Weaving blankets

I’m making progress on the weaving orders but I’m not finished yet.  I need to get these in the mail by the middle of the week.

This is a king-sized blanket for a customer in Oregon. I don’t know what kind of sheep she raises, but the yarn is beautiful and the blanket is very soft. It measures 90 x 100″.  The only place I can spread a blanket this size to dry is the floor of the shop, so I have to plan my finishing around classes, open hours, etc. The shop is too cold right now and after leaving the blanket spread out overnight I needed to get it off the floor (partly because I’m teaching a chenille scarf class tomorrow).

The blanket is folded in half and hanging over the loom on which I’m weaving a v-shawl for a customer in Nevada. This customer has Jacob sheep and I’m using her mill-spun yarn and handspun yarn. The blanket below is for the same customer. The stripes are handspun.

Here is a detail from the king-sized blanket at the top of this post. This customer also wants two twin blankets and she wants some of the yarn dyed. Here is the yarn for the next warp.

The next two blankets are woven with singles Jacob yarn. These were in a previous post while still on the loom. They are for sale at the Artery right now and will be on my site shortly.

Artery

Wednesday was Display Day at the Artery, the artists’ coop where I sell my handwoven pieces. We expand into the Gallery area for the month of December so all of us get a little more space for our items. Here is my area:

Those are all chenille scarves on the left, v-shawls in the middle and a couple of Jacob blankets on the wall.

This is my newest idea–pet leashes. Here is a close-up:

Now I’m working on custom weaving orders.

This blanket is for a customer in Nevada. The gray yarn is her Jacob spun at Yolo Wool Mill and the stripes is her handspun. This blanket will be finished tomorrow and next on the loom is a king size blanket for another customer.

22 Weaving Days Left

I have weaving orders to finish in time for Christmas. I thought I would have plenty of time after the Crocker Show. Now I’m feeling a bit panicky. Before starting other people’s blankets I had to get my own blankets off the loom. Here are 2 of the 3 blankets as they were being woven.

This warp is Jacob singles at 12 epi. I have learned that if I’m using a relatively loosely spun singles for warp to wind 4-6 extra threads at the edges so that there will be extras when those edge warp threads break. Those extra threads hang off the sides and I pick up one of them when one of the threads at the selvedge weakens and breaks. This was more of a problem in the first blanket and I was ready to cut the warp off. I changed shuttles and the next two blankets went better. I love these 16-H twills. Here are close-ups:

There will be lots of fringe-twisting before I can wash these. That may have to wait, although I’d like to be able to get these blankets ready for sale this season.

Two busy weekends

I spent the last two days in Placerville teaching Weave a V-Shawl to the Hangtown Fiber Guild. Here are the results:

Ladies,  please turn around.

These are the warps for shawls not quite finished:

Quite a variety of shawls!

Last weekend was Lambtown in Dixon, CA. The fiber building was so busy that I barely got outside to snap a few photos. The sheep-to-shawl contest was one of the most popular events. Teams come with looms already warped and they need to prepare and spin the yarn and weave the shawls during the contest. This year the fiber for the weft was Jacob wool from my flock. It got great reviews from the spinners.  Here is the winning shawl woven by the Silverado Guild from Napa:

And a close-up:

The Del Oro Guild got second place:

I didn’t get photos of the other shawls, but I did get one of Hangtown Guild’s portrayal of their theme of  “Au Naturel”:

There is a new use for all that roving that you don’t have time to spin! Hangtown always does it with a sense of humor!

One last photo taken at Lambtown:

Do I want to swap out my sheep for a flock of these  cuties? Hmmm…what is a group of chincillas called? Covey–no, that’s quail. Warren–isn’t that where rabbits live? Crowd? How about Cloud?

Finally weaving

I have started to work on the projects that are backed up from BBA (before broken arm). This is a Jacob wool blanket for a local Jacob breeder. The wool was spun at Yolo Wool Mill. It’s very open right now at 4 epi but I have notes from the last blanket I did using this yarn  and the blanket came out great. I’m keeping my fingers crossed. But now I’ll have to wait a week (at least). I’m leaving in the morning for Michigan and Vermont! I’ll take photos!

Another weaving class

I taught the Weave a V-Shawl class in Stockton this month. Judy Allen of Gilmore Looms organized it and we used the space at the shop to hold the class. Five students took the class and here’s what they created. These shawls are right off the loom so fringes and wet finishing will be done later. Aren’t they incredible? And all so different.

In the photo above you can get a feel for the warp. It’s the photo below that shows what happens when the shawl is woven–you get fun plaids on the back. The second, third and fifth shawl are out of my Jacob wool. The first is a cotton mix that Judy wove for her mother (modeling the shawl).  The 4th shawl is out of beautiful handspun and the shawl on the far right is a variegated alpaca yarn–so soft.

One of the most fun things for me was that I took an old Gilmore loom I have to the class on the 2nd day and Bob spent a lot of time fixing things for me. This loom was made in 1962 and I acquired it a few years ago. Bob fixed the space where the reed goes in the beater so that I don’t have to jam it in. He cut slots so that the top bar that holds the reed in place will slip out without having to undo the bolts. He showed me how to fix the reeds that have the tape coming off of them. And most exciting–he turned the beam into a sectional beam for me. Photo to come later.

Thanks to Bob for the loom work and to Judy for organizing the class…and of course the students.

Changing Clothes

I thought you might be interested in this project and website by Lea Redmond. Lea contacted me several months ago to buy some black and white Jacob yarn. She planned to weaving clothing labels. Huh? About a month ago she contacted me and said her project was finished and she was having a show at The Cheese Factory http://www.artatthecheesefactory.org/ near Petaluma, CA. Lea used my wool for a giant size clothing label as part of her Changing Clothes project in which she “investigates politics and ecology of clothes”. Go to this website-   http://www.leafcutterdesigns.com/projects/changingclothes.html and explore more of what she is doing in this project. There are some interesting ways that all of us can participate.