Tablet Woven Strap

The straps to the bag have been card woven, I used Sara Lamb's directions in Woven Treasures page 86. Took me a bit to get use to turning the cards in the right direction, but I figured a way to keep it straight and then it was non stop til I finished. The bottom strap is the front and the top the back, although I like the back better and is what will be the front of my strap. I'm having some difficultly with the selvages then again when don't I LOL.. but at least I'm enjoying myself.

Cardweaving and other tidbits

There is this ad on Craigslist, which I almost fainted over, I mean wow the price is insane, I emailed and got an error or undeliverable message. REALLY are the weaving gods just not in my celestial house?? I was just drooling over the whole mess of looms planned projects and everything in a matter of nano seconds, oh well, tomorrow is another day.. or so I've been told.

These are my pitiful card woven strips, Oye!!! The edges are very scary and I made some errors here and there but the exercise was good for the mind and creative mojo, I will have to make the bookmarks for my son on the inkle since that is one project that I'd like to finish. All the looms in the house are once again nekkid, but that will be resolved this weekend. I'm planning something for each one.

The RH needs to get warped for some kitchen towels, the troops are complaining that everyone has gotten great kitchen towel gifts, but in the weaver's house the kitchen is bare not so, since Meg at Megweaves sent me a great towel that is in constant use, but since they are by default Cuban they exaggerate with grand hand gestures and extreme expressions (it really does look like Ricky Ricardo when he gets annoyed at Lucy). That reminds me of an old Spanish quote "En casa del herrero, cuchillo de palo". Literally, in the house of the blacksmith there are wooden knives (that would really be annoying).

The Structo is going to be getting some warp for Baja Bags, I've finally decided that I will need to create these on something more than my poor inkle speaking of which, needs to get warped for the straps for the bags, I need a hat band, and my son's bookmarks maybe not in that order but you get the idea.

Some Card Weaving

After reading a few chapters of Card Weaving by Candace Crocket, I started warping to do some card weaving. I wanted to make a few strips for my son's bible cover as page markers. Organizing the cards and placing the right thread in each was not as confusing as I thought it would be (that was a relieve). I secured the cards as suggested by the book with a rubber band and shook the warp out, once that happened the yarn took it's place. It's very different warping for this type of weaving than what I'm use to, since with the RH and Structo evenly spread out neat yarn wraps are a necessity, not so much with this. Initially your suppose to tie it all together in a big knot and then thread the cards, I warped directly to the loom with my peg and kept my yarn evenly spaced, now that I've done this I know that it doesn't matter and I can wrap one yarn on top of the other without much damage to the placement of my thread, this point is really interesting and in a small way very liberating. After a few experiments and some failure in the set up of one of the cards (bright me forgot to put the letters on the holes I have since sharpie penned all the cards) I started weaving experimenting with the turns and what it would look like if I made mistakes and so on.

After that it was time to get serious and do some real weaving. I really like the way it looks and understand how it works now not perfectly but the concept is really not that difficult. It's a different weaving experience and the results are really fascinating. I'm finding that the shifting of the cards is very rough on the yarn, the end yarn is linen and the centers are 3 ply cotton, I'm using the same materials as the cover. The yarn is getting really fuzzy although I haven't had any warp thread break. The selvages are the same as when I first attempted inkle weaving, bumpy and uneven, but as with all weaving, practice usually takes care of that bit.

Kinda cool huh?

This will probably be my last post for this week, Mom is having surgery on Tuesday 6/29, and I will be spending the week at her house, without cable or internet connection (yikes) but I don't think I'll have much time for either. Thank you for sending us your prayers and healing vibes our way, we really appreciate it.

I started sewing the latest inkle band into bags. With the length I get from my loom I can produce two bags. I screwed up one entire bag and had only some material left. I made the small bag but could not line it, this is something I need to work out, as the liner is important for keeping thing from piercing the woven fabric and causing damage. The second larger bag is holding my card weaving cards, I would have liked to have my shuttle sticks with the cards and therefore need to design a longer bag. For now it keeps the cards in one place and I stuck the shuttles in there even if they stick out for now.

These are the cards that were made for me. I'm still working on cleaning them up and getting all the plastic bits in the holes smooth. I'm starting to get excited on the possibilities with these. I'm still not sure how it all works but that's not going to stop me from trying.

I'm planning on warping my RH tonight with what will become my son's bible cover. I"m going to use some of the techniques found in Woven Treasures, and hopefully I'll have something that can be sturdy enough to use. If the card weaving turns out well I will use it as a decorative book mark for the cover.