Towels On The Loom

Since I've been traveling so much, I haven't gotten much weaving done in the last six months or so.  I have some wonderful projects in the design phase, but few have made it to the loom.  I've had a "dog on the loom" going for almost a year.  A dog on the loom is a project that the weaver has lost interest in and just can't seem to work on.  The dog takes up space on the loom that could be used for a more interesting project.  Well, I decided that I'd finish the dog - two scarves that really should be pretty and kind of aren't.  The scarves were overshot - my favorite weave structure.  Normally, overshot uses a pattern weft twice the thickness of the warp.  In this case, the warp (the variegated yarn) and the pattern weft (the red) were the same thickness.  The tabby weft that kind of holds it all together was khaki sewing thread.  I wasn't happy with how the red weft formed large blocks.  I was hoping that the colors would fade from one to the other.  Nope!

Red Dog on the Loom

But since I was on a Dog-Off-The-Loom mission, I got the red scarf woven.  I was planning on cutting off the rest of the warp and saving it.  But hey.  It was already on the loom and why not just weave it off.  So I started the purple pattern weft.

Purple Dog on the Loom

I'm glad I did, because I think it's much prettier!  I still need to finish the scarves, but I had the purple woven off within a week or two of starting it.  So, that freed up my good old Schacht 4-harness loom.

My daughter wanted dish towels for her university apartment.  She chose a kit from Halcyon Yarn.  Normally, I don't weave with kits, but I wanted to try out their 8/2 unmercerized cotton.  The jury is still out on how well I like the cotton, but the towels are coming out very pretty.  This is the first time I've woven waffle weave.  The waffles will show up better when the towels are off the loom and washed, but you can see them forming now.  There will be three towels when I'm finished and each will be a different color in the weft.  Here's Towel Number One, woven with a light green weft:

Towel Number Two is woven with a dark green weft - almost a grey-brown-olive color:



Towel Number Three is woven with a teal weft.  I'm scared about this one because I don't think there's enough weft thread.  We'll see!

I've finished some projects that were woven earlier in the year.  I think I like to weave, and hate to hem!  Here is a set of four towels in a Barleycorn weave.  I love barleycorn almost as much as overshot.  It's very similar, but not quite the same.  These were woven at the General Sam Houston Folk Festival this past April.  Such fun!

Well, I'd better get back to the loom and finish Towel Number Three!  I have at least two towel project lined up after this one!