2026 Christmas Towels

Equipment, Festivals, Outdoors, ParaTassels, Spinning, , , ,

With the bobbins all full the next step in the process is to transfer from the bobbin rack to the warp beam. On ‘Big Mac’ this is a sectional beam with 2″ sections which equates to 36 warp yarns. I clamp the bobbin rack to a heavy chair which does two things – keeps the rack from falling over and lifts it up to keep the yarn a little more centralized. I can then slide it along as I move from section to section to keep it lined up

From the bobbin rack the yarn goes through my Leclerc Tension Box (note the 3rd peg which pushes down on the yarn is not in place in this photo). I used to have one peg on the warp beam covered in blue tape and I’d use that to count the rotations. As you can imagine, one little lapse in concentration and I’d be out by a rotation (or two). This problem was solved by buying a small counter which relies on a sensor and a magnet. 100% accuracy now!

I couldn’t find my winding handle this morning so the alternative is a ring spanner. Once the required rotations are made the yarn is taped to itself temporarily, the yarn is cut, a knot is put in the end to be attached to a leader and the tension box is moved over to align with the next section and the whole process is repeated to fill 11 sections

Yesterday we had our Weaving Guild meeting and the presentation was on Hybrid Weaving or combining tablet weaving with loom weaving. I had been meaning to try this out at some stage so it was a natural to prepare some background information and have my loom all set up so I could actually demonstrate how it is done. I’m obviously no expert on this. There is however an expert in the form of Inge Dam, who lives in Canada and is the recognized expert on the technique. I had some short you tube videos of her work and also showed the others her web site gallery which has world class woven cloth and garments made from her work. The web site is https://ingedam.net/gallery/ and is well worth the visit. She appears to still offer 3 day workshops on this technique and other tablet weaving. She has also published a book ‘Tablet-woven Accents for Designer Fabrics’ Available from her web site or Amazon or The Woolery.

This sample was just a test and demo, I will have to re-sley the reed to get a proper sett for the twill loom woven portion. I’ll also add more warp to build it out to a table runner size.

After the guild meeting I set up with Phyllis to demonstrate at the local ‘Blessing of the Buffalo’ in Georgetown. I was spinning and Phyllis weaving. It’s held annually – this being the 17th. There was a good crowd turn up – the event is totally free and along with the entertainment there is the Cherokee Nation connection, vendors, informative displays, a vintage car line-up and free food. It’s hosted by Greg Vital (TN House Representative) on his Buffalo farm.

I managed to sell 6 towels and some para-tassels, so despite the bitter cold at the end of the day, it was a fun afternoon.

Moving Yarn

Equipment, Kumihimo, Looms, Weaving, , ,

For those readers now looking for some deep and meaningful story, alas it is not to be! This is the story of moving yards of yarn from one format to another.

It is October and time to start the 2026 Christmas towels. The structure this year will be my favorite huck lace diamond design, with a solid white warp and then using up my odds and ends of greens and reds – a striped weft. These will be woven on ‘Big Mac’ as I need the full 8 shafts for the pattern. I normally wind enough warp on the loom for 28 towels which give me enough for the family and friends gifts with, one or two left over. This year I am trying more warp so that I can weave the required number of Christmas towels and have some left for a dozen in other colors (perhaps spring, summer, or fall combo’s).

As I have a sectional beam on ‘Big Mac’ I first wind the required number of bobbins with enough yarn to fill the 11 sections needed for a starting width of 22″. This year I am using a 6/2 combed cotton for the warp instead of the normal 8/2 open ended. There’s a slight difference in the weight (as the number goes down the weight goes up, but it won’t be a significant difference). It could result in the ‘diamonds’ not being as symmetrical, but I can likely adjust tension and beat to compensate. Time will tell.

The yarn comes from the cone to the fishing line counter under finger tension to ensure the counter doesn’t slip. In this configuration it is counting down from 999, but as I am winding on 1000 feet it’s just a matter of winding until I hit 999 again. The yarn then travels 25 feet down to a peg and back to the bobbin I’m winding. This length is critical to allow the yarn to naturally go from side to side on the bobbin and thus wind evenly. It’s still sometimes a little uneven but not enough to be a problem.

