four selvedge warping

Black warp on Black Friday

Black warp on Black Friday

As you know, I’ve been messing about with four selvedge warping this year. I was in one of my favorite yarn shops recently and they had a cone of the warp I like in black. Black Friday. Black warp. Why not? I’m not a shopper, so today was mostly a weaving day.

To be honest, it was Robyn Spady’s idea (Robyn is a fiercely talented teacher, weaver, and the editor of Heddlecraft). She was weaving black warps today and challenged other weavers to do the same. I’m not sure she realized a tapestry weaver would jump in, but the timing was great for me.

Weaving the sky: a studio visit

Weaving the sky: a studio visit

I’ve been squeezing in more time for weaving this month. One thing I played with was a yarn from Mountain Meadow Wool, a small mill in Wyoming who uses domestic sheep and does their own dyeing. Gist Yarn & Fiber carries this yarn and I got a couple skeins to play with. I did not actually choose the colors, so when this purple-blue arrived, I was thrilled as it is in my favorite color family. The yarn is dyed unevenly on purpose. This is something I accomplish regularly in the dye studio accidentally, but somehow this yarn which is blotchy on purpose is full of charm.

I enjoyed this tiny four selvedge tapestry which wove up in a flash. The blue and brown is Mountain Meadow and the light blue “S” is two strands of Weaver’s Bazaar. I was playing with how skinny I could make the “S” by using the doubled warp of the four selvedge warping and it was quite effective for the verticals. I did not split the warps in the curves and I think next time I will try that also. The thin Weavers Bazaar 18/2 yarn used next to this worsted wool makes a nice contrast in texture and reflectance.

Here is a little video I made as I put in the last picks and took it off the loom. Welcome to my super messy studio!

Preparations! (for Fringeless)

Preparations! (for Fringeless)

So I made a mistake. Maybe.

The jury is still out.

There is a whole industry around teaching online classes and I have taken many classes in how to build successful online classes.  And I have built some great ones, so clearly the information I've learned is useful. 

But all of those experts advise opening registration in your online class before the class content opens. Build excitement they say. Get them invested with a little bit of content they say. Get them all pumped up they say.

So for Fringeless, I decided to do that.

And I found out that tapestry weavers are an amazingly enthusiastic bunch!