My first rigid heddle weaving project.

I mentioned a while ago that I was taking Weaving 1 at The Yarn Tree. It was 10 weeks of how to set up and weave on a rigid heddle loom. The store owner and weaving teacher, Linda LaBelle, uses the Kromski Harp for her classes. She loans you the loom so you don't have to purchase anything. I already had a loom because last year I had acquired a used 24" Kromski Harp Loom from Craig's List. It sat around under a pile of yarn and fiber until this year, April 2010. I finally took the plunge and signed up for the 10 week class. I can tell you that I do not regret it.

We made a sampler using acrylic yarn. She taught us weaving patterns and techniques for 4 weeks. It was a lot of fun just to practice and not worry about the finished product. After the 4 weeks, we began our final project. For the final project, it was going to be a scarf. After learning that I spin, she suggested I used my own handspun yarn.

This beautiful roving is Pigeonroof Studios Extra Fine Merino. I think it took me over 6 months to finish it. But only because I wasn't actively working on it. When I knew that I was going to be using it for my final project, I sat down and cranked it out. It was totally worth it because the finished yarn was amazingly soft and springy. And I adore that deep red color.I ended up with 2 skeins of a different gauge yarn. Totally my fault since I let too much time lapse in between working on it. I started spinning it thicker when I decided to finish spinning it because I couldn't remember how fine I was spinning it. The earlier spinning was very fine. Luckily for me, my teacher said that gauge didn't really matter with weaving and I could still use both.
She had everyone use the same yarn for the weft. It's called Tussah Fleck and it's a beautiful natural color silk. It's great to work with because it's super strong. There was no worries about it breaking. It's also amazing that all the students used the same warp, but we all ended up with different scarves. She let us bring in any yarn we wanted for the weft. The Tussah Fleck is neutral enough to go with any color. I plan on using it for future projects when I get a chance.Look at the final scarf! I love it so much. After a soak in Eucalan Wash, it bloomed beautifully.I used a combination of techniques I learned on this scarf: Leno, Warp Face, Weft Face, and added Weft Protector (aka hem stitch) for some texture. For the fringe, it’s a twisted fringe.We were encouraged to not follow a pattern. Just do what we wanted at any point of the scarf. For me, that was hard. Though I did the best that I could to free myself up from being rigid. The great thing about the yarn is that it did a lot of the work for me. I chain plied (aka navajo-plied) it so the colors would stripe like that. I love it!

It took me a week to complete this scarf. Which was 3 weeks earlier than I was suppose to . Um yeah, I think the other students wanted to throw their shuttle sticks at me when I came into class with a finished scarf. So what's a girl to do? I started and finished 2 more scarves before the last class! The last class was about fringe techniques.

I will be starting Weaving 2 this weekend and I am very excited about it. The whole 10 weeks will be dedicated to working through the book, Textures and Patterns for the Rigid Heddle Loom by Betty Davenport, from the first page to the last. There will not be a final project for this class because it's technique based. But I can only imagine the the textures and patterns I will be able to apply to my weaving when the class is done.

Stayed tune for my other woven scarves and other fun things I have planned. There will be 2 book reviews and giveaways coming up soon.