Okay, so I wanted to start a new weaving, but I couldn't decide on a project to aim for, so I decided to just warp the Cricket with extra long threads, and just practice weaving to use up some of the yarns I had on hand to weave a long piece of fabric, which can be cut up into smaller projects if I want. That was my first mistake, but the biggest mistake was, being the inexperienced weaver that I am, I got the bright idea to thread each slot and each hole as I went, with DOUBLE threads.
I had never warped with more than one color before either. This time I decided to do the sides in yellow stripes with a large middle stripe of off white speckled. All yarn used in this project is Peaches & Crème 100% cotton 4-ply, medium weight, which I got at Wal-Mart. After counting out and marking how wide each stripe would be, I pulled the yellow DOUBLE threads about 8-9 feet across the living room to my warping pole, which was clamped to a second wooden tv tray. Yellow stripe left side, done. Got over half way across with the off white speckled and ran out of yarn. The cone was empty! :o
My eyes fell on a skein of plain white, so I tied that onto the speckled DOUBLE yarn and kept warping...til I ran out of white. :/ Oh, well, why not use the rest of the skein of hombre pink up while I'm at it, so I tied that onto the white and finished out the middle stripe.
But I get ahead of myself! Being a rank amateur at this, I did not think about the LONG lengths of DOUBLE yarns needing a support of some kind in the middle to keep them from sagging down from the weight, and about the time I started warping with the pink, it happened.
The warping pole, clamp, yarn, and all, came off the table and dumped all those yarn loops in a pile in the floor. I have to confess that I did talk a little ugly, and for a brief moment considered taking all the yarn off and starting from scratch on the warping, this time with SINGLE threads, but I was determined that it wasn't going to beat me. :{
I re-clamped the pole to the table, thought I got all the untangled warp loops back over it, not necessarily in the order they were in to start with (my thinking was that I was going to cut them off the pole later anyway), and continued the pink stripe to where the planned yellow stripe started, and then finished the yellow stripe on the right side. It's 15" across. I never experiment on small stuff. That would be too simple! :/
Finally, all the DOUBLE threads were pulled through and both TV trays were leaning inward from the yarn weight, but now I could start winding the warp onto the loom. I carefully lifted the warp loops off the pole and cut the loops in two, which I straightened out like a giant pony tail, tied a large overhand knot in the end for safe keeping and prepared to start rolling on to the back apron bar.
Winding the threads through the heddle was a whole other adventure in itself. The threads had gotten crossed and what not when they dumped on the floor, so I had to keep combing through them with my fingers to straighten them out enough to go through the slots and holes as I wound it onto the back apron bar for weaving. Trust me, it was not easy to keep all those DOUBLE threads winding over the paper winding over the apron bar either. :o
It took a while, but I finally got it all rolled on, and the ends separated and tied around the front apron bar. There was a pile of those to tie off too! But I got er done! Yay!
Then I sat in awe and looked at my whole evening's worth of work and wondered what ever possessed me, a beginner, to attempt such a thing as DOUBLE threads. But that was only the beginning of the adventure.
I now wish I had made pictures of the warping process, but at the time I didn't plan on sharing the details of my misadventures on this project.
To be continued...
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