Supernova, and new-to-me fibers

The Great Competition of (babywearing) Weavers

The most exciting/nerve-wracking event of the year.  How to be noticed, but be anonymous... well this year I did REALLY WELL on the second half.

The process was really organic this year - I churned through a couple ideas.  Seasons (obvious, too obvious, which is why I discarded it quickly even though I love it).  Cerridwen the enchantress - I almost did this one, and got really into the development of the idea, but when I set my mind and heart on parallel threading and network treadle to mimic feathers, I knew I'd run into issues with the deadline.

Something triggered a memory of an old colorway I'd done on wool, based on Kepler's supernova.  It immediately struck me, what could be MORE of a change, than a supernova?  They're stunningly beautiful, a bit sad, but universe changing.

(photo of Kepler's supernova courtesy of Google images)


I considered black warp with handspun weft but the issue of anonymity was a huge problem, being one of very few weavers who makes handspun baby wraps to begin with, and add on to that the already problematic time frame.

Until this I'd never done a *baby wrap warp* out of anything but cotton.  I've done scarves, shawls, etc out of other materials but always cotton for baby wraps.  So I knew I needed something not cotton.  I settled on rose viscose from Saltwater Rose Threads in the UK, and then decided I wanted something that would take a neon color (splashes of neon pink to be precise) for the weft.  I ended up discussing with the owner of Saltwater Rose to try to get a good idea of the yarn weight and balance, and decided on her silk bourette.  It came from the UK to UP Michigan in less than a week!

Again because of time, I did a pretty short warp.  I wound it using my warping reel Carl built, and measured it in just 3 chains in the span of an hour or two.  I wound a mini skein to see how the rose would take color (to make sure I could get rich, dark colors) and was amazed at how quickly it absorbed water, and dye struck within a matter of an hour or less. Win!

I did soak the actual warp overnight.  I went back and forth so many times about snow dyeing it, but just couldn't figure out a place in the house where we could spread the warp, and it would freeze in the garage.  Instead, I laid it out, unchained, and swirled in supernovas with dye.

After the initial color swirls, I went back and filled in the dark space with navy, deep purples, and rich blues. I used I believe 22 dye colors all in all.

I carefully chained it and kept it chained for rinsing and drying.

I was told that the Lilla was "built" for back to front warping so I went with it again.  It was basically a mess.  Rose is a bit like warping rubber bands.  It just stretched and stretched and then bounced back and tangled in itself more, strumming was a mess.  I think sectional it might have been ok, if it had never lost tension, but beaming was probably the longest step of the whole process for me.

Slowly though, I got it on.  (And that's the last warp I've beamed back to front since! Made for it or not, the Lilla warps just FINE front to back!)

I chose three weft options, not really knowing what I'd submit until I saw the yarn on the warp, but I had a good idea that I'd proceed with the bourette for one of the pieces anyways.

The bourette I dyed for pooling, and used different degrees of fluorescent dye to achieve a blacklight glow as well as "rings" on the weft - to mimic the circular pattern of a supernova of course.

Then I dyed up a muted silk/nettle option

Both had variation between skeins of how much "accent color" was on each skein.  I also then dip dyed a sparkly merino/silk/stellina (which I ended up not using because it was too dominant to show the warp)

The pooling rings of the fluorescent bourette silk.
This is the one I ended up submitting.  While I worked on it for some reason, I kept thinking of Doctor Who, Doomsday.  It was not in my mind when the project started, but I couldn't shake it.  David Tennant, he was whispering in my ear as I wove, I swear it.  "I'm burning up a sun, just to say goodbye."  Aaaah Ten, he gets me every time.

And so my chameleon warp became "Burning Up a Sun", an unintentional but fitting tribute.  Ultimately it was the most interesting piece I'd woven to date.  The structure was complex and a long treadle pattern.  As you moved away, it became blue/purple dominant, but closer, the bursts of color emerged and almost had rainbow explosions where each painted supernova was.  (See the bottom right corner of the collage compared to the outdoor pictures).  And of course the blacklight reaction changed it further.  The bourette was grippy, but soft.  The rose was shiny but bouncy and lofty in an almost wool type of way.  Paradoxical.

The sister was far more introspective.  It was a reflecting pool.  It was deep and flowing.  It was internal and dark.  I just called it "Reflections" and put in random handspun silk blessing threads/inlays scattered throughout.

The silk/nettle made this piece all luxury and drape.  Again, close up the bursts of color would emerge, but the piece as a whole was just a bit more quiet and elegant.

In my race against the clock, I ended up cutting off with a single day to spare.  And February would end up being a mental break for me, having woven something like 50 yards over the previous 5 weeks.

Loom up!

After a year of trying to figure out options that will keep me with two working looms for my shop, I finally decided on an Oxaback Lilla.  I knew I needed something versatile, but I wanted a small footprint so it could go along with us when we RV or settle in a skoolie as the kids get older.  Ultimately the option of a drawloom upgrade later sold me, although the aesthetics didn't hurt!  I was able to stop at the Woolgatherers in Fond du Lac on my way home from Rhinebeck this year, and got to weave on one of the Lillas set up in the store.  They're so traditionally beautiful!

Of course a snowstorm hit right after we got back, and we've had snow basically every day since.  After almost 2 weeks of this nonsense, I emailed them back and asked them to ship the loom.  It arrived Wednesday, and the next 24 hours were utter torture as we let the wood warm up, to prevent any odd expansion or contraction after assembly.

At any rate, Thursday brought us this!

The directions were unfortunately pretty difficult to understand, there are two pages of swedish instructions with a diagram, a page that is meant to be a translation, but only summarizes and refers back to the swedish.  It reminds me a bit of early English Lit classes, having to translate Beowulf and interpret at the same time, different bit of work for my weaving brain.  The slideshow is pictures after a bit is done, rather than how to do each step, but ultimately helped more than either set of written directions.  And we ended the day with the frame together, leaving me to do the pulleys and tie ups. This part is unfortunately more of a struggle, without clear instructions.  But I have a draft chosen, for the first piece, so I can set it up and configure it for my first weave in one step!

The end of the Bergman adventure, part 2

Eventually with some help from people on Ravelry, I was able to move my warp off of the Bergman and back on to the Nilus.  It was not fun, I don't know how I had the patience to stick with the project.  But I sort of got tabby sheds and put in lease sticks, and moved it and warped front to back.

Once the weaving started, it was done quickly and easily.  I was reminded by how very *reliable* my Nilus always has been.  I decided to invest in texsolv heddles to replace my breaking string heddles, and give it one more try.  I wound on some bronze 10/2 to make a handwoven cowl.  The structure needed a first floating selvedge.  It was a nightmare with the double back beam setup.  

I was able to complete the project just fine, but I realized that as fond as I was of the character of this loom, it was not up for the production kind of weaving that I needed it to do.  I ended up selling it as I finished up this scarf warp, and immediately replaced it with an 8 shaft Herald from Eugene Textile Center, and it came with a sectional.  A whole new thing to learn!