After a few days not weaving, I jumped back to the loom and started off. I forgot to take pictures of how I did the tie up on the loom. So here is the front loom bar. Notice the big loops?! That will come back to bite me later at the other end of the warp. Because I came up short a few inches on the other end! Because I used so much warp here on the tie up I ran out of yarn on the other end of the warp.Notice how cool the warp stripes look? All the really hard work is done. What I need to do now is focus on technique because the simple things need to be done as near perfect as possible.
Here is a picture of the two towels in progress. Notice the two seperators? Those are pieces of cardboard about one inch wide. That separates the towels so I have some room for hand hemming and some fringe. When I weave, I get into a pattern of "heddle up for weft on left, heddle down for weft on right" so when I use two separators, the pattern stays the same. Using one separator changes the pattern and then I have to change my rhythm and then I get mixed up and get mad and then I want to punch a water buffalo.
Anyway, I also use a measuring tape to keep track of how much I've woven. I prefer to loosen the warp before I measure so I get more of a "slack" measure. The paper measuring was picked up for free at IKEA, so when you are at IKEA, pickup a couple. They're FREE!
I mark the measurment by tying a piece of yarn to the side of the woven piece.
Here I am at the end of the warp. You can see how I'm right against the heddle and the far loom bar. I'm trying to push through as many throws as I can before I can't put any more.
Here my heddle is in a DOWN position (weft on the right) and is held down by the heddle block. The heddle block is the U shaped piece of wood on the loom. When in the UP position the bottom wood piece sits on top of the heddle block. The slot in the middle of the heddle block is the Neutral position and is good place to park the heddle for warping up.
This heddle block is cracked and I'll need to make a replacement for it.
Close up of the measuring tape and the marker yarn tied to the side.
I'm hand hemming the ends with a fringe. I hem it on the loom because it is easier that way.
Here is a video that showed me how to hemstitch with the fringe.
hemstitch video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHBKqG2Do2I
Here is the almost finished towels. They still have to go through the washer and dryer to finish and shrink some.
Have a good day!
7 comments:
Hi, it's a great blog.
I could tell how much efforts you've taken on it.
Keep doing!
Thank you. And if I find a way to do this with less effort I will be glad to tell everybody!
Have a good day!
did you make the loom yourself?
No, the loom is 1970s era Erica Rigid Heddle loom made by Northfield Manufacturing.
It was given to me by my sister in law. She picked it up at a garage sale. My SIL is now the biggest fan of my cotton towels, of which she receives many pieces to test for me.
I was just given a Northfield loom similar to the one pictured. It came with a 8 dent reed. I loved your blog because I want to make cotton towels with it also.
What is the size of your reed in the pictures? What sett did you use with your dishtowels? What size yarn are you using? How many yards per pound is my question.
Do you know where I can purchase another reed similar to the one that came with the loom? My loom has two heddle blocks for two reeds. Thanks ahead of time answering these questions.
Jean
Check the Aug 26 2009 post,
http://francosfiberadventure.blogspot.com/2009/08/hot-stripe-towel-part-1.html
It was 8 dent reed, other details are in Part 1 of the Hot Stripe Towel article.
Correction: I do not have another reed for Erica loom.
Have a good day!
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