Ravellenic Games 2014 Report: Day 13

Last time I summarized my Ravellenic projects progress, there was only one left to do: the woven band. I was eager to weave.

I was not so eager to figure out the font. I was surprised to find nothing online. (I did find some embroidery fonts I tried to convert, but it wasn't very successful.) I thought I found a book of woven fonts to order which would solve it for me, but the book only included capital letters in the font I liked. So I realized I would have to draft my own. :sigh: :work:

Neither was I eager to wrap the warp threads on the loom. I only had one ball of one colour so I knew I would have to either cut and wrap the threads for each card separately (yuck) or figure out how much I needed and pull that much off the one ball to make a second ball. Plus I had to consider how to deal with the twisting threads. When you do fonts, it seems to always work out that some warp threads twist in one direction more than another and a lot of twist builds up. You can use fishing swivels to solve this (none of which I own yet) or you can just warp extra length and just "push" the twist out of the way. :sigh: :decisions: :work: (These are the types of decisions that can put me into complete project paralysis.)

I bought some time by asking Troy to complete the loom he made for me by gluing the pegs. When I used the loom in the summer, the pegs stayed in place. Now that it's winter and much drier, the pegs were loose enough in the holes that they weren't sitting perpendicular to the frame (which will cause uneven tension on the band) and slipping out of the holes completely (hopefully why that is a problem is obvious enough I don't have to explain it). While he cheerfully took care of it, I was off the hook for a couple days.

I used the time to graph out the letters in Excel. My first version was very blocky, working off the alphabet provided by my teacher (John Mullarkey) at Squam. His were all capitals, however, so I made up lower case letters. Then I edited them so that they were more rounded and I was happier with the result.

Wednesday evening I decided it was time to bite the bullet, make the decisions for better or worse, and get started. I made some guesstimates about length so I could figure out what path to warp my loom and pull off enough string from the one ball to do a continuous warp. The second colour was some cotton I had purchased in a big bag at the last Red Purl "Green Sale." I had two balls of it so I was set there. One had less on it than the other, but it had enough to finish this project without cutting it so close I had to worry about it.

When it came to the actual weaving, it was very uneventful and I was surprised to have it half done the first evening and finished in the second! I can't decide if weaving is more agonizing than a knitting project for me because there actually are more decisions to be made, or if I'm just used to making the knitting decisions and so they're easier. (Hopefully the latter so I can have the hope that weaving will become easier too.)

It's double faced weaving so you can see the letters on the "right side" (light letters on a burgundy background) and you can see reversed letters on the "wrong side" below.

Here is just some of the twist that builds up on the warp threads.

It was worst on the center cards where every letter has a brush stroke (so to speak).

When it was done, I had a band about 1-1/8" wide and 28" long.

I was particularly happy with my curvy "s"

and fancy "a."

In both cases I smoothed out the curves by borrowing cards from the block above and below. Next time I'll do that on more of the letters with curves. (But one lesson at a time...reminding myself that I'm just starting out.)

And what does it actually say?

These were the admonitions heard from my Oma (grandmother) the most often. They were used as a good-bye and almost any other time she was searching for what to say or how to end a conversation. They summarize her basic philosophy of how one ought to live and it was her hope for all of her grandchildren. And I still hear them often in my mind in her strong Dutch accent.

I am planning to use this band in a "Dream Catcher" like these ones I saw on the Squam website. I think they are beautiful and when I looked closer, I realized they used a doily for the center. The dream catchers I've seen before are woven and look like spider webs (to me). But when I saw doilies I got excited. I have a few that my Oma made and I was never sure what to do with them. I wanted to keep them, but I don't really decorate with them, putting them out on side tables or the backs of recliners. But I thought this was a project I could work with. So this woven ribbon is the first piece I've put together to hang off the bottom. I thought capturing Oma's perennial advice would be fitting.

She was a brave woman. Not courageous, because I think she was afraid or nervous all the time. But she braved her way through what needed to be done. For example, she had a terrible sense of direction and once got off a Greyhound bus in the town she had been living in for decades and got turned around and couldn't find her way to the person meeting her. (Fortunately it was a small town and they found her before too long.) But this is the same woman who emigrated from her war-torn country after WWII to Canada (a land where she didn't even know the language) with her husband, five young boys and my mother (aged 9 to 0). It's crazy if you think about it.

She was never mean, but she could be "direct." Comments that might confront you, but never belittle. But she once told my sister that she really didn't like saying things to confront people and was shy to say them, but they would be important things on her mind and she knew if she didn't say them, she would regret it and feel like she had not fulfilled her duty of helping to raise us kids. So she swallowed her fear and said them. Conviction.

These are some of the reasons I chose her words to weave into a band.

Once the band itself was done, I cut it off of the loom and had all these lovely twisted ends.

I kind of wanted to keep them, but I had to straighten them all out in order to get the cards off. But it planted an idea and so I braided or twisted the strands once the cards were removed. Here are a few examples:

From left, three-strand braid, two-ply twist of
four strands each, two-ply of two strands each,
and four-strand braid.

