A loom of another color..

Some pictures of my weekend activities:

This is my tablet weaving loom, all warped up.



My dad made the loom for me for Christmas. I had put one of Herveus's looms on my Wish List and, being dad, he said "I can make that" and he did. I've never seen one of Herveus's looms in person, so I don't know how close mine is to one of Herveus's, but in looking at the photos, they're pretty close.

And here it is after working a band for a few feet..



You can see a little better in this show how it all works - but it's a pretty simple design - as you work the band, the roller at the front takes up the finished work and the unworked warp is spooled off the back roller. The two racheted wheels allow you to keep the tension even as you progress through the piece. I must say, I really love this loom. It really makes it much easier to work on a band than an inkle loom. It's so contained and neat and portable and I can work on it in my lap, which means I should be able to work on it in the car.

.. and here's a closer shot of the band pattern.



It's just a simple woven in pattern. I turn the cards one direction until the twist build up is too much and then I reverse and turn the cards in the other direction. The photo above shows a point where I switched turning direction. The little bit of pink showing is the weft - in tablet weaving the weft almost never shows, but when you switch turning directions you create longer floats that don't hide the weft as well.

Once I'm through with this band, I have plans to warp up a much narrower band in some 60/2 silk I have from Handweaver's Studio. I have a few colors and haven't decided yet which ones I want to work with, or what pattern I want to use, but since there's still quite a bit of warp left on this one, I have some time to figure that out.

And while I'm posting pictures, here's one of the arm warmers I'm making, in progress. I've started to divide for the thumb and will work a pattern repeat back-and-forth and then rejoin for one more half repeat and then do a few rows of the twisted rib to finish it off.



And tonight is Rogue Monday, but I'm not sure I'm motivated to drag out the charts (I have the embossed leaves pattern for the armwarmers memorized, so it's close to mindless at this point). We'll see. If I do, I'll post pictures tomorrow.