Loom Held Hostage

A loom is too expensive of a tool to be held hostage.  Almost three years ago, in March of 2011, I put this wool warp on my Artisat loom.  It was a slow moving project right from the start because it required four shuttles to weave.  I would work on it a little bit and grow tired of all the shuttle switching and move on to another project on another loom.  It didn't help that the colors don't really appeal to me either, so I didn't have much motivation to get it done, other than to free the loom for something more interesting.

Late last year, I decided I was going to either finish it or cut it off the loom.  I did end up cutting the New Canaan Check fabric off after using up my filled bobbins.  I did some easier weaving with the tan, wine, rust and plum rayon textured yarns I was using.

 I figured I still had 2-3 yards of warp on the loom so I chose a dark blue green color wool to weave plain weave.

 I finally finished weaving it after Christmas.  I wove a little bit more with the rayon and called it good.  Wet finishing was done and I ended up with less fabric than I thought I would have.  I was going to give it to my daughter Becky to make a tunic, but there might not be enough.  Maybe I will make another bear or a hat with it.

Wet finishing created a pattern in two of the stripes that is called tracking.  The white yarn didn't track because it was slightly thicker than the other two stripes.  The tracking has something to do with the twist of the yarn and having a little bit of wiggle room in the weave.  I kind of like the look of it.

It's good to have my loom back and working again.  I will post later about the project on it now.