This is the 36 bobbins full. That’s 6.82 miles of yarn moved from the cone. Next steps will be to wind the sectional beam – a future posting.

Other work during the weekend, which was going to wet right through with the remnants of hurricane Isaias passing to the west of us. We mostly had inside work planned because of that but Sunday afternoon all rain was gone so we did manage to get outside.

Before that though I worked on my small kumihimo bobbins (tama). I have to add some weight to each so that there will be a natural tension between them and the weight bag (Tsuri-omori) as I braid. This is all an experiment to see if I can produce these for the potential class in beaded kumihimo.

Initially I bore out the center hole to make space for as much lead as possible. I then hammer in lead air rifle pellets to fill the hole. Finally to tidy up the ends and add just a little more weight I glue a nickel on either end. I need a set of eight before I can try braiding.

Anne didn’t waste any time either. She wound and then braided her second beaded kumihimo necklace with very little input from me this time.

Her new one has the Ravens purple and gold braid along with white and gold beads.

And as mention we did get outside to gather some firewood from the forest. The dampness is not a problem as I just gather limbs off fallen dogwood or in a lot of cases standing dead dogwood that absorbs very little water for years.

A relatively quick burn before a nice soak before dinner.

And the final news from the Oak & Fern… I saw what is likely to have been our last hummingbird for the season. Our regular ‘flock’ of 10+ left a week or so back but yesterday there was a lone hummingbird at the feeder. Very likely from north of here and heading south like the rest. We keep feeders up for a few more weeks just in case.

Alternative (and very temporary) Studio

Kumihimo, Looms, Studio, Weaving

With the work on the studio stairs still underway all the looms are in ‘storage’ positions out of the way of the actual building. I have deadlines to meet on the next two projects so one solution was to move ‘Gypsy’, the HD 21 inch 4 shaft portable loom into the kitchen. The work I had to do was to re-sley the reed to see how my combined card weaving/floor loom would look on a 10 dent reed rather than the original 8 dent. The first test was at 8 dent and each group of 4 warp yarns has to go through the same dent in the reed. This spread it out a little too much so that the weft showed up in the finished sample. Typically you don’t see the weft in a card woven sample. The warp yarn easily moved around in the dent at 8 so I was confident that at 12 it would work and bring the warp yarn groups closer.

The re- sleying worked fine and then the tying on of both the card woven portion and then floor loom parts.

It has taken a while to get the tension and beat ‘right’ as while the card woven part in now better, the twill weave on the floor loom sections is now a completely different sett. It was 2 ends per dent in the first example (16 epi) and is now 1 end per dent (10 epi). It requires just ‘placing’ the weft rather than an actual beat.

I’ve ended up with the card weaving upside down, hence the second photo of the underneath of the woven portion!!

I’ll carry on weaving this now so I have plenty to be seen at the guild meeting in October where I am going to show everyone how it is done.

In a typical ‘the best laid plans of…’ fashion yesterday we set off into the forest to gather some firewood to heat the hot tub. We’d not gone more that a couple of hundred yards when the definite sound of heavy rain on trees could be heard approaching from the west. We turned around and barely made it back to the house before a heavy deluge started and along with some thunder, continued through until lunch time. Out backup indoor plan was to start teaching Anne how to do beaded kumihimo ahead of the May 2027 Birchwood Fiber Festival ( https://birchwoodfiberfestival.com/ ) where she will likely be assisting in a class teaching students this technique. We had to time how long various aspects of the process would take so that we could see if it was going to be at all possible in a 2-3 hour session.

First step was to wind yarn (20/2 unmercerised cotton) into groups of 6 and attach them onto the tamas (bobbins). With that done we then had to put the required beads onto each strand.

