Repaired On The Fly

Day 173: A moment of utter panic occurred this morning when I went to wind my weaving project onto the cloth beam and couldn't get tension on the warp threads. The gear had seemed a bit loose to me as I was finishing up a table runner a few nights ago, but this morning, it just spun 'round and 'round. With warp for another six-foot runner still on the loom, I had no choice but to remove the bolt from the frame with the beam resting on a stack of books and a box. Much to my dismay, I discovered that the two wood screws holding the gear to the beam had stripped a groove in the wood to their full depth. I was able to effect a repair with longer screws, but having let down my work, I was worried that I wouldn't be able to get the tension even when I re-mounted the beam. Fortunately, the Weaving Gods smiled on my efforts and I'm now back in business. Once this project is finished, I'll replace the screws with even longer ones.

Cloth On The Beam

Day 93: It has been several days since I felt like sitting at the loom and I'm not there yet. I'm still running a fever, coughing, find it a great effort of both physical and mental strength to knit a whole row, and the only thing I feel like eating is homemade bread. Fortunately, I made two different kinds before this bug took hold of me. As a consequence of my lack of vitality, you may be getting some rather mundane photos and superficial descriptions until I recover. That said, I wish I felt like weaving. The table-runner project has been moving along much more quickly than anticipated. Here you see the finished cloth being wound onto the appropriately-named "cloth beam" at the front of the loom. I have one six-foot runner completed, and two feet on the second. I warped for three, and I hope to put one of them in the Washington State Fair this year along with some bobbin lace. I've never entered anything in Home Arts before.