Thrums Away?

8/4 Cotton Carpet Warp Thrums

Weave it and they will come. "They" are the unavoidable waste at the beginning and end of each warp.

What's to be done with thrums? What do you do with your thrums? Do you toss them away?

Upon learning to weave I was told to save my thrums. No reason was given. I tend to follow directions so with only the rare exception I blindly followed this advice, not knowing the whys or the wherefores of it.

Over the years my thrum collection has grown to fill entire bins. Thrums make good choke ties but my supply far outstrips that need. Uses for them had indeed been few – until recently.

Warp On/Weave Off,
RepWeaver

Beginning and Improving

Rep Rugs
One of these is destined for a wedding gift

"We've Only Just Begun", sung by Karen Carpenter is playing in my head.

Here is my latest warp of rep rugs. Their sizes were dependent upon my supply of certain types of rags. The smallest one is with teal colored wide wale corduroy of which I had a limited amount. The beauty of that teal with this warp just sings. The happy combination more than compensates for the rug's small size. One of the longer rugs is destined for our dear friends' son and his bride.

As of today, the young couple has been married exactly two months. This gift rug will be in the mail to them far before the honeymoon glow has dimmed. For some couples that glow remains steady through decades and decades. That is our wish for Alec and Sarah. The rug should serve them well for at least the first couple of those decades.

These rugs are woven in Rep Weave using 8/4 cotton carpet warp sett at 24 e.p.i. The rags in two rugs are mostly old bed sheets. The other two have wide wale corduroy as the thick weft.

My experiment with floating selvedges in Rep Weave continues. Even though weaving with them is slightly slower, the method agrees with me. An extra opportunity for a splash of color adds to their appeal. Floaters greatly improve the selvedge edge on hems. This particular adventure will continue. Who knows the twists and turns to occur in subsequent chapters?

A floating selvedge in a contrasting color adds punch

The fuchsia-colored floater enhances these rugs

Life is a journey. Weaving can also be seen as a journey. In the studio and at the loom many discoveries are possible. Some things remain the same. But who is to say a new thought, new experience, new venture isn’t just around the corner? Even weaving an oft-repeated draft can spark a revelation or two.

Rep Rugs showing both sides. These rugs are reversible.

Time passes and every living thing ages. It is said that some things improve over time. Wine comes first to mind. Rugs age, may they do so gracefully. Marriages can mellow and bloom. I pray this is the case for Alec and Sarah. May it also be the case for their rug, a small token of our best hopes and wishes for a long and happy life together.

Warp On/Weave Off,
RepWeaver

Changing Seasons, Changing Colors

This has been an unusually hot, dry summer here in what we playfully refer to as “The Pacific Northwet”. Dry, dry, dry it has been. Last night a smattering of rain ended our record-breaking streak of 55 consecutive rainless days. We are not used to this. My garden is sighing with relief and so am I. Autumn is my favorite season. It’s coming.

My overloaded warping reel puts up with a lot of abuse.
In the background hangs a Summer & Winter sampler.
On the right is the "Hippie Bag" from my junior high school days. 

Getting back to the studio, here is a bit of what I was doing last May. To prepare to lead a Mini-Workshop for my guild I wound this Rep rug warp. First off, I admit to overworking my warping reel. But, embarrassment aside, this is honestly how I operate.

Most often I wind my warps twice as long and half as wide as the planned project. Beginning at the selvedge edge, I wind warps in to the center of the draft. Since my warping reel has only one cross bar I place a chopstick in the previous vertical support to the lower turning post. Between the chopstick and the end-post I create a second cross.

With two ends (one dark and one light) in each pass I splice in new colors at either top or bottom turning peg at will, cutting the old color and knotting in the new each time and designing as I go. Watching the colors build along the warping reel it is easy to see how they will look woven.

Rep Rug color changes

The rug detail photo gives an idea of how often the colors change and how much work warping double length saves. In addition, I do not have to keep track of where each color should fall for the mirror side of the warp. The more time and trouble (and chance for errors) saved, the better.

Rug weaving in process

My Glimåkra Standard countermarch loom has center cords on the top and bottom of the heddle bars. So it makes sense to me to do all sleying and threading from the center outward. I bring both crosses from the top and bottom of the warping reel together and place them side-by-side in the lease sticks then continue dressing the loom as usual.

During the workshop I described and demonstrated these techniques. Nine experienced weavers attended and kindly watched and listened attentively. Maybe they gained something new to take home and incorporate into their weaving. As I always stress, if some new idea or improvement comes to my attention I put it to use. Just as much as the seasons change, so do I. Over time I learn and adjust. This can be just as refreshing as rainfall after a drought.

