Friday Roundup #1-20

Wow! So here we are back at post number one of the new year, 2020. And a big Happy New Year to you all. 2019 has flown by. Christmas feels like an age ago, now that all the decorations and bright twinkling lights are gone. I am holding on to my little fake tea lights for the hallway. I need to find some new tea light holders though, as some are too Christmassy. When they are on it just lifts that space without a big light needing to be on.

I finished my band weaving. My first attempt at this and I have to admit to being a little proud of the final result. It took a couple of attempts to get there, but here you go.

The section on the right is the reverse side. I think that had I pulled down on the green pattern threads I would have replicated the front side with the stronger definition of green blocks. One to try again to test that theory. Logic suggests it should mirror in this style because all of the pattern threads are either up or down (front or back). The instructions with the kit are on the light side. A bit like, “Here’s your heddle, all warped, this is what it looks like and away you go”.

The blue, white and green are what is called the background. If I didn’t do anything with the green pattern threads, the white cross shape is replicated along the band. Then the blue, yellow and red on the edge are the border warp threads.

I’ll have to provide something more detailed for you, with a picture of the heddle, to explain it better.

Needless to say, I have now become a little addicted to this. So much so, I went and purchased two more heddles; a 7 pattern Sunna and a 13 pattern Sunna. These mean I will be able to do more patterns and different widths.

On Tuesday I went and purchased this book about band weaving. Susan J Foulkes is recognised as a definitive voice on band weaving and has some great Youtube videos online. The book is really good. It explains the history and traditions of band weaving, plus Susan’s own journey. And it leads you through various steps of the weaving, hints and tips and contains over 100 patterns.

I went and purchased a graph paper notebook too. And got crazy busy as I would love to do a Celtic Knot pattern. This wasn’t in the book and is advanced. But you know me! Always take a leap ahead when I should be slow and steady. I found online, a picture of a band someone had woven and set myself the challenge of reading that and translating it back into a pattern. And here it is.

And because I am on my computer a lot for work, I set up a little workbook to make it much tidier and to write out the pick up pattern as numbered threads. I am just working on a little warp calculator to total up the length of yarn needed.

So you need to imagine that there would be a border to this and the resulting width of the band would be about 2 inches (nearly) I think. Toying with the colour choices. It might be blue background and white pattern. Or reversed. I presume the reverse side of the band will be the opposite colour to that in the front. We shall see. After I wrote up this pattern, I then found it as a pattern online. But hey, time not wasted as it is all learning.

So, now I await the arrival of my two new heddles and I shall have to look for some more practice yarn. As to the hat, it hasn’t been cold here, so I haven’t felt the urgency to finish. Maybe this weekend.

Eye test tomorrow. I am guessing some new lenses as I know my eyesight has changed since the last one I had done a year ago.

And there you go. All caught up. Have a great weekend.