A Few New Things

Changing My Look
Decided I didn't like the look of my blog so I picked a different background. All the previous posts are still here, it just has a new look.

Show This Weekend
Been really busy the past couple of weeks. My show season is starting up and the first one is tomorrow. I sat around all winter playing with my looms and figuring the booth setup was perfect as it was. One week ago I set my booth up in my studio to make sure I have all the pieces together and ready for the show. As usual, that's when I decide to make some major changes to the booth design and I'm off to the lumber yard for raw wood. Tonights the setup for the show and my booth is nearly ready (just a few more nails to hammer in).

The show is tomorrow at Waterford Mott High School (Waterford, Michigan). Corner of Scott Lake and Pontiac Lake roads. Saturday, March 31 from 10 to 4. I'll be in booth number 35 in the gym. I won't have any of my weaving there - I'm still learning the craft. I'm hoping by next year I will be able to bring some of my weaving into my shows as well. This year it will still be all beadwork.

Experimental Shawl
I know I promised to post pictures of the expirimental cotton shawl I was weaving. It didn't work out the way I planned and I just haven't been inspired enough to take pictures yet. As I mentioned previously I was going to run out of yarn before the weaving was finished. My solution was to leave the center unwoven and create a fringe from the weft that would run up the center back of the shawl. I removed the shawl from the loom and knotted the weft to pull the two halfs of the shawl together. Unfortunately, there was no longer an even tension on the shawl so the fabric is all buckled around the knots. I've decided that I need to untie those knots and place the shawl back on the loom down at the bottom, so the two halves match up correctly in the center. Then I'll try retying my knots and that should make the fabric lay correctly. Pictures of the before during and after will be posted next week (after I finish my show).

Princess Poncho
I built a small 18" triloom a few weeks ago because I wanted one I could take with me for long trips in the car and stuff like that. Then I went craft shopping with my 3 year old and while I was looking at beads she wandered over to the yarn and found some bright pink bulky yarn, so I decided to make her a shawl. I wove 4 triangles and stitched them together. She had trouble keeping it on, so I turned it into a poncho. Now all her little friends want one too. I'll upload the picture next time I post.

I made the new loom using nails, but I'm finding the nails catch in the fabric of my sleeves as I work with the loom. So I need to replace those nails with pegs.

Ruana
I'm now using the 18" loom to make a ruana for myself from a nice brown boucle yarn. I want it to be warm and the yarn is a bit thin, so I've learned to double up on the nails. I couldn't wait to start weaving the ruana, so I didn't switch out the nails for pegs yet. Now I wish I had, but it will have to wait until I'm done weaving all the triangles for this project.

Cut Length Bias Shawl
I started another shawl on the large 7 foot triloom. I'm using wool this time and making a plaid in blue, pink and white. I've decided to try the cut length technique and so far I really like it. The most difficult part is trying to cut the lengths of yarn. Each time I start measuring it out to cut he kitties think that I'm playing with them.

Recycling
I believe that recycling is very important for our environment and the future of our planet. Occasionally I come across ingenious and creative ways people have found to recycle used objects into new ones. I can no longer resist the need to share these discoveries with others, so I'm creating another blog where I can post links to all the beautiful new things created from recycled materials. Whenever I come across a crafting project that recycles I'll post that there too. The new blog is at http://recycling-art.blogspot.com/

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Building my Triangle Loom

Several times I read Wayne's This and That instructions on building a triloom before I started my project. I chose to make the whole 7 foot loom. Not sure why, I just couldn't get that size out of my mind so I went for it.

I discovered a few things to make it easier along the way. Here's my instructions for building the loom. I'm just a beginner, so there may be better ways to do this.

Choose Your Wood
Make sure to choose the straightest boards you can find so your sides don't have any curve to them. I used pine even though it's a soft wood. Hard wood is recommended to extend the life of your loom. Cost me $30 for three 8 foot 1x2 boards. Wood is expensive in my town for some reason. I was impatient and didn't go look for a salvage yard or drive to the next county for cheaper wood. I may even have afforded a nice hardwood if I'd done that.

Cutting the Hypoteneuse
I measured 7 feet for the hypotenuse (longest side) and cut the ends on a 45 degree angle. I used a triangle template I had from when I studied Graphic Design to get the angle. A lot of quilting tools have a 45 degree angle you can use too, so you may have something lying around. If not, get a cheap plastic protractor like the ones kids use in school.

Making the "V"
I attatched the other two boards together with dry wall screws. Make sure you pre-drill your holes so your wood doesn't split. Push the narrow side of one board against the long side of the other and it should give you your 90 degree angle for the point. If you want to be able to take your loom apart for storage, use bolts and nuts everywhere I used drywall screws.

Attatching the Hypoteneuse
Then I took the hypotenuse board and put it between the other two, sliding it down and measuring each end to make sure it was the same from point to hypotenuse. Marked it at the top edge, cut them down to size, pre-drilled, then screwed those together with drywall screws.

