My daughter-in-law spins gorgeous yarn. Which makes me very happy.
Because, sometimes a skein or two finds its way into my studio.
Recently, she spun Merino and silk and dyed it turquoise and purple, separated by short sneezes of sunshine yellow.
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I love it, and have been puzzling over how to use it in one of my new tapestries in a way that keeps the integrity of the colorway, while working across the entire width of the tapestry. Weaving narrow bands of it in vertical columns would not be a problem with maintaining the colors as units… but… horizontally- ah, well… that’s another cup of soup entirely.
I didn’t want to have the colors end up in little splats of one color arguing with another.
That meant working in short segments, weaving small blocks of each color.
I could have woven little squares of each color, with little slits that would need to be stitched or interlocked. Myech…
I sat down with my trusty little pencil and thought about this conundrum….
and came up with this:
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If I started at the left hand edge, and wove a little triangle with one length of turquoise, then, I could use the little bursts of yellow to tell me when to nip down, and start a slanting wedge of purple.
This completely worked for me! I wouldn’t have any joins to deal with, and I could work each little section of color in order, so the colorway of the yarn stays intact.
It’s a happy solution to an interesting problem!
Tapestry weaving is full of nifty little voyages of discovery 🙂
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My first little purple patch was not so perfect, but by the time I had woven across to the right hand side I was pleased with it.
If you have a loom that doesn’t have a shedding device, picking up the warp strands for every row you weave can be a tedious process.
I like to use a stick, a pin and a loop of string to open the sheds. It’s a huge time saver!
I’ve made a video tutorial on how to do this for narrow bands, but this technique also works on wider pieces, too.
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Pick up every other warp strand with a weaving stick (even a popsicle/craft stick or a paint stick will work).
Push that stick up to the top of the loom.
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Now, use a knitting needle to pick up the ~remaining~ warp strands, to open the second shed.
You’ll be going over the strands that you went under in the first shed, and under the ‘overs’.
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Take a loop of string (in this case, I used 2 string heddles from one of my inkle looms held together for more strength, and to make it easier to see in the video) through the open shed.
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Pick up the end of the loop with a kilt pin, and then lift the loop strings between each warp strand onto the pin.
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Take the second end of the loop up onto the pin, and close it.
Adjust the length of each section of the loop.
And, Voila! you now have a handy, dandy way of opening both sheds!
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Here’s a pic of the shuttles that I make by upcycling old rulers and bits of decorative trim:
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HOT TIPthat I mentioned in the video: If you use a file folder as the separator/background thingie between the front and back of your loom, you can use the pocket of the file folder to park your shuttle and beading needle when you’re not weaving.
I love buying vintage crochet cotton at the thrift shop. It speaks to me of the hands that it has passed through, and the pleasure it has brought to other thread lovers.
I like to use it in my weaving, crochet and tatting, as it gives me a sense of connection to needlewomen of the past.
BUT… storing balls of crochet cotton can be a problem. Those hollow cores take up a LOT of space!
So, for many years, I have been upcycling old credit cards or pieces of cardstock to make bobbins like this:
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Because, storing yarn or thread on a small flat bobbin is so much more efficient than leaving it on the cardboard tubes:
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Last night, I had insomnia, and was thinking about winding off a pile of vintage crochet cotton, when I had a flash of inspiration!!
Instead of making chubby little embroidery style bobbins, if I made ‘dog bone’ shape bobbins, I could use my bobbin winder to speed up the process of winding them. AND, they’d take up less room, as it would be a longer, leaner shape.
I jumped out of bed, and started cutting the new shape bobbins:
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And, winding up balls of cotton:
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In a twinkling of an eye, I have compactly wound bobbins that won’t tangle with other bobbins, as the thread is taken through a slot and secured. Another bonus! No snaggles!
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This shape of bobbin is great for warping the Mirrix loom, as it’s so compact. Yep – it’s a win!
And, they can be easily stored in unusual containers, like this:
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I made a video to show how quickly and easily this works:
I haven’t tried using these bobbins for tapestry weaving, but I will, and will let you know how I like them.
I love making tapestry bobbins from wood- especially upcycled wood, so I will be showing you how I do that in an upcoming post.
Happy weaving, and here’s to creative ways of storing yarn and thread stash! 😀
At the beginning of May, a ‘new-to-me’ loom , a large Mirrix tapestry loom, arrived in my studio. (Courtesy of my son and daughter in law who picked her up in the city 4 hours away, that used to be her home- the previous owner didn’t want to ship her).
