Introducing Hale Akala

Here is a short video after beaming Hale Akala (Hawaiian for house of the sun)

Once beamed, the threading begins.  From there, it's sley the reed and start the weaving!  This is the first warp we have done that is totally Brassard yarns.  The beaming went beautifully and the threading is going very quickly.  I'm looking forward to weaving this warp and trying a couple of different color wefts to show off the gradient.
The name Hale Akala mean house of the sun in Hawaiian and is pronounced "holly ah kah la".  It was named by our customer who lives in Hawaii and provided this photo as the inspiraiton for the wrap

I could stare at this photo all day and dream about how warm and lovely it must be in Hawaii right in this photo.  Certainly beats the 12" of snow we got this week.  Hmmm.

It's a blessing!

I enjoy weaving baby wraps and feel lucky we have a waiting list of mamas who want custom wraps from Lotsaknots.  We have worked out our own little "production line".  Janet, who has an amazing innate sense for color, does the initial design and works on a mock up of the wrap.  The mama chooses a photo or picture for inspiration and Janet works with her on the warp design.  Here is an example of a mock up and the final wrap.

Janet winds the warp and together we beam it onto the loom.  

I take over and thread the warp, weave a sample and consult with the mama on the weft color.  I do the weaving and the finishing.  Janet jumps in at the end to correct any weaving errors such as a skipped thread, and I do the wet finishing and ironing.  We have it worked out and it's going well.

I was recently asked to add blessing threads to the wrap that is currently on the loom.  It's the sister wrap to the Wizard of Oz Competition of Weavers wrap.  This one is called "Follow the Yellow Brick Road".  Here's a video of the wrap and the blessing threads.

See you soon,

Claudia and Janet

The Lotsaknots Team

It's a threesome!

In my last post, I removed three baby wraps from the loom.  It took a couple of weeks to complete the repairs, sew the hems, wet finish, iron and repair again all three baby wraps.  Two wraps were 3.7 meters long and one was 3.4 meters.  We go over each one very carefully, several times to be sure we find and repair all weft skips or weft threads that erred in the path from one side of the wrap to the other.  It's tedious, time consuming work.  But our wraps do not leave here until they are as perfect as possible.

Well, the Sedona/Solace triplets were boxed and sent to their homes yesterday.  Here is a short video of one of the completed wraps.

In addition, we entered a Facebook Competition of Weavers where everyone wove a wrap inspired by the Wizard of Oz movie.  We chose to make a fibonacci sequence representing Dorothy's trip along the Yellow Brick Road to the Emerald City.  Janet wound the warp while I was busy weaving the previous 3 wraps.  We beamed Yellow Brick Road and I finished weaving the day before the wrap was due.  Thirty three people entered the competition in the fall and we were 1 of 11 who completed their wrap in time for the anonymous judging on the Loom to Wrap page on Facebook.

Here's the completed Follow the Yellow Brick Road:

 We've been pretty busy and now the loom is prepared with the sister wrap to Yellow Brick Road and Janet is winding the next custom wrap.  I'll be posting about that one as it goes on the loom.''We have a new system for beaming the warp and it's working much better.  Ten years of weaving and I'm still learning!!

They are done!

It's an exciting day in the Lotsaknots Studio as I removed the baby wraps that once were warp strings on my loom.

  Here is the mock up for the warp called Sedona.  The first wrap was named Solace by the mama who ordered it.  All the wraps on this warp were inspired by a painting we saw in Sedona, Arizona when traveling in late fall 2013.  Here's the original inspiration.

and here's the video of the wraps coming off the loom.  

 Wait until you see what's next!  Ir's a big surprise and I won't be able to reveal anything until after January 17th.  Stay tuned, we'll publish a few hints.

Happy weaving!

Farewell to Julia

Over a year ago I purchased a weaving kit, something I rarely do, for a Bronson lace shawl made with alpaca/silk.  It was a good deal from Yarn Barn of Kansas.  The yarn was on the expensive side and the draft was easy enough.  I made it for my best friend.  I should say I cursed, struggled and pulled my hair out over that shawl.  It was my second 8 shaft project on the Julia.  The first, a simple twill bread cloth, was not a success.  I adjusted the 8 shafts, lamms and treadles on my Julia countermarch loom an easy dozen times before I finished that shawl.  It's a beautiful piece.  I'd love to make another one but not on that loom.  Julia and I are parting ways.

After I finished the shawl, I took 4 shafts off the Julia and wove several other items successfully.  I concluded that Julia and I do not work together in 8 shafts.  After a while I began thinking, how ridiculous.  I bought an 8 shaft loom.  I want to weave 8 shaft patterns.  The only conclusion I came to was that I needed to sell the Julia and buy a different loom.

So, after several months and several postings on weaving sales sites, Julia is heading to a new home.  I hope you enjoyed my little video tribute to Julia.

Next week I'll return with some big baby wrap news!

Merry Christmas to all!!

A view of the Lotsaknots Studio

For the past few weeks I have focused on the long warp on the Glimakra Standard that will be 4 baby wraps.  There is a lot more going on in the studio.  I've put together a quick video tour of the some  other projects.

The warps are all designed and wound by Janet who has a fabulous eye for color.  The Sedona wraps that are currently on the big loom was designed by Janet using a painting of Sedona, AZ.  We were visiting Sedona in September and walked into an art and sculpture gallery where they featured the painting Janet used for this warp.  She is very talented and has a great feel for color which can be seen in this and all the warps we produce.

BTW, Janet is the other half of Lotsaknots.  She is a knitter, spinner and occasional weaver.

Enjoy the video:

This warp is featured in our Etsy shop.
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Trials and tribulations?

Well, it's been a trial, not sure about the tribulations part.  I was making great progress weaving plain weave in the first wrap of 4.  The warp was beamed and the weaving begun.  I wove the middle marker, a brief section of twill patterning, and headed down the road of the second half of the first wrap.  I keep repeating myself because each wrap requires close to 170" or close to 5 yards, 15 feet of weaving plain weave.  It's the easiest weave structure to weave and the least forgiving if you make an error.

You know where this story is leading.  I hit a poorly tensioned section of warp and the weaving went totally wonky.  I thought just a few threads were off and discovered that several individual threads throughout the warp were tensioned poorly.  They probably got hung up in the reed for a second or two during the beaming process as I wound the warp onto the back beam.  That's all it took.  Just a few seconds and that one thread had less tension than it's neighbor.  Creates huge problems when you are weaving.  You're thinking, okay, a bump in the road.  Think 3 foot deep pot hole you cannot avoid and each tire falls in one at a time.  Jolting to the whole system.

I corrected the errors I could find and continued weaving.   I noticed a few skipped threads and unwove.  Then, continued weaving.  I wove a few more inches and noticed several different threads that skipped over several rows.  So, I unwove again.  You get the idea.

By shear determination and some skill, I completed the first wrap.  Okay.  Tension issues behind me.  I wound part of the warp forward to correct some of the errors and re-tension the next section of warp.  Wound it back onto the back beam and continued.

Here is a brief video clip of my progress, if you can call it that.

The weaving continues forward for now.  I'll keep you posted as I weave on.