Saturday, February 28, 2009

Towels Off Loom

The six towels (and a towelette from extra warp) are off the loom. Here are pictures of them, some from the "front" and some from the "back:"


And, here's a close-up picture of one of them:


I was happy with them as they came off the loom, but when I washed them I got a lot of tracking and the patterns became quite muddled. You can still see them from a distance, but up close, the pattern gets lost. Quite a disappointment. I used a combination of cotlin and 8/2 unmercerized cotton from a mill-end batch. Next time I may try mercerized cotton for the colored yarn, although I'm not sure which of the yarns caused the problem. Maybe next time I won't do six towels before I see how they wash.

Thursday, February 05, 2009

Towels

I've been out of town and not weaving for a few days but I just finished towel #6. I warped for six towels but still have warp left for another, possibly shorter, 7th towel. Here's a picture of the first one:



This isn't my favorite pattern of the ones I've done - I'll post more when they're off the loom. I need to get the 7th one woven tomorrow and finish at least a few to put in our gallery on Tuesday, which is jury day.

I joined another guild - three wasn't enough. For years I resisted joining the Weaver's Guild of Greater Baltimore because they meet the night before the Central Pennsylvania Guild of Handweavers and I just can't bring myself to go to two guild meetings in twelve hours - one 45 minutes away and the other 2 hours away. But I also felt bad about not belonging to a close and very active guild. Some day I'll find the secret of 36 hour days.