Warp On/Weave Off,

RepWeaver

Two of the finished rugs showing front and reverse side colors

The Beat Goes On . . .

Heat-seeker Dot lending a paw to my fringe-twisting efforts
She loves the lime light and thinks she is a tiger.

Putting together colors for this fourth and last Rep Swirl warp, I kept picturing tigers. It wasn’t until the runners came off my loom that I wondered which side should be the “right” side. Technically, rep weave is reversible. Both sides seemed appealing so I hemmed some of them one way and some the other.

Tiger Swirl Rep Runners
Warp: 8/4 Cotton Carpet Warp
Thick Weft: ¾" Wide strips of Tee Shirt Knit

Is the tiger black with orange stripes?

Later I began thinking, really thinking, about tigers. Are they orange with black stripes? Or are they black with orange stripes? Hum . . . Better take a closer look next time I see one.

Or is the tiger orange with black stripes?

Following my workshop experience with Kelly Marshall, I knew these would require black for the thick weft. On hand, the only black I had available for rags was a pile of old black tee shirts. Tee shirt knit is messy to cut but makes for soft, well-packed Rep weave.

For extra interest I added three small blocks of brown in the border. This was careless, as they could have been better thought out beforehand. As they are, they are slightly reminiscent of paw prints. Also evocative is the contrasting lime-green floating selvedge. Those seem like tiger eyes peeking out at me, a happy result.

Christmas-Turned-Easter Outfits

Sewing has kept me busy lately, too. Here are a few outfits for my grandchildren. The dresses have yet to be hemmed. My daughter had hoped to sew the dresses as Christmas outfits but ran out of time. Caring for three little ones, it is hard to imagine her actually finding the time. So I volunteered to take on the project. Once the two dresses were as finished as I could make them without trying them on my far-away granddaughters, I decided my grandson should have something to match. So I sewed the little shirt for him as a surprise. He was thrilled. The too-late-for-Christmas outfits worked out just in time to serve as Easter outfits.

Isn't it interesting how the colors of sewing and weaving projects match? Even at a far distance, my daughter and I think a lot alike.

Summer & Winter Sampler
Bottom - Paired X's treadling
Center - Paired O's treadling
Top - "Plain" treading

Next up on my weaving agenda is Summer & Winter, a structure long on my to-do list. There is much to do and much to learn.

Here is a small sample of current explorations. The draft is from Shuttle Craft Guild Monograph #19, "Summer and Winter and Other Two-Tie Weaves" by Harriet Tidball. The warp is 20/2 cotton with pattern weft of 10/2 cotton. A perfectly balanced plain weave is essential for this design. I think the sett of 24 e.p.i worked okay.

Adding color through the center of the tree trunks  created extra interest with a checked effect in the middle, a happy result. Experimentation will continue.

The beat goes on . . .

Warp On/Weave Off,
RepWeaver

Starry Night Swirl

Starry Night Swirl Rep Runners

It’s always slightly sad when Christmas is over and our decorations are back in storage. Each year the whole process of “taking down Christmas” is a hurdle. At least getting a start on the process is tough. But then, once begun, I warm to the task.

After Christmas with all its red and green, I turn to blue for January. To me blue means cold weather, starry nights and Epiphany. In January we change our kitchen tablecloth to blue with sparkly blue snowflakes.

Planning my second rep swirl warp, I naturally turned to the color blue. The Yuletide Swirl runners seemed too tightly sett at 48 e.p.i. At least that was my opinion of them at the time. For the second warp I backed off and chose a sett of 40 e.p.i. Consequently, these runners are slightly wider than the previous ones, measuring 8” wide. You can see a slightly thicker and contrasting floating selvedge, a recent idea that still appeals to me.

January blue tablecloth with sparkly snowflakes
Starry Night Swirl Table Runner

The runners from this warp made me happy so I decided to weave the design again in another color way. Perhaps you can guess which colors I chose for the next warp. Look for details soon.

Detail of Starry Night Swirl showing red floating selvedge

Tatted snowflakes hang from antique fretwork

In keeping with the January theme, tatted snowflakes hang from a fretwork panel in our home. The fretwork came from my great grandparents’ Minnesota home where it once hung above the doorway between their dining room and parlor. But that was in the day before Mother was born and before the house was reconfigured. At least three generations occupied that house over the years. For my entire childhood the fretwork panel remained stuffed in the back of a storage shed. After my grandmother died, the fretwork came into my mother’s possession. When Mom and Dad moved into a retirement home a few years ago it came to us. I am so grateful to have this memento of generations past. After several nights' work to clean and refinish it, we hung it between our dining room and "parlor" where it fits perfectly and is the best place to hang tatted snowflakes.

