Meet Jutta, My Leksand Loom

Day 179: Meet Jutta, my Leksand loom. None of my other looms are named, unless you count the Bonker, but this distinguished lady deserves more than to be called simply "the Leksand loom." I spent several years of my youth living in Ballard, Seattle's Scandinavian district, and I think that must be where I first heard the name. I loved the sound of it as it flowed from a Norwegian or Swedish mouth: "Iyuuutt-ta," a distinct pause separating the two t's, and a U formed deep in the back of the throat and so round you could roll it across a pool table. It stuck so firmly in my mind that I gave the name to a character in a fictional piece about park rangers, Jutta Arnestad coming into being in the storyline long before there was an Arnie in my life. In any event, before I retired last night, Jutta had been given her name, but we were still struggling a bit with her job performance. Like so many things I've learned over the years, I had to sleep on it to let everything Ed had taught me soak in. This morning's session produced a much better band. Jutta produces many of the same type of bands I weave on the bonker (not sure about krokbragd yet), but she arrives at the destination via a different route in the same way that weaving with two heddles and two pickup sticks on a rigid heddle loom can give you the same four sheds you'd open on a standard loom by operating treadles. The end result is the same, but the process is different. You'll be seeing more of Jutta as we become better acquainted, each of us learning the other's foibles.