Peg/Nail Spacing on the Hypoteneuse
Next is the toughest part. Decide how far apart you want your pegs. Most seem to have a half inch between them on the hypotenuse. I used 3/8 on mine (half inch just seemed to wide to me but now that I've woven a shawl I know that would work fine too). I've looked further into looms and 1/2 inch seems to be standard. 3/8 seems to be called fine? 1/4 inch on the hypotenuse will make the pegs on the short sides of the triangle super close together and I think it would be tough to get your yarn into the spaces easily. I figured with the 3/8 I could just skip a peg if I wanted a looser weave. Find the center of your hypotenuse and make a long mark there. This will be your center peg. Now measure your chosen distance for your pegs going out from the center to each side. Make sure you end up with the same number of marks on each side of your center peg. Make all your marks long to make the next step easier.

Draw a Guideline
Now look at where your end marks cross the seams between the boards for the hypotenuse and sides. Mark a guide line just below or above that point, going all the way across the hypotenuse. This will insure your corner nails don't fall in that seam. Where this guide line crosses each of your earlier marks is where you will put a peg. Measure the length between that seam and the bottom of that hypotenuse board. Use that measurement to make a similar guide line down each of the sides. Where they cross on each corner will be where you put the corner pegs for your loom.

Peg/Nail Spacing on the Sides
You don't need to measure for the shorter sides. (Hurray!) Use a T-square. Get yourself a good long one - it's worth it. Hook the T square over the top of your hypotenuse and line it up with each of your hypotenuse peg marks. Mark where it crosses your guide line on the shorter sides. My T-square was too short for the center of the triangle. I taped another ruler to it to overcome that. Tape it real good though. Mine came a little loose so my lines on the second side weren't in quite the right place and I didn't notice. I was a nail short on one side, which I discovered while weaving. I just stuck another nail between two others and kept going. It works just fine.

When you're done you'll see that from the top board, the left half got transferred onto the left side and the right half got transferred onto the right side and the center nail crosses where the two sides meet at the bottom. So you have now made half your marks onto each side.

To make the rest of the marks needed on each side you just make a mark between each of the marks on each of the sides. Just guess at the center by looking at it - no need to measure for an exact center. When you're done if you count the marks you'll see that you now have the same number on the top and each of the sides.

Drilling Holes
Pre drill your nail/peg holes. Drill one just below the line and the next just above it as you go across. This will stagger your pegs a bit and reduce the chances of splitting the wood off. Use whichever you want, nails or pegs, just drill a hole sized to fit what you chose to use. I used nails.

Don't Forget to Sand It
Sand everything down real good to keep the wood from catching your yarn.

Optional
Stain it if you want to. Or paint it. Or draw on it. Or use a woodburner do burn designs into it...

The Long Boring Part That Will Tire You Out
Put in all those nails or pegs. I made every 10th nail on the hypotenuse a bit larger (starting from the center) so that if I want to plan something out with fancy color changes I can see where I'm at without counting all the pegs. I've since read that you can get finishing nails for aluminum siding in many different colors and use that to tell your nails apart. I've also found many colors of paneling nails are available. If you use wooden pegs, you could stain/paint your pegs different shades. Or leave them all the same - I think that's how most of the professional ones come anyhow.

Storing and Using My Loom

I have a library/studio in my home. Used to be a living room no one used (tv is in the den). I just converted it - shelves all along the longest wall, large table in the middle to work at. The back wall was still very bare. I put two nails into that back wall and screwed a couple of hooks into the top of my hypotenuse, then hung it on the wall. I figured between weavings I'd hang pictures on those nails instead. A friend of mine came over when my shawl was half woven and she thought it was a really neat work of art. She had no idea what it was or that I had made it. I think it makes a good conversation piece and I plan to leave it on display at all times now.

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Warpless Weaving

I recently heard of a new beading loom that is warpless - sort of. It still has warp threads, but it eliminates the need to weave those warp ends back in. Warp threads are the threads that are strung on the loom prior to weaving. The weaving then goes in and out of those threads. The new loom looked like it would have some limitations, expecially if you do not know the exact finished size of your piece. So I looked further into looms to see if there were any other warpless ones out there. Forgetting to put the word "bead" into my Google search, I found some interesting and truly warpless weaving looms for yarn and fiber. The TriLoom really caught my attention.

The TriLoom is a very simple loom constructed of three boards and many, many nails or pegs. It was easy to build my own over Christmas break. Weaving on the TriLoom is unique. There is no need to warp this loom prior to weaving. This loom can be entirely woven on with just one long piece of yarn - no need to cut pieces off the skein. Weaving on one side of the loom automatically produces the warp thread for future passes and the corresponding weave on the opposite side of the loom. It's really hard to describe. I'll post lots of links, pictures and instructions soon.

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