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I immediately sat down and made a whole lot of heddles for her, as she didn’t come with them.
And then, I warped her up- ooooooooohhhhhhhhhh, I love how easily she warps! Bliss!
As I was warping her up and starting to weave, I thought…. ‘Hmmmm…. there must be a group for Mirrix weavers on Ravelry’
(Ravelry= the facebook of the yarn world)
I looked, and sure enough! There is a Mirrix group…. which I joined, pronto.
And the first thing I saw was that Claudia (the inventor of the magical Mirrix looms) and Elena, her talented daughter, had posted that they were accepting applications for their annual ‘Social Networking for a Mirrix Loom’ campaign. Link
Well… I had decided within hours of starting to weave on my ‘Joni’ loom that I wanted to fill my studio with Mirrix looms.
So, I sent off an application….
Um… I wanted to fill the studio with ~Smaller~ Mirrix looms!
MEANWHILE>>>> The Joni is one big Mamma, and even though I am tall, my arms are short, so I found that I was having shoulder pain.
My clever daughter in law subtly sneaked the information out of me that I was longing for the treadle kit for the Mirrix loom. Then, she orchestrated the family buying me the treadle kit for Mother’s Day! What a sweetheart!
To say that I was thrilled was an understatement!
THEN! on the 18th of May, was just tickled pink to hear from Elena that they had picked me as one of their team for the 4 months of the ‘Social Networking’ campaign. Whee! What a couple of thrilling days!
And, now… I am starting to keep my part of the bargain, which is to chronicle my experiences with the Mirrix loom(s).
So, since I began my Mirrix adventures with making string heddles, I am going to show you my quick and easy way of making the string heddles for the Mirrix looms (or inkle or frame looms, too).
The colors! the textures! the complete wonderfulness of them- sigh….
For many years, I did a lot of off loom beading- using brick stitch and peyote stitch to create pieces like this necklace:
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This necklace is an homage to the Minoan Goddess of the Bees.
The blue teardrop shapes are dew drops, as the Minoan Goddess of the Bees is also known as ‘The Dewdrop Goddess’.
I love that—- dew happens when the earth is waking up and shifting from the dreamtime to the waking world.
How wonderful that there is a tiny Goddess there, guiding us back from our dreams, to our waking lives, and refreshing our spirits with dewdrops!
The red petal is a pomegranate seed, as The Minoan Goddess of the Bees is also closely aligned with the Goddess, Persephone.
Persephone was snatched from this world, and taken to the underworld, where she ate 3 pomegranate seeds. This meant that she had to return to the depths for 6 months of every year.
In Western Canada, where we live, winter reigns for at least 6 months of the year, often longer, so I resonate deeply with Persephone’s journey!
By the way, I love how the corded part of the necklace formed a figure ‘8’ – tilt it sideways, and you have infinity!
I worked the cord in peyote stitch, using tiny brass beads that a friend found in a thrift shop. Nice!!! 🙂
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I carved her face from a tagua nut (an ecologically harvested palm nut) that is also known as vegetable ivory.
I have never done much loom beading, but that is about to change!
Every year, Claudia and Elena at Mirrix looms have a ‘social media campaign’.
They choose 2 weavers (a bead weaver and a tapestry weaver) to be part of the team, and then give them each a Mirrix loom.
Then, the weavers blog and post and tweet and fb etc about their adventures with their Mirrix looms for 4 months.
Well… I am soooooooooooooo delighted!
They picked me as one of their weavers! wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
A few weeks ago, I bought a Mirrix Jonifrom another Canadian weaver who hadn’t bonded with it. I am working on a series of woven tapestries and fiber arts collages and I need Joni Mirrix to be my loomie for that 😀
Woots! I fell madly in love with Joni Mirrix (although I felt unworthy of her at first… will tell you more about it, later) and thought-
‘Hmmmmm… there must be a Ravelry group for Mirrix looms’.
I joined, and the first thing I saw was that they were having their annual Social Media networking campaign.
I sent in my application, and last night, I was doing a huge happy dance to discover that I got picked for the team!
(good thing I don’t have to catch a ball or throw one to be on the team, or else I would still be standing on the sidelines! ahem)
Oh ho! I want to fill my studio with Mirrix looms, (tapestry is slow, and I want to be doing bead weaving, toooooooo, so I am just ecstatic!)
