I carefully took the puckery binding off that blanket, then lot the problem move around in my brain for a bit.
DOH! I had this problem before, and solved it, and blogged about it! All I had to do was go find that blog post and see how I did it.
Although I did use tissue paper underneath, I think the primary problem solver was pulling that binding really tight as I sewed. I opted for no pinning except at the very beginning ‘cuz I couldn’t figure out how I did that before. I went slow and it looks great. I didn’t take a photo so you’ll just have to trust me.
That’s the good news.
As planned, I started weaving YF’s baby wrap today, using the periwinkle cotton she chose for her weft. The difference between this and HR’s iris tencel is dramatic. (Sure do wish the color wasn’t so wrong, and that I could figure out why it was sometimes right so I could do that again.)
Let me back up just a moment…I’ve had to revert to the loom’s braking system instead of the live weight system for this warp. An email conversation with Kati Meek convinced me that I needed to do some tweaking, and it would be easiest for me to wait until this warp is off the loom to do that.
Things were going very smoothly weaving YF’s wrap. I got just over 40″ woven and needed to advance the warp again. As usual, I took the tension off the warp then stepped on the brake release. All of a sudden my back beam spun like the Tasmanian devil.
The weight of the bamboo blinds created a momentum that my brain and foot couldn’t react to quickly enough. It unwound at least 8 feet in about 2 seconds before I could stop it.
CRAP!! Now what?
Just walk away, I thought. But I could only stay away for a minute. I needed to act. But what? How? Where to start?
First I had to get those blinds that unwound off the floor, untangled from loose threads, and out of the way. Not as easy as I’d have liked it to be.
Walk away again, this time for about 5 minutes. I had a plan. Instead of working from the back beam, I’d work from the front. Slowly & carefully I wound the warp onto the cloth beam, using one of the bamboo blinds for packing when I got past the woven cloth. I broke a few threads in the process, but no big deal.
Once I had the warp wound up to the point where it was tensioned again, I slowly & carefully released several inches from the front beam and wound it on the back beam. I did this over and over till I had the warp back to where it was.
Once I’ve fixed the broken warp threads, I hope I don’t have other problems. I’ll admit I’m fearful. I knew I had to let it all sit till tomorrow, don’t try anything more tonight. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes.
P.S. I’m done with the bamboo blind packing for now. This was the icing on the cake. I’d already decided to revert to paper packing for future baby wraps so I can use the live weight system successfully. This was a good experiment/experience, and I learned what I need to, for now at least. In weaving there are ALWAYS more things to learn. That’s one of the reasons I love it!
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