Great Towel Warp of 2012

There are things in life that I'm afraid to try for fear of failure. 

Oddly, when I sat down to weave for the first time, I did not have that fear. I approached it with a general attitude of "Eh. It will work, or it won't. Let's try." And so far, with the exception of one project, that attitude has maintained throughout my weaving education.

Its something Erin and I continue to giggle at. She is very structured - I am not. We both absorb a little of the other's attitude; I'm a little more structured and picky, she's a little more "who cares."
I love how we've both slid to a more centered view of life and fiber-art. Its lovely to find that friend that helps to balance you out.

After Thanksgiving, I came home from the holiday and wound a 12 yard warp - known in my mind as "the epic warp" - of 8/2 cotton and started making towels.

This is the same project that required about 2 million string heddles because I'm an idiot and didn't count heddles.  (PS: I'm now an EXPERT at string heddles.)

It became 1/2 overshot towels and 1/2 waffle weave towels - the unintentional split was due to my boredom and frustration. I think I have a 6 yard limit per project.



This is the first 1/2 of the towels before I rethreaded for waffle weave. Erin was kind enough to snap a photo after I did my "OMG I MADE FABRIC" dance of dorky joy. I had lots of fun playing with colors and learning overshot. There's also a towel in there that is cotton and linen weft, which I'm sorely tempted to keep for myself because its just yummy.

The remaining yardage of warp was used for Waffle Weave towels.



The red white and blue towel and the yellow towel became x-mas gifts for mom. My sister received a Red/Black overshot towel and a white/Black overshot towel, while my brother in law received the butt-ugly blue/orange overshot towel in honor of his beloved Miami Dolphins.

Nothing against the Dolphins specifically, however after weaving that atrocious towel in those particular colors, I am a firm believer that a design consultant should be hired by the NFL before team colors are selected. 


So that's the great towel warp of 2012 and how it ended up.

All towels got finished. The warp got used - every bit of the 12 yards!

The remaining woven Xmas Gifts need more pictures before they should be mentioned in a blog. So pics and details to follow.

I'm so pleased with the towels. They are not error free. They are not perfect by any means. There are "oopsies" in each one. But I'm still proud of them. One towel contains some of my handspun cotton. The rest are fun colorful experiments of "this yarn looks good with that yarn." And they all are just plain neat.

Weaving is not 'hard' in that I do not feel I need a degree in applied physics to attempt it. But it is entirely different from spinning. Or knitting. Or crocheting. Or any of the other arts I've tried. Without Erin's patient help -and copious reference library and book addiction - I would have given up and walked away.

I'm glad Erin stuck it out with me. I'm glad I powered through the 12 yard warp. I'm glad I had several hand made gifts to give this year. And I'm really glad I didn't approaching weaving with a fear of failure. :)