Speaking of bead weaving, I treated myself to Claudia’s bracelet workshop on Craftsy (anyone who has seen any of my video tutorials will know that I am madly in love with bracelets!) and I am chomping at the bit to get going on a bunch of yummy woven bracelets!
Alright…. back to work on design deadlines so I get back to my weaving!
Go gently! 🙂
Oh! PS: if you would like to knit yourself a Minoan Goddess of the Bees, I designed one for you to knit, and can be ordered here:
Link to the doll page on my website (scroll down, waaaaaaaaay down the page to click the ‘buy now’ button)
Last week, a friend asked me what I was working on these days.
In response, IÂ rattled off a list of projects and tasks that is the length of my arm.
The next day, as I was leaving the dentist, he drove up to the stop sign, he said: ‘Oh yah, you say you’re working on all these things, but here you are, just walking down the street!’ 😀
Um… if I could master the transporter, I would! Zap! into the dentist chair! Zap! Home again! Sparkle sparkle zing. 🙂
I would like that…. 🙂
Anyhow, here are some of the things that are happening in my studio right now….
(Not ~ all ~ the things that are happening, as I can’t show projects that I am designing for magazines etc- the editors would be smacking me on the side of the head if I did….)
(and I am working on some stuff that I need to not talk about until it ripens. You know how it is.)
Okay… first things first…
We have adopted an adorable little rescue…. he’s 4 1/2 years old and is just wonderful.
(except for being a cat botherer… that is NOT good 😦 ) This is him (in his fetching blue harness) with his adopted big brother. (Our dear old chihuahua/daschund cross).
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Ah, well, other than being oh so barkie about the cats, he is completely adorable. As you can see, he has settled in beautifully.
Although, every adoption takes time and patience and attention….
Alright…. a brief zip around the studio:
Okay, in the southeast corner, there’s a big project happening on my tri loom (configured to the 3 foot size).
I’ll be posting more about this as the project moves closer to the finish line:
Hearts are one of my most favorite design motifs ever.
I decided that I should design a tiny little woven heart motif as a project for the ‘Stitch Red’ heart health campaign, and also work as an embellishment on a special ‘I love you’ scarf for my daughter.
Here’s the link to the previous post about using tambour crochet to embellish the scarf: Link
The yarn used in the heart motif is from Koigu, made specially for the Stitch Red campaign. Link
Here is the pattern to make the pin board loom to weave the heart:(Note: Print it out so the pattern is 2 inches by 2 inches)
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Materials and equipment: a square of foam (I upcycled some packing material) that’s about 4 inches square by an inch or so thick.
34 pins or 1 inch fine finishing nails. (You may need a nail file to file rough edges off the tops)
A 3 or 4 inch square of clear plastic from a clamshell package or other recycled thingie.
Knife to cut the foam, scissors.
2.5 mm crochet hook
small tapestry needle
Instructions
1: Copy the pattern, and trim to fit the size of piece of foam.
2: Place the piece of clear plastic over the pattern. Push the pins into the dots.
Warping: The right hand arch of the heart is held vertical and the left hand arch is horizontal.
3: Tie 2 strands of yarn together (Note, you need to be working with fine yarn, like a sock weight) and place over the pin at the point of the heart.
4: Skip 8 pins, go around the next pin and down to the lower edge, and around the pin to the left of the pin at the point.
5: Go up and down across the 5 pins at the top and their mathcing pins on the lower edge.
6: Take the yarn up to th emifpoint pin (there are 3 empty pins above it) and down.
7: Go up and down across the next 5 sets of pins. There will be 3 vertical pins/nails left empty. Make an ‘8’ around the last set of nails to bring the yarn back down to the lower set of nails.
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8: Weaving
Row 1: Weave hook from right to left: Over 4/Under 4 between the 1st and 2nd pins.
Make a loop of yarn and place it on the hook, then draw it through the warp strands. Place the loop on the 2nd nail on the right hand side.
Adjust yarn.
Rows 2 & 4: Weave Under 4/Over 4 across, pick up the loop of yarn, ease through, place loop on nail/pin.
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Row 3: WEave Over 4/Under 4 across, pick up loop, ease through, place on nail on right hand side of loom.
Rows 5 & 7: Weave )ver 4/Under 4/Over 4/Under 4/Over 4… make loop, ease through, place on pin on right hand side.
Note: on Row 7, the yarn passes by 5 pins before it’s woven in.
