Ode to the Shawl

Spring is a tricky time of year. The temperature fluctuates between very warm days, warmish days that are a little on the damp side, not so warm days, and down right cool days. So what to wear? Layers are a good choice, but there are times when a sweater is just a bit too much.

One of my favourite clothing articles is the shawl. I have a number of them: some knitted and made of homespun wool, and others are woven and made of cotton, and, yes, even of acrylic.

Most likely when you think 'shawl' you are reminded of the pioneer women with their triangular shawls. Who can forget when Laura asked for horses for Christmas in the book On The Banks of Plum Creek. On Christmas morning "...Ma helped them button up the shoes and she pinned their shawls under their chins. They ran out into the cold". (from the chapter A Merry Christmas)

And, indeed, the first shawls I made were triangular, just as Garth Williams illustrated them for the Little House books. I have several versions of this kind of shawl laying strategically around the house, just in case I get a bit chilled. A favourite one is based on a Danish fisherwoman's shawl. It is also triangular, but the points are extra long so you can tie them behind your back and keep them out of the way, leaving your hands free to do other things.

But shawls today are more than just coverings. They are also fashion statements and can be worn just as well with jeans, officewear, or formal attire.

These shawls are great to cuddle up with on a cool day, a cold winter evening, or to accent your outfit for almost any occasion. Machine washable and very user friendly! Feel free to contact me if you would like to acquire one for yourself or as a gift.

When do you wear your shawl?

Making Tea Towels

I thought perhaps some of you would be interested in the making of tea towels. So here are a few pictures to give you an idea of the steps involved in making these wonderfully soft and absorbent tea towels. I will put a brief explanation under each photo to tell you what is happening.

After I have decided the design of the tea towels, I go to my warping board to wind the warp. The warp consists of the threads that run the length of the tea towels. I usually wind a 5 yard warp that will yield 4 towels plus some extra for a sample of what I have done. The warping board has pegs spaced at a width of 36". I am careful to make a cross at the top of the board where the threads go under and over. This keeps the threads in order when I take the warp to the loom.

 I have taken the warp which consists of 441 threads (each 5 yards long) to the back of the loom. Where the cross was on the warping board, I have put a set of sticks called lease sticks. A lease is another word for a cross. I have also put the back apron rod through the end of the warp.

 Here is a picture of the front of the loom. You can see the bundles of threads laying on the front apron. The orange threads have been tied on the warp in 1 yard increments. This was done when the warp was still on the warping board. The ties make sure that the threads don't slip passed each other.

 The next step is to spread the warp to the width that the towels will be woven at. In this case I will weave at 22". I have 441 threads and each inch will consist of 20 threads. I use a raddle to do the initial spreading. The raddle looks like grill work. It is really a board with nails at 1/2" increments. It is open at the top so that I can lay bundles of 10 threads in each space. After I have all the threads in place I put the top of the beater bar on the raddle so that the threads stay in place. 

 Here is a view from the back of the loom. You can see the raddle still in place at the top of the picture. You can also see the lease sticks still in the warp. I will use the cross later to help with the threading of the heddles. But first I must wind the warp onto the back of the loom. As I wind the threads, I also wind paper in between each revolution. This keeps the threads separated.

 The warp must go on the back beam under tight and even tension. This tension is significant. There is a crank at the side of the loom (sorry, no picture), and after every revolution I walk to the front of the loom and wind 2" sections around a stick so that I can give a great yank on that section of warp. This tightens it on the back beam. After the warp is all the way wound with about 24" hanging at the front of the loom, I am ready to do the threading.

 My loom has four harnesses. You can see the bottom of them in this picture. Look for the 4 horizontal grey bars. On each of these bars are heddels. Each heddle has an eye in the middle of it. The order that these heddles are threaded in is part of what determines the pattern that will be woven. So I put on some nice quiet music (maybe Bach's Goldberg Variations with Glenn Gould) and thread all the 441 threads into the correct heddles.

 Here you can see that all the heddles are threaded and the threads have also been put through the reed. The reed is somewhat like the raddle, except that it is closed both top and bottom. This reed has 10 dents (spaces) per inch. So, in order to get 20 thread ends per inch (epi) I will sley 2 ends per dent.

 Then it is time to tie all the ends to the front apron rod. This must also be done under very even tension or weaving will not go as planned. The orange thread at the front of the weaving will be taken out when the tea towels are done.

 Here you can see the progress of one of the tea towels. It takes about 1 1/2 hours to weave one towel, barring any mistakes or broken threads. What I haven't explained is that under the loom there are a set of treadles. The treadles are tied up to the harnesses in a certain combination. The order that I treadle these treadles also determines the pattern that is woven. When  treadle is depressed ( not a bad kind of depression) some of the threads go up while the rest stay down. This creates an opening, called the shed, through which I can throw the shuttle. After the shuttle has gone through, I bring the beater with reed in it forward and beat the thread into place. Then I press the next treadle and do the same thing again.

