Fair and Square - continued

Wendy-Marie offered a rep weave table runner, using Rosalie Neilson’s pattern in the the May/June 2017 issue of Handwoven. The warp is 3/2 cotton sett at 30 epi. The weft alternates 3/2 cotton for the thin pick with 8/16 mop yarn tripled for the thick pick. The runner is finished with four rows of Cavandoli knots. Having studied Rosalie’s DVD course on rep weave, she believes the draft in Handwoven has some errors –that shaft 4 should be paired with shaft 8, and shaft 3 should always pair with shaft 7. 

 She also made matching placemats.

 

The same issue of Handwoven had a design by Deanna Deeds called “Gumdrop Scarf.”  Wendy-Marie used this pattern to produce her Nevada County Inspired entry, a “Farmer’s Market Scarf.” The warp is tencel, sett at 24 epi at the two ends, and changed to 16 epi for the body of the scarf using Beryl and Igor’s variable reed. The reed is 12 epi, but the top comes off so that the weaver can rearrange the warp. This reed allowed for a more even distribution of the warp once the edging was completed. The scarf is finished with Danish Medallions. Diverging a bit from the pattern, Wendy-Marie used bambu for the weft, which helped make the scarf softer and drapier.

 Her dishcloths are based on the “Herringbone Twill Towels” by Linda Gettmann, from the Sept/Oct 2014 issue of Handwoven. Where would we be without that magazine? Yarn is mostly 8/2 cotton, with a smattering of tencel and 5/2 cotton used for color. The sett is 20 epi.

It's Fair Time Again

If it's August, it must be Nevada County Fair time.  Many of the Not 2 Square members entered their spun, woven or knitted items into the Wool, Fibers and Textiles Section.  We are lucky enough to display in a nice cool, clean building rather than one of the other open buildings.  (They were not quite barns, but they sometimes felt like it.)

In this post, we are featuring Ingrid and Sue's entries.  

Ingrid entered nine items this year.  

She entered two baby blankets.  These are from different warps, but are made in a similar way.  The warp is a mixed warp of different cotton yarns, in varying thicknesses.  The purple warp has more similar sized yarns that the green/yellow one.  The weft is a synthetic blend.  These are both woven in plain weave.  The variegated colors really bring interest to the otherwise plain weave structure.

Baby Blanket

Baby Blanket

Ingrid's next items are two scarves.  They are both woven using Malibrego yarn but are from different warps.  Both scarves are threaded to an advancing twill on eight shafts.  One is woven with a 2-2-3-1 tie up and the other a 2-1-1-1-2-1 tie up.

Scarf

Scarf

She also entered two shawls.  These are woven from Mountain Colors yarns.  The purple is wool and merino and the orange/gold shawl is wool and alpaca.  The structures are both an extended point twill with a 1-1-2-1-1-2 tie up.  

Shawl

Shawl

Ingrid also submitted two towels for judging.  One (on the right) is a twill in 10/2 cotton.   It has an irregular point twill design. The second is a turned twill design woven using cottolin.   Full information about this towel can be found at Ingrid's blog:  https://foothillweaving.blogspot.com/2017/03/poker-challenge-turns-to-twills.html

Weaver's Poker Towel

Twill Towel

Finally, Ingrid entered a scarf in the Nevada County Inspiration Division.  This category challenges the entrant to create a piece that is inspired by something in the County.  Ingrid chose Fire as her inspiration.    

This scarf is woven with sock yarn, sett at 15 epi.  he structure is an extended point twill with a tie up that is almost a 2/2 twill.

Nevada County Inspiration Scarf

Sue entered two items in this year's Fair.

The first is a towel. 

The second is a inkle band.

Stay tuned for more Fair entries from the Not 2 Square members.

The Looms we Love - Part 2

 Here is Eileen's 8 shaft Macomber.  She bought the loom from someone who was downsizing and wanted a smaller loom.  Eileen loves how solid the loom is - good tension, easy to treadle and wide enough for big projects.  She keeps this loom pretty busy these days.





But like most weavers, Eileen has other looms as well.  Below is her Ashford table loom.  Perfect for weaving outdoors in the summer time.

Not shown, is Eileen's newest member of her loom family; an 8 shaft Schact Wolf Pup.  She can't wait to get started with a warp on it.

Ingrid's main loom is a big, 8 shaft Cranbrook countermarche loom and she weaves almost everything on it..  Because Ingrid is tall, she finds this particular loom very comfortable.

But one loom is never enough!  This is Ingrid's 24 shaft AVL Studio loom with a compudobby. 

 

..... and her cherry, Schact Baby Wolf.  Ingrid often weaves scarves on this loom and it goes with her to workshops.

 

 

More looms to come in our next post.  Our weavers love their tools!