Then I started to think of beads and looked through my bead box. I found these wooden ones I had picked up who knows where:

The colours, weight, and size were perfect. I have loved them, but never knew what to do with them. I added them to some of the strands:

Then I found a few other beads:

I had a lot of fun working on these ends. At Squam, John Mullarkey summarized weaving as "string management" as a funny punchline, but it has stuck in my brain. I do really like string management. Whether it's knitting, weaving, braiding, or undoing knots! I spent a happy time working on simple braids and twisted strands. If they didn't come out the way I liked, I just undid them and tried another option. I should consider this on some evenings when I'm not up to a capital P, Project. Some people doodle; I could braid. It's not like I don't have the string for it! :)

In the end, it came out a bit of a jumbled mess, but I like it.

The longer strings on the sides are from the selvedge warp threads. I cut them quite a bit longer and weighted them instead of including them with the continuous warp. The selvedge cards are twisted the same way all the time to give a neater edge, but it means a lot of twist builds up. Warping them separately means I can get rid of the twist. And on my last band, the selvedge warp threads were "used up" a lot quicker than the rest of the warp so I thought I would need to make them longer to start. Apparently not in this case! Anyway, I decided to leave those strands long and have just knotted the beads in place. When the whole project is done and I have more bands/ribbons/whatever hanging from the dream catcher, I can always decide to cut them.

And to the left you see the entire band. The fringe is 27" so that gives a total length of 55".

That means medals in Alpine Abode Enhancement (since it will hang on a wall), Labyrinth Weaving, Nordic Colourwork Combined, and Stash Skeleton.

Games Update, Thursday, Feb 20:
1. Rainbow Cowl DONE!
2. Rainbow Hat DONE!
3. & 4. Ravel Sweater 1 and Sweater 2 DONE! DONE!
5. Dye Green Yarn DONE!
6. Spinning DONE!
7. Woven Band DONE!
8. Baby Bib DONE!

And that is the end of my Ravellenics projects. Maybe not as ambitious as my Whistler sweater in 2010, but I really can't believe I got all of them done. In part because knitting is easy (for me) so the only challenge in the Whistler project was the sheer volume of knitting it represented.

This year there were different projects and the weaving and dyeing especially present "mental paralysis" problems for me. But I pushed and got them done. And they were, by and large, successful. And I had fun. I hope you enjoyed reading along.

Skirting my Baggage (Prequel to Part 2)

I said I would be making a strap for my "skirt purse" and I'm excited to report that I have it started.

I ordered some cotton "Curio" from Knit Picks, the giant online supplier of yarnie goodies. It's a lace-weight Mercerized cotton that was recommended by someone on the Ravelry tablet weaver forum.

I took a look at the website and thought three of the colours were exactly the brown, yellow, and green that I was looking for. It's hard to be sure on a screen, but I got lucky and they are great. Being Mercerized, the cotton has a beautiful sheen to it. I think it has a much nicer look than the "common" crochet cotton I've been using so far.

I've worn the purse a little since making it, even though the strap is a little short. I put a magnetic closure on it, which helps the purse from falling open and I've decided that the purse does need only one strap (not two as I was thinking) and should be worn crosswise over the body. I measured a bag I have and like and loaded up the loom.

I've made a few mistakes. (In fact you can spot a little one in the picture above if you look closely. No, I'm not going to point it out specifically.) The worst was one that I didn't notice for a few repeats of the pattern and it caused the cards to be turned in the wrong position. Long story short, the design still looks like diamonds and chevrons but the colours aren't in the right position. Once I figured out that something was wrong and discovered the cause, I was way too far to back out of it. Just not worth it. (No one is going to be looking at my purse that closely.) The only really sad part is that shortly after the mistake, I looked at my band and something didn't look right. But I didn't pursue it any further. Well, lesson learned.

I feel very much like the beginner knitters I watch. Slow and not really sure what's going on even as my fingers go through the motions! One specific example is that I put down the shuttle before I turn the cards, every time. It's like a knitter who drops the yarn before moving the needle for the next stitch. But that's what I need to do right now. (It really doesn't bother me--these thoughts come because it's a slow hobby and I have lots of time to think!)

I got the pattern from the same website I've used before. Click here to see the specific pattern. I changed the colours and then added an extra V going in each direction. You can't make those modifications online, but it's easy to do by printing two copies of the pattern and cutting and pasting. (I mean literal cutting and pasting with scissors and tape, not CTRL-X and CTRL-V!) I thought the strap was long enough that it could use a longer repeat.

This pattern is easy to keep track of. I'm sure even though you can't read the pattern in the picture above, you can see that it is very symmetric and repetitious. I keep a paperclip at the side of the paper to keep track of which section I'm on, and that's all I've needed.

One thing I did for the first time was add a border on each side. (You can easily see the solid brown border in the first two pictures above.) The neatest border requires you to always turn those cards the same direction no matter what the pattern cards are doing next to them. This causes those strings to twist up, making those warp threads shorter and shorter. To deal with this, I cut separate strands for those border cards (as opposed to a continuous loop). That way you can periodically untwist the strands.

