February TotM update - trying a different supplentary warp

Since this is a supplementary warp, I didn't beam it with the linen.  In fact I didn't beam it at all; it's just weighted off the back of the loom, over the second back beam.  This keeps the cotton warp from hanging directly on the linen and changing its tension.  (I've had problems with this when doing my sprang-and-weaving work in which I weight the sprang sections.)  If you don't have a second beam and want to weight the supplementary warp, you might devise a way to keep the weighted  warp up off the beamed warp, or spread the beamed warp a little to make a place for the weighted warp to rest.

The cotton I'm using seems a little thick for this ground.  I'm wondering if that's why I'm having problems with my weft not beating down to a balanced weave no matter how hard I beat.  I'm only getting about 24 weft shots or picks per inch (ppi), whereas the warp is sett at 30 ends per inch (epi).  Consequently, my hearts are coming out tall and skinny.  They still look like hearts, but I'd like them to be plumper (is that a word?), and the plain weave fabric to not be so sleazy.


So I'm taking advantage of the fact that I beamed
this separately, and I'm swapping in a red 10/2 cotton for the second towel.  This time I'm beaming the warp, though, on my second warp beam, because I was having trouble with the supplementary warp bubbling up when I beat (probably because I was beating so hard).

Instead of attaching the warp to the fabric like you do when putting in a repair warp, I'm weighting the other end of the supplementary section off the front beam while I start the weaving.

Changing to a thinner supplementary warp helped, a little.  I'm now getting about 27 ppi.

Weave along and get a chance to win the Towel of the Month!  You do not have to weave every month, just the towels that interest you.  If you are weaving along, please leave a comment to let us all know.  Put a link or url in the comment to a photo (on your Flickr, Picasaweb, Photobucket, your blog etc.) of your work in progress. Deadline to post you r comment is midnight GMT Feb 28, 2014.

February TotM - update

How are you doing on your February Towel of the Month?  Don't forget to reverse the pattern on the second half of your towel if you want your hearts to be a mirror image!

Weave along and get a chance to win the Towel of the Month!  You do not have to weave every month, just the towels that interest you.  If you are weaving along, please leave a comment to let us all know.  Put a link or url in the comment to a photo (on your Flickr, Picasaweb, Photobucket, your blog etc.) of your work in progress. Deadline to post you r comment is midnight GMT Feb 28, 2014.

February TotM - Weaving and the pick-up

To weave February's Towel of the Month, see the tie-up and treadling in the diagram.  Weave using treadling sequence "A" (treadle 1,4,2,4...) for an inch.  Then use sequence "B" (treadle 1,3,2,3...) for one inch, then another inch of "A".

Now begin the pickup sequence:

a. Weave with treadle 1.

b. Treadle #5 but do not throw a weft shot.  Use a thin pickup stick or knitting needle to pick up threads according to the heart pattern.  Pick up 4 warp threads for each black square in the pattern.

c. Push the stick/needle to the reed.  Treadle #4 and throw a weft shot.  Remove the stick/needle.  Beat.

d. Weave with treadle 2.

e. Repeat "b", picking up the same threads.

f. Repeat c.

Repeat a through f for each row in the heart pattern.  Put an inch of treadling sequence "A" between each heart.  The article shows 3 hearts before reverting to plain "A" for the center section, but you could do more hearts to your heart's content.

Weave along and get a chance to win the Towel of the Month!  You do not have to weave every month, just the towels that interest you.  If you are weaving along, please leave a comment to let us all know.  Put a link or url in the comment to a photo (on your Flickr, Picasaweb, Photobucket, your blog etc.) of your work in progress. Deadline to post you r comment is midnight GMT Feb 28, 2014.

February Towel of the Month - Warping

Beaming the warp onto a standard beam is always nicer  if you have a helper to turn the crank while you keep tension on the warp.  If you're a solitary weaver, you've probably developed your own method of getting the warp onto the beam neatly and evenly.  Here's what I do.  From the warp beam, the warp is going through the raddle, just visible on the right in the photo.  Then it is routed up over the castle and is weighted in sections.  I tie a slip knot in each bunch of warp, and hang a fishing weight from the loop with an S-hook.  In this instance, I put 8 ounces on each of four 4-inch bouts of warp, and a little less weight on the bout that is less than 4 inches wide.

