Twisp of Fate

We’re off to Seattle (aka “The Coast”) for Thanksgiving with family and visits with friends.  The weather seems to be cooperating so we expect the drive over the passes to go without incident (or accident, that is).  The cats are going along since we will be gone for 5 nights – they usually tolerate the drive without too much complaint, and recognize the apartment once we get there.

So I will leave you with some pictures of our guild meeting room set up for the sale (which went well), and a promise to resume blogging sometime next week.

We had many rugs on display all over the room

Kay Reiber's shawls displayed on loom

towels displayed on a 72-spool rack

the "tableware" table

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I’m heading into the home stretch, trying to build up some inventory for our annual guild sale next weekend.  I finished up six more shawls this week.  These are woven with handpainted boucle yarns from New Zealand for the warps, and none of them will be repeatable because the dyer sold her business and these colors have now been discontinued.  For the weft, I used various colors of wool or alpaca yarn, except the accent stripes are done with fine kid mohair/silk yarns.

Blue/mauve boucle with pale lavender Shetland wool

Blue/mauve boucle with mauve wool weft

Deep blues with black alpaca weft

Deep blues with rich brown alpaca weft

"Lollipop" boucle with dark teal wool weft

"Lollipop" boucle with black alpaca weft

As you can probably tell, I am getting two shawls from each warp put on the loom, but am mixing it up a little (and making it more interesting for me) by using different colors or fibers in the weft.  I’m also experimenting with making some shawl pins, since I like to wear these pinned shut at the front, leaving my arms free – sort of like wearing a vest.

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This was a good week for finishing projects.  My package finally came from Macomber with the things I needed to finish the restoration of Mother Mary’s loom.  We put the new cloth (canvas) aprons on the front beam and the plain warp beam in the back.  Then I re-strung the cords on the sectional warp beam using the materials they sent, and their instructions:

Then we wrapped it up and put it in the cargo trailer and took it on up to its new home at the Methow Valley Spinners & Weavers guild room.  I also got 2 more reeds, a raddle and a bunch of the pedal hooks – there were only 8 pedal hooks when I got it, should be more like 64 for a loom with 16 pedals.

Now of course everyone in the guild wants to know what I am going to weave on it and if I will jump in with both feet and use all 12 harnesses on the first project… yikes!  no pressure, none at all.

I also finished 3 rugs and that was the end of the rug warp.  31 rugs since the beginning of May, and I have sold about half of them already..

blue jeans denim rug, 28" x 41"

9 shades of blue cotton corduroy, 28" x 27" and 28" x 38"

Yesterday I took 7 more rugs up to the Ashford Gallery in Winthrop, as they were running a little low.

I did some maintenance on my 48″ Macomber – replaced the flat steel heddles with new inserted-eye heddles I ordered a while back.  Then I gave it a thorough cleaning and lubricated the jacks.  I am planning to start another series of shawls, as they have sold all of the ones I had up at Ashford Gallery, and we have holiday sales coming up soon!

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I have finished 12 more rag rugs in the past 2 months and thought it was time to put up a few pictures!  All of these are on the same 28″ wide warp.

Rust & tan fringed selvages, probably cotton, 42" long

Bronze, silver & chocolate fringed selvages, probably synthetics, 42" long

Pendleton fringed wool selvage, 39" long (sold)

The above rug was so thick and cushy (especially to bare feet!) that I decided to make another one.  I had quite a bit of that color left and just kept weaving until it was all gone.  It came out 76″ long after washing, and I think it will be great next to a bed, for example.  But I don’t have a picture of it.  I also failed to get a picture of the next rug I did after that one, which was the same thick, cushy Pendleton wool selvage material, but black with jewel tone flecks.  It came out 44″ long.

The rest of them evolved as I got into the boxes of denim and colored cotton corduroy strips.  For most of these, I pick out the colors I want to use (usually 6 or 7 colors), arrange them in a color progression I like and then sew the strips together in those repeating sequences before winding them onto the shuttles.  So the colors do repeat over and over, but not in stripes, since the length of the sequenced strips are not usually an exact match to the width of the rug.  If you get what I mean…

Green denims and corduroys, 36" long

Green, teal and bright turquoise denim and corduroy, 51" long. Reminds me of breakers coming on shore.

Corduroy in shades of gray, also black denim, arranged so there is some striping. 46" long.

Mixed denims, dark blue through medium gray. 43" long.

Now I started into the box with burgundy, brown, purple and a bright raspberry red, of which I had a lot:

Burgundy, brown, purple & raspberry denim & corduroy, 44" long.

Corduroy in 7 shades of purple, 36" long.

"The leftovers" from the 2 above, lots more raspberry. 28" long.

I think I’m seeing the end of this rug warp – I have completed 28 rugs since the beginning of May and may have 5 or 6 to go, at a guess.  It’s been a blast but I am ready to do something else!

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After spending a fair bit of time and effort cleaning up and trying out the Herald loom that is for sale up at our guild meeting room, I decided it just wasn’t what I was looking for, mainly because it turns out the brake mechanism isn’t original and I couldn’t get it to work properly (this is the mechanism that allows you to release the warp beam at the back to advance the warp).  Also, I am used to my Macomber loom here at home, which is so rock solid and sturdy.  So then I got to thinking, maybe I should just look for a smaller Macomber to keep up at the guild room as a “second loom.”

A friend had recently sent me the link for a Craig’s List search tool that lets you search all Craig’s lists within a specified mile radius of your zip code:  Search Tempest.  I was looking for a 32″ or 40″ Macomber.  There weren’t many, in fact the nearest one I found was in Colorado.  I was starting to promote a “vacation” trip to Colorado when all of a sudden a new one came up in Port Orchard, near Bremerton in western Washington.  It was a 40″ weaving width with 12 shafts (twelve!!) and 16 treadles, both a plain and sectional warp beam, a bench, a 72-spool rack and some other nice features.  Our “fearless leader” at the guild told me to GO FOR IT so I did.

The Macomber Loom company has been in business since 1936 and is still making looms back in York, Maine.  Don’t bother trying to find their website, because they don’t have one.  The closest thing you can get, and it is a good one, is the blog of a fiber artist in York, ME who is a big fan of their looms, and is also a sales rep for the company.  She lives practically next door to the workshop, and visits them frequently.  She has posted a lot of useful information and maintenance tips on her blog:  Macomber Looms and Me.  In fact, I think I will add this to my links in the sidebar.

But you can also call them directly to order parts, etc.  (207-363-2808).  They have records of just about every loom they ever made, because they are all identified with a model and serial number on a metal plate on the side of the loom.  So I called them to find out about B5-1046 before we went to Port Orchard.  Eddie there told me it was built in October 1954, the original buyer was “Mother Mary” (no record of location, though), and verified all of its original specifications – 40-inch, 12 harness, 16 treadle, sectional and plain beam, warp separator, etc.

So I am now the proud owner of Mother Mary’s loom, and in the next posts will show you how we spent this last week bringing the old girl back to life.

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