But then you're stuck with how to tension those strands. If they're not wrapped in a loop, you have loose ends. Enter the highly specialized tool of a water bottle:

I tied a loop around the neck and just tie the strands from the right border to the strands from the left border through the loop. The full water bottle is a little too heavy, but obviously not that big of a problem since I haven't bothered to empty any of the water out.

Here's a shot of the twisting threads:

The ones in front (on the right) have been untwisted, but you can see how snarled the ones in back (left) are. Some people do this with the strands of every card so that they can untwist them. So far, I prefer to continuous loop and just make it longer than I need so I have room to "push" the twist into. (And in this pattern, the twisting that happens in one repeat is "untwisted" in the next so, except for the border cards, it's not really an issue.)

(Some take it one step further and attach each set of strands to a fishing swivel and that removes the need to manually untwist the strands. But it doesn't work with my loom so I'd have to use a different set up. I'm still tempted. The swivels are cheap so there's not a lot of cost in trying it. I'll do it some time when I have a pattern that requires it.)

I do have one other problem I may have to face soon. My border warp threads are much shorter than the rest. I thought I cut them all the same, so all I can guess right now is that constantly turning in one direction uses up more length. A second, less likely (I think) possibility is that it's because of the tighter tension from the heavy water bottle. But I would think that would make it use less, not more. I just don't know.

The blue line highlights the border threads hanging
down the back (without the water bottle for the
moment) and the pink highlights what is left of
the rest of the warp threads.

My band is pretty long. About 43 inches stretches down and left from the cards, down to the bottom, all the way across to the other side, left to the tension peg, up again, and down to the far peg, which is where the weaving starts. As I recall, I need 50 inches. And that's a generous measurement. So far I am thinking I'm going to end up tying the border warp threads to a waste string so I can weave right up to their ends. We'll see.

Bag Lady

I've been itching for a weaving project but was held back by things like not knowing what to make (first) and not having supplies to make it. Do I buy more cotton, or silk, or wool? Where do I get it? I finally decided just to start and get on with it already. That was when I was in front of the crochet cotton at Joann's and they had some nice reds, black and white. (Well, I already had the white.)

I thought, those are some colours I can live with. So I bought one of each: black, "victory" red, and a darker red. Then I remembered my Red Purl bag was getting shabby and it could use some new handles. It was a white bag (now a little more dingy from much loving use) with a black and red design. I can match that.

And this Saturday (tomorrow) is another "Bag Lady" event. A deadline!!

First, what's a bag lady? It's Amy's affectionate nickname for the customers who have purchased a Red Purl bag and then are privileged with monthly discounts and the occasional special event. Not the sort of thing I usually pony up for, but this was a club I wanted in on (all the prestige, you know). I bought one of the bags the first year she did it. And you can kind of tell.

There's no washing it back to like-new condition any more, but the worn handles were something I could do something about!

Through the tablet weaving group on Ravelry, I discovered an incredible collection of patterns that are available from someone named Babette on a website. No matter that it's in German; one can figure it out. (Thanks to the hints posted on Ravelry, I did.)

I am fascinated by the warp threads
coming off of the weaving as if they
are streaming away...but in a very
orderly fashion.

I chose a pattern, threaded the cards, and tried it out. After about an inch, I could tell it was about half as wide as I needed. So I printed a second copy of the pattern, cut and pasted it next to the first copy so that they were mirror images, and threaded some more cards. I put them together and started weaving the pattern.

The first strap was a little rough with quite a bit of unweaving from not following the pattern closely enough. But I learned a lot. One night when I did make progress despite spending more time unweaving than weaving, I learned a couple of things repeatedly. I guess I'm a slow learner.

But ever I got better, and the second band went a lot smoother. I think I was also a little more diligent about keeping my place in the chart by moving the post-it note! :)

Once woven, I gave the bands a good soak and then pressed them with a hot iron. The second band came off the loom a little longer than the first, even though they had the same number of pattern repeats. I made sure to stretch them out to the same length while ironing, and then also pinned them in place as they dried:

Once dry, they were the same length. I cut the ends even with my rotary cutters. (I'll have to remember scissors really don't work well enough for it. Or if I don't, I'll learn that lesson again too!)

Then I cut off the original straps and sewed these ones in their place:

Just a simple outline of a square to hold everything in place.

When I initially measured the length I thought I was going to sew the woven band over the old strap so I didn't allow for the overlap with the bag. After being sewn on, they feel just a little short to wear over my shoulder:

They could use an inch or two more in length. But I don't look like I mind, do I!

Project Stats
Started: 11 Aug '13
Finished: 15 Aug '13
Pattern: Muster von Lira nur verkürzt (doubled--24 cards)
Materials: Aunt Lydia's Classic Crochet 10--white, black, victory red
Tomorrow's event at Red Purl is the pre-sale of what she calls her Green Sale--The sale of "second hand" craft items (wool and other knitting tools/books, and this year she added fabric and quilting tools/books). You can hit the sale this Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. I'll be there at 8:30 tomorrow morning for the "Bag Lady" only pre-sale.

Hey, I just realized it's Friday, and this is like a "fix it" so we're going to file this under Fix It Friday and pretend I intended that all along!

Enjoy your weekend, all. And if I find any great stuff tomorrow, you know I'll tell you about it!