February TotM - Yarn - Feb 7

I don't have much more 20/2 cotton, and I want to try some towels in linen which I understand should make nicer towels than cotton, so I broke down and bought some linen.  As I mentioned before, I have not found a source for bleached linen.  I bought the half-bleached, which is not a cool snowy white but a warm ivory white.

The cone on the left in the photo is white cotton for reference.  The cone in the middle is half-bleached 40/2 "Normandy" by Henry's Attic I bought from Yarn Barn of Kansas.  The cone on the right is unbleached (natural) 40/2, also the Normandy.  I think the Normandy is made in Belgium.  The tubes are, from left to right, half-bleached 40/2 Valley Yarns (made in Egypt) from Webs, the 20/1 half-bleached Bockens (Sweden) from Vavstuga, and unbleached 40/2, also by Valley Yarns.  The Bockens is also available from Village Spinning & Weaving, from whom I would have ordered had I realized it since he is close to me geographically.

Regarding the cottolin for the supplementary pattern warp... the article calls for 20/2 cottolin, but that doesn't seem to be a standard size for cottolin these days.  All the sources I can find only have 22/2 cottolin.  22/2 cottolin seems to be around 3000 yards per pound.  I have a few tubes of cottolin, but sadly no red or even pink, so I'm trying a red cotton that looks similar in size to the cottolin I have and balances out at 3400 yards per pound, which I think makes it an 8/2 cotton.

Have you chosen your yarns for this project?

Weave along and get a chance to win the Towel of the Month!  If you are weaving along, please leave a comment to let us all know.  Put a link or url in the comment to a photo (on your Flickr, Picasaweb, Photobucket, your blog etc.) of your work in progress. Deadline is midnight GMT Feb 28, 2014. 

February's Towel of the Month - the Pattern and Draft

Here's the draft for February's Towel of the Month.  Like January's towel, it is again sett at 30 epi if you are using the 40/2 linen.

The linen warps are threaded on shafts 1 and 2 and make the plain weave ground, so this structure is heavy on those two shafts.  Shafts 3 and 4 are only used for the cottolin pattern warp.

Turned Summer & Winter is "turned" because instead of a supplementary weft forming the pattern, it's a supplementary warp.  To weave, you only need to use one shuttle with the ground weft.  The supplementary warp is threaded in the borders, and sleyed in with the ground warp as indicated in the draft, so that the warp is double the density in the border sections.  The marks in the draft are if you are using a 15-dent reed.

With 4 shafts, there is only one pattern block; that is, the pattern area works together as a unit when controlled only with the loom.  There are only two things you can make it do using only the loom: weave the pattern floats on the front/top of the fabric, or weave the floats on the back/bottom side.  This is how the weaving will start out: weave the floats on the back for a while, then on the front making a red rectangle in the corners of the towel, then float on the back again.  Then we'll start the patterning, which is done with pick-up.  By picking up the pattern, we will cause select pattern warps to float on the front while the rest float on the back.

That's the basic flow of the draft; we'll go over it in more detail when we get to each step.

Weave along and get a chance to win the Towel of the Month!  If you are weaving along, please leave a comment to let us all know.  Put a link or url in the comment to a photo (on your Flickr, Picasaweb, Photobucket, your blog etc.) of your work in progress. Deadline is midnight GMT Feb 28, 2014. 

February TotM - Hearts in Turned Summer & Winter

Are you ready for February's Towel of the Month?  It features the structure "turned summer and winter".  It has borders along the long edges, patterned with heart-shaped motifs for Valentine's Day.  Here's a fuzzy photo from the original scanned article in Weaver's Journal to give you an idea what it looks like.

This towel, like January's towel also calls for 561 ends of 40/2 bleached linen.  The pattern warp is red cottolin, and the weft is again the bleached 20/1 linen.  The sett is 30 ends per inch (epi) if you want to substitute a different yarn.  The warp ends are 380 in the center plain weave section, 60 in each pattern border (not counting the red cottolin), and 30 at each edge (plus 1 to balance if you like).

So let's get started!  Are you interested in trying turned summer & winter?  I have never done this weave before and I'm excited to try it out.  Next post will be the draft including threading, tie-up, treadling and a pick-up pattern for the hearts.

Weave along and get a chance to win the Towel of the Month!  If you are weaving along, please leave a comment to let us all know.  Put a link or url in the comment to a photo (on your Flickr, Picasaweb, Photobucket, your blog etc.) of your work in progress. Deadline is midnight GMT Feb 28, 2014.