For many years, I have adopted all the stray balls of crochet cotton that I have found at the thrift shop.
I have happily been using them in many different ways, but now they are coming together to be upcycled into lovely kitchen cloths to use instead of paper towels.
They are a pleasure to weave on potholder looms and are lovely and soft.
While we are all holding the fort at home, let’s create some beauty, and enjoy the sweet pleasure of weaving on simple looms!
Here’s the video I made about this very satisfying form of upcycling.
Here’s another installment in my series of video tutorials on weaving with yarn on the potholder loom, using colorwork techniques. I hope that these videos will bring you some respite from the challenges of the pandemic!
The Houndstooth Check is a timeless classic pattern that can be woven on any size potholder loom.
I’ve figured out a way of warping the potholder loom that makes colorwork with yarn much easier- there are some tricks to it. This video reveals them all 🙂
Houndstooth Check is woven slightly differently on the 18 and 36 peg potholder loom than on the 9 and 27 peg potholder looms.
An astute weaver caught an error in the Potholder Loom Weaving book:
I made a little video that shows exactly where to look on page 52 of the Potholder Loom Weaving book to correct the error in the chart. I apologize for the error. 😦
I wrote and designed and wrote and designed sooooooooooooo many patterns and projects for the Potholder Loom Weaving book that the book became too big, and my editor and I had to make some hard decisions. Even so, the book is a lot thicker than the publisher had originally intended, so many thanks to Stackpole Books and especially to my wonderful editor, Candi Derr, for going to bat for the book and letting it grow bigger than it was originally intended.
We pulled this design from the book and now I am offering it to you as a gift.
If you want to make the blanket larger, use a 27 peg (Pro size) 9 inch loom instead of the Traditional 18 peg size potholder loom.
POTHOLDER LOOM GEOMETRIC BLANKET by Noreen Crone-Findlay (copyright)
The Geometric blanket is a cozy wrap to keep you warm no matter what season. The teddy bears and their friends are having a lovely picnic on the Geometric blanket. Won’t you join them?
NOTES: Feel free to change colors and yarns. The blanket in the photos was woven with a single strand of bulky yarn. If you choose to work with thinner yarns, you will need to purchase (or spin) twice as much yarn and use 2 or more strands held together as if they are a single strand.
The twill pattern is on page 59 of Potholder Loom Weaving. The brown and green butterflies in the original blanket didn’t work well, so use the twill pattern or you choice of alternates instead.
FINISHED MEASUREMENTS: 60 inches/150 cm square.
If you would like a larger blanket, then use the large size (27 pegs or nails per side) potholder loom, following the chart and weaving the same number of squares and rectangles. You will need to purchase at least 50% more yarn.
WPI of yarn: 6 wraps per inch
EQUIPMENT AND TOOLS: Potholder loom- 6 inch size (18 pegs or nails per side), Optional: Small size (9 pegs or nails per side) potholder loom; weaving hook; chopstick or knitting needle for shed stick; crochet hook; scissors; tapestry or craft needle.
YARN: Lion Brand Wool-Ease Tonal; Bulky #5 weight yarn; 80% acrylic/ 20% wool; 124 yd/ 113 m; 4 oz/113 gm; 1 strand of yarn is used as warp and weft. 3 balls of each of the following colors: #112 Raspberry; #153 Night Sky; #123 Sand; #126 Coffee; 4 balls of #194 Lime.
INSTRUCTIONS:
WEAVE:
20 squares in #194 Lime Here’s a link that will show you how to weave with yarn on the potholder loom: LINK
16 squares warped with #194 Lime and woven with #126 Coffee
16 squares in #112 Raspberry
1 square in #153 Night Sky
12 squares in #126 Coffee
36 rectangles, warped vertically over 9 pegs or nails, and woven horizontally over 18 pegs or nails in #153 Night Sky, woven using Rectangle technique on https://youtu.be/K2X4nLRBBNs
16 squares in #123 Sand
4 small squares in #194 Lime, woven using instructions for how to weave small squares (9 pegs or nails by 9 pegs or nails) on p.10 of the Potholder Loom Weaving book or instructions that came with the small size potholder loom.
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER:
Stitch all the squares and rectangles together, following the chart .
I love baskets. I love weaving them and I love using them.
These soft baskets hold a lot of stuff, and fit great on shelves and into cube shelving.
When they are empty, they are easy to store, because they fold flat. You can fill a soft woven basket with other soft woven baskets until they are needed.
I designed a whole bunch of them for my new Potholder Loom Weaving book.
The baskets are a compendium of a slew of techniques (some of which I figured out for the book) that can also be used in all kinds of other ways- the sky’s the limit on the creative possibilities!
By the way, the baskets work great as market bags or project bags.
Here’s the video:
The Potholder Loom Weaving book is available now online for pre-ordering and will be available in stores and online worldwide in January of 2020.
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