Rows 6 & 8: U4/O4/U4/O4/U4 make loop, ease through, place on pin on right hand side.
Row 9: Working with top 3 pins only: U4/O4/U 4 make loop, ease through, place on pin on right hand side. (It already has loops on it, but not to worry).
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Finishing:
Wrap the yarn around the circumference of the heart 2 1/2 ties and snip.
Working in a counter clockwise direction: Thread the yarn ends into a darning needle and lift the stitches off, one by one, stitching through them.
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Some nails have 2 sets of threads on them, so lift the sets of yarn off one at a time.
Stitch over the long floating threads to capture them.
Stitch twice at the tip of the heart.
Untie the beginning knot and weave in the ends.
Adjust the circumference stitching to shape the heart, and stitch through the outside edge again if desired.
Weave in ends and trim.
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The hearts can be used to embellish or trim scarves, hats, mittens, gloves, cowls, hair ornaments, bags, stuffies, dolls, toys, blankets, shawls, stoles, vests, coats, wall hangings, cellphone and tablet covers. The sky’s the limit!
Here’s the video tutorial on how to weave the heart motif:
I think that people might like to have a heart loom in wood, so I asked Donna and Gary McFarland of Dewberry Ridge looms Link if they would make them, and they said yes, so if you want one, drop them a note.
PLEASE NOTE: All content of this blog, including video, audio, written and photographed is the sole work and property of Noreen Crone-Findlay, and MAY NOT be used without my permission. Thanks so much!
My husband is a jazz musician and composer and completely awesome bundle of wonderfulness, and I love weaving beeeeeuuuuutiful shirts for him to wear when he’s performing. (last year’s Jazz festival shirt: Link).
I have been weaving away on fabric to make him a new shirt for this year’s Jazz Festival, LINK
But…. oops… it’s cream and ecru with lotsa colors…. and, the color that the guys mostly wear to perform in is black.
Our daughter made Jim a gorgeous black shirt from the Folkwear Victorian Gentleman’s shirt pattern, so it’s kinda dumb to weave him another one….. sooooooooooooooo the big AHA was…………… weave him a VEST!!!!!!
Ding! Lights go on, whee’s and skippetty hops and happy dances ensue….
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When our son got married, I used the Folkwear pattern to make him and my hubby kilts, (oh my word.. the grooms men, hubby and our son, all wore kilts and they looked FABULOUS…).
The kilt pattern has a really spiffy vest pattern, which Jim likes (that’s essential- why make it if he doesn’t like it?)
Oh oh, whenever I go on the Folkwear pattern site, it makes me want to buy more patterns. I love their patterns and have been wearing them for more than 3 decades. We actually got married in clothing I sewed from Folkwear patterns, and our children grew up in Folkwear.
(No profit, affiliations etc, just love their patterns)
Okay, just had a brief noodle through their website, and am seriously in love with the Siberian Parka….. hmmmm… that would be fun to weave the fabric for…. hmmmmmm.
Anyhow…. in the midst of meeting design deadlines, and new projects that are so delicious and tantalizing and time consuming,
I am in the throes of weaving up narrow bands for this vest, and loving it!
The vintage Structo looms are kind of like the ‘Featherweight’ sewing machine – tiny, perfectly formed workhorses that are beautifully engineered and much sought after.
Although, after I spent hours the other evening, warping the black cotton, I would have cheerfully sold the blessed loom to the first taker. (Warping black thread at night is not so much fun).
Luckily, I got over my snit, and am now utterly enchanted and weaving merrily away.
Which is good, as the Jazz festival is getting closer and closer…. eep… I need to go meet some deadlines and then get weaving!
😀 Happy weaving!
PS: I carved the shuttle in the photo a few years ago. 🙂
My dear friend, Terri Bibby, is a Saori teacher and weaver extraordinaire, who told me about some shuttles that don’t have a metal rod through them.
This intrigued me, so I made myself one to see how I liked it.
I absolutely love it. I made it small and low profile to fit the small shed of Structo and Peacock looms. Thumbs up, indeed!
The bond was formed in childhood, when my beloved teddy was a panda (a pink and white one at that- you can see the very tiny homage I made to her on my website at About Us )
Panda designed by Noreen Crone-Findlay for Lion Brand yarns/Martha Stewart Loom
I hope that I will contribute to other people’s Panda love with this design for a Panda bear knitted on the Martha Stewart loom.
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