Another year over.

I have this weird habit of not feeling like its "next year" until my birthday. I have no idea why that is but it does let me write off any residual post-December crud as last year's problem.

That does mean January is a pretty weird month for me though. I tend to simultaneously feel very unproductive and somehow manage to get a largish amount of stuff finished. I think it might have something to do with the fact that January is a grumpy month for me and I spend a lot of my free time avoiding people and thus manage to get a lot more craft-y time in (I have debated if this is a good or a bad thing but its hard to draw a conclusion in light of that trade-off).

So far this month I've knit a Pretty thing:

Finished my first project to come off the pendleton (which - I would say about 90% of was done this month because I took so long to warp it and then got distracted):

Finished a pair of socks:

And finished half of another pair of socks:

I also did a bunch of little design swatches and tonight I warped the flip. I'm also in the home stretch on my handspun targhee sweater and yesterday I got around to sewing some hook clasps on the featherweight which was handy because I wore it today and it DIDN'T FALL OFF ONCE.

Clasps are nice.

In completely unrelated news (and Mom, I can totally hear that face you're about to make all the way in Texas) I was trying to decide what to put on the loom tonight and after trashing my stash looking for some KP Shadow that I was positive I had but apparently don't or else have lost I came to the conclusion that I did not have any yarn.

I was pretty convinced of it for about an hour while I tried to find something I wanted to work with.

Eventually I turned up some Rittersporn left over from my Porphyria mitts so it ended OK but I still can't help feeling like my stash redistributed itself into sweater quantities and spinning fiber when I wasn't paying attention.

Overambitious

I haven't been talking about my loom lately.

This is not because I have lost interest. Its not because I'm not using it. Its not because I don't love it lots and lots.

Its because I am a crazy person.

See, rather than warp up a simple scarf or something else narrow and fairly uncomplicated I decided that the first thing I wanted off my loom was fabric for a new knitting tote bag. I decided that it was going to be large (a bit over the size of my current go-to ravelry tote), it was going to be slightly felted (which means it needs to be woven even larger than usual) and it was going to be a large, dramatic pattern.

I found a large scale twill draft on weavolution, figured out how to read it (I hope) and got to winding the warp. Since I figured this would be a fairly time intensive threading and since I had two whole cones of Shetland wool I wanted to use up I decided to warp for two bags worth of fabric. I figured that way I would either get a Christmas present out of it as well or maybe be able to negotiate with someone more competent with a sewing machine than I am to make the bag itself in exchange for the second hunk of fabric.

This all sounds only a little unreasonable until you consider the fact that I have never actually warped a four-harness loom before.

So four weeks later this is how far along I am:

That's right - I have ONE WHOLE THREADING REPEAT DONE! On the upside I also have all the warp wound finally. Having my Dad on hand to hang the warping board this week is mostly responsible for that last part (its very annoying to wind onto a board that is leaning on the wall or propped on your lap).

I am at least 50% sure that I'm doing this right.

I'm also at least 80% sure there is some more efficient method to do this.

Sometime before I do this again I should try and figure out what that is.

Anyway, one repeat down and two to go.

I started winding the weft bobbins so that whenever this thing is finally tied up and ready to go I won't have to wait on that also:

This bag may not be done for a year or something but I'm still confident its going to be pretty awesome when it finally happens.

Day 2: History Lesson

I'm taking a break about halfway through coating the loom in tung oil (and yeah, I really didn't set out to actually refinish her but that's how its turning out anyway) and thanks to my Mom's awesome research skills I have some more info on her.

Based on the size and this ad:

It would seem I have their 30" "mini-loom" and the wood is birch (this agrees with what the guy at Woodcraft told me so I'm pretty confident of that now).

Interestingly another ad suggests that the loom is intended to be threaded in the folded position. Also the sectional beam on mine was likely an add-on as its available without.

Of related interest the University of Arizona has an archive of the newsletter "Looming Arts" which seems to have been put out by Mary Pendleton. Her husband is the one that made the looms.

The "Thing"

I am convinced that every dedicated yarnie/fiberista/crafter/artist type eventually has that score that they will tell stories about forever and their friends will tell stories about and then eventually it will turn into a crazy niche-type urban legend about finding 50 balls of Cashmerino at the thrift store for 5$ or a Reeves wheel in a parent's attic or a dozen froggable cashmere sweaters at goodwill.

Like if you just stick with your crazy obsession long enough someone somewhere will leave you their entire stash of Noro or some distant relative will find out you spin and mention that hey, they raise sheep or alpaca or angora on the side and would you like a few prime fleeces for christmas this year?

And until it happens to you all you can do is try not to be too overwhelmingly jealous when someone shows up at knit night with a complete set of Addi Turbos they got at some estate sale for pocket change.

So.

Yeah.

I think this is mine:

Its a 30" 4 harness Pendleton jack loom (& yes, it folds).

It needs a new reed, heddles & heddle bars and some small bits of hardware here and there.

Also a really good cleaning.

I'm hyped. I've been wanting a 4-harness loom for awhile but its been a kind of a pipe dream. I don't have the space for the large looms that sometimes crop up on craigslist on the cheap and the smaller folding looms like the Schacht wolfs don't usually resell for much below retail on the rare occasions you can find one used.

This one is pretty much everything I could ask for. She's a good size - large enough for bigger projects but not so big that I don't have space to set up. She's well built - I'm not sure what the wood is yet but it seems sturdy and in pretty good shape in spite of having spent the last some-odd years in someone garage. She's even pretty - underneath a layer of grime the wood is warm with an attractive almost iridescent grain.

Oh, and did I mention that she was free?

Its OK if you need to hate me a little bit right now. If I wasn't me, I'd probably hate me a little bit too.