. You continue cutting the warp threads and weaving until all the warp is cut. I’m assuming that this creates a join along the side so that when you are done and open it up – magic occurs and you have the point.

I’m at 25 inches so I’m just 11 inches away from the fun part. So far I’ve been trying to entertain myself by visualizing what colors I can overdye with scarf with! If I like the end product I will probably do it again in some silk from my stash. It could make a good gift for my still working buddies who live in warm climates.

And for a little eye candy from our trip to Italy. This is only my favorite photos of the Ponte Vecchio bridge in Florence because I took it from the balconey of a yarn store -- Beatrice Yarn Shop. Unfortunately she is retiring and closing the shop in March.

What! Home for the Holidays!

Home for the holidays --- what’s that about! When the holidays arrive, my feet get itchy and I’m ready to travel. Last year we spent all of December and then some in Italy and the year before we went to the Christmas markets in Austria and Germany. Maybe this desire to see the world in December comes from living overseas for awhile – or maybe it is just a way to avoid our US holiday madness.
So when we decided to stay home this year, I thought “Okay, that’s probably a good thing.” NOT! Instead of getting my Christmas cards done in Sept, packages mailed in November and avoiding all candy making…I put it all off until the last possible moment. (I’m still avoiding the candy making – DH did it.) Then I felt rushed and very, very cranky (think the b-word). Then the weather turned nasty and all white. We don’t usually have a white Christmas here – a green Christmas is the norm! Temps have been in the teens and we have almost 10 inches of snow on the ground. So why am I not in Sorrento, that’s what I wanna know!

I have spent time at my looms…getting more presents completed and thinking to myself “I have until Christmas Eve!” Well, I’m all done now and have a few things to show you. I have still been caught up in Mobius Mania and sent a few off before photos were taken. Plus I did a few more scarves.

I’m been thinking about my weaving goals for the beginning of the New Year. First I want to get my LeClerc Fanny loom up and weaving, then I want to explore double weaving and just maybe sort through all the stuff in my studio (or not!)

And now for those of you who like snow and dog in the snow pictures:

Wishing you a totally terrific holiday -- where ever you are!

Storytime Rugs...

Coming up with a woven gift for toddlers living in south Texas has been a challenge for me.

This fall we made an unexpected road trip to Utah and stopped at the Pendleton Mill on the way home. I loaded up on Pendleton selvages! I have a friend that has woven some lovely rugs with these selvages and I also saw some beautiful ones for sale in Taos last spring.

Probably a crazy thing to do since I had never woven with them (which is true of most fibers since I'm a beginner). I bought two large bags full -- about 25 pounds. I now realize that I have enough selvages to weave a floor runner that could stretch for blocks around my neighborhood!

After staring at these big bags for a while, I realized that I could make small rugs for the boys and learn about using the selvages at the same time. First I did some research on the internet and got some good advice from the RugTalk archives and I got advice from several friends who have made these rugs.

The sett I used was 12 ends per inch, sleyed double for 6 ends per inch (per RugTalk advice).

I looked at the various small rugs around the house and picked one that I liked for a size guide -- 33 inches by 22 inches. My estimated on the loom length was 38 inches with a reed width of 25 inches.

I had a small amount of a blue/red/orange/brown selvage and was able to weave one rug with it. The second rug (using a red/blue/black/gray selvage) turned out to be a little longer because I still had some warp left when I reached 38 inches, so I kept going. On the loom it was 44 inches by 25 inches and off loom it was 41 inches by 25 inches. I washed the longer one this morning and it came out at 39 1/2 inches by 25 inches.

I'm calling these little rugs Storytime Rugs and I'm going to send them to the boys with some storybooks.

The laprug that was suffering from negative karma is all done and ready to go out the door. I had one threading error that still showed after I washed it -- but otherwise all the negative karma is gone. I really love the texture of the Merino Angora weft...so much so that I asked Lisa Souza to dig through her bins of yarn and find any skeins that she had left (the yarn is discontinued). I was able to get another half a dozen skeins which I will use for more laprugs -- xmas presents for 2010.

On this day last year, we were here:

Happy weaving!

No More Looking At Craigslist!

For several months now I've been haunting the local Craigslist, looking for a counter balance loom that I would mainly do rugs on. I'm lucky to live in an area with lots of weavers and wanna be weavers so there are about 5-10 looms posted on Criagslist every week. Most are jack looms and many of been sitting in basements and garages for a long time.

My criteria for the counter balance loom was it that had be assembled, 36-45 wide and only needed TLC -- not a major investment -- to get it going again and it had to fit into the back of my Explorer. I found and lusted over a Glimakra, but it required a drive to Canada to get it (however with the Canadian dollar down against our dollar it was almost worth) and then explain to the Customs guys what I had in the back of my Explorer. I found a super cheapie for a $150, but missed it.

Then this week a LeClerc Fanny popped up on Craigslist. After exchanging a bunch of emails, staring at the photos, we went down to Olympia and picked it up. Very nice knitter decided that between knitting and remodeling their house, weaving wasn't going to happen. She had had the loom about ten years, getting it after a weaving class. But she had only woven about three inches on the warp it came with. Included were: a very nice LeClerc bench, 3 rusting reeds, 2 warping boards, Glimakra stretcher, 2 boat shuttles, more flat stick shuttles, a book, and more that I have forgotted.

I'm going to have to get the rust off the reeds and make new aprons. Then I and DH will have to crawl all over it with a screw driver making ajustments. The photos were taken at it's old home and it was all prepped for transporting. I got most of the dirt off last night and pitched the old warp immediately in case there were any travelling critters in it.

Any tips on getting Fanny into great shape would be greatly appreciated.

Mobius Mania...

Years ago I started knitting a Mobius (aka Moebius) scarf, following Elizabeth Zimmerman's excellent instructions...but somewhere along the way I lost interest plus Mobius instructions always make my brain swirl. I'm sure this Mobius still lurks somewhere in my stash of yarn and UFO's.

Now my Mobius interest is BACK! For the past month, between my annual knitting retreat and a visit to family on the east coast, I have been caught up in Mobius mania...really faux Mobius, because the twist is created once I take the flat piece off the loom. That what I love about them -- weave, twist, then twist the fringe together and there it is!

I was inspired by the photos posted by WovenSpun and SaoriWeaver on Ravelry. The purple mobius above was my first, using left over yarns. In fact all these are from left over yarns. The brown one uses some of Lisa Souza's Queenstown yarn in the warp and a mystery yarn in the weft. I like these because they are quick and if I keep tying the warp on, I only need about a 130 yards of warp (on my little Louet table loom). Great stash busters!

I also did a really quick neck warmer for a 91-year-old cousin. She really admired my purple Mobius and since she was wearing four layers of clothes on a warm day, I figure she will get a lot of use out of it. I had intended for it to be another Mobius, but the takeup was significantly more than I had estimated so it became a neckwarmer. Shown below...light blue handspun Merino in the warp and handspun Alpaca in the weft.

I took my little travel loom along on my knitting retreat and started a scarf using some of Lisa's new baby Alpaca sport...talk about soft! Think melting butter. It's finished now and really to go out the door as a Christmas present. I had enough of both the warp (Twisted Sisters Jazz) and the baby Alpaca to do a Mobius, which is on the little loom now.

On my big loom I am threading the heddles so that I can weave a couple of small rugs using Pendleton selvages...but all this will have to wait while I do prep kitchen stuff for Thanksgiving dinner and then cook, cook, cook on Thursday.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!