#weaving!

My current weaving project is (intended to be) a set of placemats for my mom! Thus far, it is an Adventure in using the full width of my 20" table loom, every single one of my loom's heddles (plus a few repair heddles for a threading mistake and for the shaft that had SLIGHTLY fewer heddles than the rest!)

I discovered that my previous solution for separating layers of warp (old cereal boxes opened up into wide, long, weird cardboard shapes) weren't actually wide enough when I was using THE ENTIRE WIDTH of the loom... so I bought this lovely roll of heavy cardboard paper, my friend trimmed it to size with a bandsaw (? I think?) and it fits PERFECTLY inside my loom, and works SO MUCH BETTER than the cereal boxes!

...I also discovered that none of the shuttles I'd been using previously were long enough for projects this wide, so I have three looong thin dowels and a weaving sword from a backstrap loom pressed into service as shuttles.

I spent FOREVER trying to decide what pattern to weave, after making the warp... and settled on a rather simple twill, but I changed the direction with each color change, and it is, in fact, looking REALLY COOL!

Having now finished weaving the length of this strap, it's become obvious that I'll need to make a second, matching, strap. Of course!

Some days, it's hot and humid and perfect for fingerweaving while watching one of the many, many things your friends keep yelling at you to watch.

I am finally ALMOST weaving something on my loom again!

This yarn is Interesting silk, that I'm not at all sure WILL hold up to weaving. But I'm trying it anyway, because assuming it works, I'm pretty sure it will be lovely! I'm planning to use this same yarn for warp and weft, so hopefully the colors will interact in Fun and Interesting ways!

...

So. A few months ago, I attended a meeting of the local weaver's guild! (Yes, that's a thing. Yes, it's very cool.) and the speakers that month talked about a type of weaving and loom from Laos which was SO COOL, doing extremely intricate supplementary weft patterns using a system of 2 shed plain weave and strings that store the supplementary weft pattern in string heddles. It's AMAZING!

I decided to try to replicate it, on my trusty inkle loom!

Setting up the heddles took FOREVER! And it's... really not very easy to use! But it DOES work!

...

And then I got my 4-shaft table loom, and got Slightly Distracted from this project. So it sits, keeping me from using my inkle loom as a warping board, taunting me.

I made this on a day when I wanted to work on SOMETHING, and had no clear idea WHAT! It's an experiment in fingerweaving; it's an oddly monochrome object, when most things I make are colorful. It's too short to be a bag strap or a belt. Maybe a camera strap? But I don't have a non-phone camera!