Tag Archives: weaving

I’m not dead :)

Been a long time since I last updated you all here. Over a year has in fact passed…

Things have happened in my life, things that took time and energy to sort out, and quite frankly I simply didn’t feel like updating the blog. Probably gonna be very sporadic posts going forward as well. But it should at least not take over a year until the next one.

All set to go again :)
All set to go again

Finally got the loom moved to my new location as well, the hold up has been getting room for it, but finally got the keys to the hobby room in the basement of this apartment building a few weeks back, so last weekend me and my sister took the loom apart and moved it here. It’s now all set to go in its new location.

Assembly of the loom is rather quick, done in 15 mins or so, but threading it, that did take a couple hours. There’s “only” 184 threads in it for this setup, which gives a width of roughly 35 centimeter on the finished weave, perfect for table runners.

Next time I think I’ll set it up for making rugs, I expect there to be needed roughly a 100-150 more threads for that, depending on how wide I want the rugs to be, limit being the physical width of the loom. Don’t even wanna guess the time that will take to thread. Not to mention I’ll actually have to start completely from scratch, something I have never done before. This time I at least had some of the work done already (all threads were already rolled up on the warp beam).

Making rags to weave with
Making rags to weave with

Work in progress right now is taring up old bed linen and make rags to weave with, takes a lot more time then I expected it to do. Having a friendly helper cat doesn’t really speed up the process. She loves to either come lay down in the middle of it all, or just try to catch the tared rag strips as I make them into balls.

My "helper"
My “helper”

Bagheera decided to come and lay down in my work, effectively making it impossible for me to do something other then cuddle her. And trust me, when she’s in that mood, she will lay there expecting me to scratch her belly, or just pet her, for an hour or two..

 

My afk project in the basement

I figured I might as well share few pics from my hobby room with you all. The hobby room is all set for use now, all cleaned up and I’ve mounted some shelves for storage.

Well the cleaning up was done a while back. I actually had to mop the floor three times to get it all cleaned up, was a very long time since anyone did that. The room was only used for storage the last few years.

My loom
My loom

As you might know by now, I got a loom (posted about it here earlier). I did get it right in the end, and have almost made a 1 meter long runner in yellow. Not entirely sure it was a good idea to make it so long though, not even sure the color fits our house… But I had to start somewhere. I got a few other colors to chose from as well. Runners are mainly made from a special kind of yarn, but rags can be used as well. Granny mostly made them with yarn, but I know she made some using both yarn and rags as well.

All boxes contains rags of some sort
All boxes contains rags of some sort

I also got a lot rags with the loom. They are now neatly sorted into boxes color wise. All I have to do now is get creative 🙂 But before I can get full use of the rags to make rag carpets I need to finish of the warp that is currently setup.

While sorting through them I got a few aha moments, recognizing the fabrics 🙂 I did throw away a lot rags as well though, as the balls of rags were pretty small. No point in keeping something that would only be enough for a centimeter or two of carpet 🙂

In case the rags shouldn’t be enough when I turn to weaving with rags I got a big basket full of worn out bed sheets and stuff that can be made into more rags 🙂

The desk where I'll be sewing
The desk where I'll be sewing

Also there’s a place for my sewing machines there (only one shown in the picture). I ones did get me an education in the area of sewing clothes, mainly women’s clothes. I’m basically one step away from being a women’s tailor 🙂 It is a rather long step though, since I’d need to have a lot more experience before I can (successfully) take the last test.

In any case I enjoy sewing, and through out the years I’ve made a few items for my self, the best part of doing that is they actually fit 🙂 I’m not made from the same mould that the clothing industry uses when they make clothes. I’m about 10 centimeters to short.