My current tatting project

Most usually I have a tatting project in the works. As it is quite small and portable, tatting is the easiest kind of handwork to carry along to meetings. Here I am at work on a tatted bookmark with a center twist. I have a way to go on this one. You will find the pattern for it on the designer Jon Yusoff's blog here: https://tatsaway.blogspot.com

Ancient nub of sewing beeswax next to a new block

Do you remember my mention of the little bit of ancient beeswax I use when hemming? Here it is in all its glory. After 45 years of constant use it is now quite small. Once it was the size of the plastic holder on which it rests. That bright green rubber band keeps the slightly broken holder together. My sweet husband bought me a fresh bar of beeswax. But this little old nub of wax carries a lot of sentimental value. I wonder if it might last longer than I do.

A couple of weeks ago my husband brought the latest plague, an especially nasty cold, home from work. Naturally, he shared it with me. The timing was bad. Back in September I signed up for a workshop with Kelly Marshall. It was scheduled for this past week and for the 10 days prior, I’d been knocked off my game by the bug. Next time I’ll let you know how it went.

Stay warm out there on these cold, starry January nights. Soon it will be February!

Warp On/Weave Off,

RepWeaver

Rep Swirl - Yuletide Swirl

Having woven all those Rep Weave coasters it occurred to me to try a denser sett using 8/4 cotton carpet warp. Over the years my favorite sett for carpet warp has been 24 e.p.i. For this first attempt I tried 48 e.p.i, two ends per heddle for a working sett of 24 e.p.i.

Yuletide Swirl Rep Runners

Inspiration for the design came from a larger design found in the book Rep by Catharina Carlstedt and Ylva Kongbäck. I adapted a small section from the draft called “Tiger Blue” (page 84) that caught my eye and made it into a table runner.

These colors are pleasing, reminding me of Christmas cards from a bygone era, the 1950’s perhaps. And while they are red and green, they don’t necessarily shout “Christmas”.

The first Yuletide Swirl runner, the one with plied fringe gave me trouble. The places where there are “breaks” in the pattern and the white rag peeks through did not please me. Color blending happened in an area of the smallest pattern blocks and made the colors look muddy. Maybe it would have helped if I’d stuck to blending either reds or greens right there but I’d done both. Then there was trouble with the tension. I found it difficult to beam the warp properly with that many ends and with two ends per heddle.

After weaving two runners with this set-up I found it impossible to continue. I cut the first two off the loom and rethreaded the entire width, maintaining the sett of 48 e.p.i. but switching to one end per heddle. This was essentially a return to the beginning since every single end was involved in the re-thread. While I was at it I rearranged the color order in a few places taking special care in the areas with smallest blocks. It was a lot of work but as they say, “Anything worth doing is worth doing well.”

Left side of photo - Sett: 48 e.p.i., 12 dent reed, 4 ends per dent, 2 ends per heddle
Right side of photo - Sett: 48 e.p.i., 12 dent reed, 4 ends per dent, 1 end per heddle

In the end, the rethreaded runners were a huge improvement and I was far happier with them than the earlier ones. Here you see the runner on our kitchen table. For each month of the year we use a specific tablecloth, placing it beneath a tabletop glass cover. Yuletide Swirl compliments the Christmas table theme nicely.

Yuletide Swirl runner atop our Christmas-themed table cloth

Even though the colors are fabulous, I wasn’t entirely satisfied with these runners. Check back to see what happens with my next Rep Swirl project.

Warp On/Weave Off,

RepWeaver

Allison's Rug

Allison's Rug by RepWeaver

Here are the finished rugs from my latest rug warp. There are three in total and each is around 25" x 52". After a long struggle with the colors, I am beginning to like this combination.

The area woven with the darkest green (Forest) may look familiar. I saw it in Väv Magazine, No. 4, 2013, on page 37. This issue is devoted to the topic "Stripes" and is filled with great ideas and inspirations and is bound to be a favorite.

Three Rep Rugs by RepWeaver

Just to either side of center there is an area of dark grey/duck patterning that doesn't stand out. There isn't enough contrast. It would have been better with the light grey rather than the dark. But I didn't have enough of the light grey. Ah, well. Otherwise I think the design works. This design is one I plan to eventually weave again only next time I will chose different color way.

