A Brilliant Invention

Day 279: I'd like to give a shout out to the unsung hero who invented the fringe twister. According to Google's AI, tools for twisting fringe date back to ancient China, and the modern versions (of which there are several different designs with varying numbers of clips) cannot be attributed to any one person. Okay, that will have to satisfy me, and suffice to say that in my opinion, this is the greatest thing since sliced bread. No, wait...that idiom doesn't apply in my case since I make my own. That said, of all the gadgets I own, this one gets five stars, an A-plus in the categories of Clever, Functional and Time-Saving. I already have one end of the shawl done, and that's 128 little twisted fringes. If I was doing this with the "lick your fingers, roll one group 20 times, lick your fingers, roll the second group 20 times" method, I'd be here until Christmas. Even so, it's a lengthy process, and not one you'd sit down and complete all in one go.

'Til Hell Freezes Shut

Day 45: I am going to be tying fringe until hell freezes shut. Since the summer-and-winter will be an "heirloom" piece (not that I have any heirs), I decided to create a more luxurious fringe by doubling the number of strands over that left by the warp alone. I've hemstitched by fours, so each cluster receives an additional pair cut from the thrums (loom waste) which is folded over to yield four more ends. The two sets of four are then twisted together and tied. Although I wasn't thinking about how I was going to finish the weaving at the time, I am thankful I had the foresight to purchase a fringe-twister tool before reaching this point in the project. That little gadget is worth its weight in gold. I cannot imagine how long it would take to finger-twist it! I'm almost a quarter of the way done, so there's hope.

Fringe Twister

Day 357: "Gadget," I said to myself when I first saw a fringe twister for sale. "I don't need another gadget." And then I sat down at the loom and wove another shawl, knit another scarf, made some cotton towels, and about halfway through the tedium of licking my fingers, picking up a pair of threads, spinning them 10-12 times, picking up a second pair while holding the first tightly, spinning those, and then allowing the two pairs to twist together, I would say, "Dang, I wish I had a fringe twister." Well, now I have one, and the process of making twisted fringe which would normally have taken half an hour took about five minutes. Sometimes gadgets move to the back of the closet in fairly short order, but sometimes they're good. The fringe twister is brilliant.

Mine has three clips. Some models only have two. Each clip is attached to a small metal crank, and each of those is anchored in a piece of wood with an offset handle. When you rotate the handle, the cranks go 'round on their axes, rotating the clips. Thus, each strand of yarn (or groups of threads) captured in a clip is twisted simultaneously with those caught in the other clips. The handle is rotated in the same direction as the twist of the yarn, and when the yarn is removed from the clips and knotted at the ends, the threads twist back on themselves to form a neat, even fringe. The operator only needs to count revolutions of the handle (20 in this case) to obtain a uniform fringe across the work. This model gives you the option of using two or three groups of threads (or singles). What a time-saver!