 Four washed and finished towels ready to be purchased!

These towels are the same pattern as the brown ones. They were woven to order for my friend, Mita from British Columbia.

If you would like to know more about weaving and you live in my area, feel free to contact me and come and have a look.

In Memory of Eva te Bokkel

My mother-in-law was a very unique person. She was one of five children who, along with her parents, ate tulip bulbs during the hunger winter in the Second World War. This, along with other events in her life, made her a survivor. Despite a long battle with lupus and macular degeneration, she was determined to enjoy life. Lupus is an auto immune disease that can be very debilitating. But it was the gradual loss of her eyesight that was mom's biggest fear: to not see the colours of nature that she loved so much

As a child she was a dreamer, avid reader, and artist. She loved, and I mean, really loved colour. Mostly this was evident in her love for gardening, for the first crocuses in the spring, for the tulips, lilly of the valley, poppies, geraniums....  Most of her watercolour paintings are of landscapes or vases of flowers.

But mom also loved fibre crafts. One of these was weaving. When my sister-in-law, Helena, and I began to clean out her weaving stash, we were amazed at all the bins of yarns, all labled for colour and yarn thickness. Evidently mom had plans to do a lot of weaving.

One bin had an assortment of acrylic yarns that were, as our kids would say, 'Oma colours'.  These were the pinks, blues, and greys that she herself loved so much to wear.

This past week I took that bin of colours and made a blanket in memory of my mother-in-law. I wove it on the 60" counterbalance loom that I inherited from her, remembering her as I wove with her yarns, in her colours, on her loom. The blanket is woven in a straight twill, but the colours are somewhat haphazard in accordance with the way that flowers in a meadow have no particular pattern. The blanket is for Helena, in memory of her mom.

Here's 2 Ewe, Eva te Bokkel 

March 22, 1925 - May 3, 2009

Just Do It!

 When you want to learn to knit, a good teacher will tell you that if you can learn to do a knit stitch with the bump on the back of your knitting, you have a lot of possibilities of what you can create. But if you can also learn to purl, with the bump on the front of your knitting, you can knit anything. All knitting is composed of knit and purl stitches, so we are told.

If only weaving were that simple! The on-line dictionary defines weaving as: Form (fabric or a fabric item) by interlacing long threads passing in one direction with others at a right angle to them. That doesn't sound so hard! But........

There are also weave structures to consider: tabby, twill, crackle, double weave, overshot, and more. You could spend all your time in twill and never get tired of it, I am sure. (The tea towels I have woven fall into the twill category). But it is always good to learn something new.

Overshot weaving has traditionally been used to weave coverlets and you will find many examples in textile and pioneer museums.Usually two thicknesses of threads are used; a finer one is used in the warp, and both a fine and a heavier thread are used in the weft. The heavier thread makes the design and the finer thread stabalizes the woven fabric.

In writing this may not sound too complicated, but I just couldn't get my head around how it really worked and I didn't want to commit to a large project that wouldn't turn out at all. (Being who I am, I don't want to mess something up, even at the first try, but I also want something useful!)
Well, I found the perfect small project in Handwoven's May/June 2005 issue: pot holders! It called for 4/8 cotton and craft cotton, the kind used for knitting dishcloths. Both of these I had in the house, so I was off to the races. You can see the results below.

 The potholders above are called the Rose treadling.  The ones below are called the Star treadling, although I think of them as the X treadling because of the X 's in the corners.

 At the end of my warp I had just enough left for one more potholder. I decided that, instead of using the dishcloth cotton double as the instructions said, I would use it single and see what happened. It made for a more square potholder but not quite as thick. I think I almost prefer it over the other one.
This little project was a great way to understand the basics of overshot, and I am sure I will be playing with this weave structure again.

Oh, and by the way, the first person (non-family members) who sends me notification of the mistake(s) in one of the potholders wins that set.

A Flock of Sheep

Over the last number of years I have discovered that sheep have a way of finding their way to my house. It started when I found a sheep sitting on a shelf at Home Sense just begging to come home with me. It wanted a spot by my fireplace. Since it followed me home, others have followed, most of them wagging their tails behind them.

 A cozy flock around the fireplace. What could be more 'gezellig'.

 Some of my sheep like to lounge, dreaming always of green pastures!

This one used to sing with Diana Ross and Supremes......Stop! in the name of wool......la, la, la,

ba-ah, ba-ah, bop-sheep-bop
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDPjYZxi0n8

 And these little ones just stand around looking cute.

What I love about my flock, is that they are no trouble at all. Just a little dusting from time to time and they're good to go.

Feel free to drop in some time and say hi to my 'girls'.