Rep Rug by RepWeaver, detail

Rep Rug by RepWeaver, detail

It's Wedding Season

Yes, it's that time of year again and already there are three wedding invitations in my inbox. Yesterday's children are preparing to say "I do." Time passes in spite of the fact that I cannot possibly be any older.

With each invitation's arrival I check the online wedding registries to look for the happy couples' color ideas. Then I look for a rug in my inventory. But a recent bride, Allison, chose a combination that I hadn't yet attempted -- turquoise, mint green and grey. These are three colors that I would not have put together and could not see myself using. Since then I have discovered that for the moment these colors are tres chic.

Allison's Rug by RepWeaver

Where to start? The biggest hurdle was getting over my own color sensibility. After a long deliberation I decided the best thing to do would be to add a few of my own ideas to include lighter and darker shades as well as highlights.

For some time I had been wanting to use common Inkle-type threadings side-by-side in a rug. The possibilities are absolutely endless so it was a lot of fun playing with various ideas and combinations.

I limited the warp length to six yards due to the fact that I had limited amounts of either shade of grey on my shelf and also because I had limited time before Allison was to be married.

The rug went out in the mail a couple of days ago and should be delivered today. It will be interesting to hear how it is received. I sure do hope the newlyweds like it.

Here are the three rugs fresh of my loom before they were hemmed. I'll post a few more photos of the finished rugs soon.

Class Prep

The rep class I'm teaching begins soon so I have been knee-deep in preparation. Weaving the sample projects has been fun if time consuming. This little table runner made me happy. The bright spots on the rag weft worked really well. Amazingly, I found the rag after my loom was dressed. That chartreuse colored rug warp is one of my favorites -- truly a must-have in my inventory.

New Entry Rug

It must be at least 13 years ago that I first wove a Rep rug for our home's front entry. Since then the rug has been through it all, including teenagers and pets. The design was adapted from Laila Lundell's book, "Rep Weaves". The rug is still in rather good shape except for the permanent dirty look along certain pathways. Here you see old faithful in the background.

New Rep Rug on the floor near the old Rep Rug.

Recently we moved my mother into a retirement home and I wound up with several sets of light blue bed sheets. These were the perfect rags for my new rugs. They will remind me that the struggles my family and I have been experiencing over the past couple of years are over. We have been caring for my father who suffered from dementia. For the past year neither he nor my mother could drive and I was often called upon to chauffeur. It was difficult but my precious mother took loving care of Dad at home until the final two weeks of his life. He is now at peace in heaven and she can finally rest.

I wouldn't be telling you all of this except that since January my loom has been naked. Naked! It has not been idle for this long since it came to me back in 1989. All the work and angst dealing with a dementia patient took a huge toll on me. I just didn't have the heart or energy to do anything creative during the last few months.

After such a long break, getting back into weaving was sort of intimidating. I fussed around in my studio for some time before plucking up the courage to dive in again. Dive in I did and managed to design the widest rug I have ever woven. The profile draft is #203 from "The Shuttle-Craft Book of American Hand-Weaving" by Mary Meigs Atwater, a book chock full of great ideas. I could weave for a lifetime out of this one little book. It holds just the kind of inspiration I love.

That old rug was a work horse and was so beautiful I wanted to replace it with a similar one. My goals for the new one included:

• Using darker colors in order to better hide traffic dirt
• Using a busier block design to help hide traffic patterns
• Maintaining the yellow/blue pallet
• Adding a touch of red
• Weaving a slightly wider/longer rug

It turned out well. I cut this first rug off my loom to check the design before going all-out and weaving the longer replacement rug. For the longer rug I chose a slightly different block arrangement. That one still needs hemming but I'll post a photo once it is finished and in place.

Dot was kind enough to help me weave the new Rep Rug.

This, by the way, is the type of help I get around here. Jenny and Dot appreciate every stage of the weaving process. Can you see how I put socks over unused treadles? When setting up I simply leave unneeded treadles tied up as they had been previously. Binding them together in pairs with a sock helps keep me from mistreadling while weaving. I'm always looking for ways to speed up my weaving and keep myself from having to look down at the treadles. Socks work for me.

It is wonderful to be weaving again. Until I returned to my loom it didn't occur to me how much I missed weaving. There are a couple of things more to post including my super-secret jeans pocket project. Watch for them.

Weave on. Weave Off!