That all went smoothly and we attached the 8 tamas to the marudai ready for braiding. I used mine and Anne used the marudai I had made as a test. The idea was to be able to demonstrate the actual techniques without having to swap places on the one marudai. We braided 1/3 plain braid then 1/3 with beads and then 1/3 plain again. The basic plan for a class is we would have everything up to almost the end of the first 1/3. Everything would be set up and ready to go from then so the new student only needed to learn the basic braiding moves then braiding with beads then finish off the last portion. Seeing this was a first time for Anne we timed her as our ‘test case’ Sadly she is a very quick learner and once started was almost as fast as me and she didn’t make any mistakes (like I did, requiring an un-braid, re-braid to fix putting two instead of one bead on one turn!!). It still showed that our basic plan still seems sound.

We have noted any improvements to be made and I’ve ordered the clasps to make these into necklaces or if the plain braid is cut shorter; bracelets. Once we cut them off and finish them I’ll drop the pictures into a future post.

We can now return the ‘craft’ table to normal kitchen table work, and now the loom is up and running move that back to the studio. We’ll have a kitchen again.

A brief break

Spinning, Studio

Anne’s sister and her hubby have a mountain home on Lookout Mountain, Georgia. They spend time there and also at their home in Atlanta. We visit (both places) often as either are about and hour and three quarters travel on easy back roads – minimum motorways. Anyway Anne had a couple of days off so we packed up and drove up to the mountain. As usual we took a lot of food – more than we’d need!!

We arrived early afternoon and despite the weather had been cloudy on the way there, once we arrived at the top of the mountain it cleared to blue skies and puffy clouds. Perfect weather to move out onto the deck for some relaxing with the view. Anne and Sue worked on a jigsaw puzzle, Jack read and I continues to spin on my Rappard wheel.

The fiber is a bit of mystery. It was sent to me as a gift by a customer of R&M Yarns. https://rmyarns.com/ He weaves rugs made from sock loopers (it’s the part of the sock that is trimmed off as they are sewn together and was often thrown away) and would take natural colored sock loopers, ice dye them and weave the rugs which he said flew off the shelves. As it turns out a lot of the sock making industry moved off-shore and those that remained updated their processes which pretty well ended the supply of sock-loopers. We did however have a couple of hundred pound of them from a much earlier purchase by the owner. He was very pleased to find the new supply and eventually bought all of our natural colored ones. There was much too-ing and fro-ing in the process and he obviously appreciated it as he asked me if I would like some qiviut fiber to spin so I said yes, having heard of it before but as it is extremely expensive, I had yet to try it.

It eventually arrived and I was very surprised at the amount – a whole pound, which at current rates could be worth more than $800. So that is one part of the mystery. Another is that it is natural white, which for qiviut is very rare as it is normally light through dark brown Qiviut is the soft under fiber from the Arctic muskox and while it can be farmed it is more normally gathered from where it is found after it naturally falls off in spring (hence the high price). I can really only find out if it is qiviut if I can see, on a microscope, if the fiber is hollow. The staple length is short so that does match. Anyway it is fiber and I’m spinning it in very fine singles to eventually make 3-ply. Once I have some I will put out a blog entry on it and hopefully by then I’ll have identified it properly.

Back at the mountain we eventually moved to dinner: spare ribs, roast veggies from our garden, coleslaw and cheese garlic biscuits. After clean up we set up the fire pit on the lower level of the property – still looking out over Alabama.

It was a great sunset and as the clouds cleared we sat and spotted satellites in the night sky.

After that it was back inside to play a game of Farkle (Sue won) followed by an old episode of Midsomer Murders before bed.

As is typical with these visits we started the day with coffee in the hot tub (yes it too has a $1M view) before a hearty breakfast and for us a slow pack up. Jack and Sue are staying on for another couple of nights.

We returned home to the valley and continued work on the studio stairs. These are the stairs up from the studio to the spinning loft, library mezzanine, and the ‘Fairly Large Room’ – our second lounge which is the room above the garage.

Various shots of the stairs – the step parts are finished, I can now put the outer railing back on and then to the top step and landing finishing. They will finally look like stairs (after 3 years of open treads).

Making A Marudai

Kumihimo, , ,

In previous blogs I have written of my move to kumihimo on a marudai and also the further refinement (for Anne) of producing beaded kumihimo as a possible class to teach at the next Birchwood Fiber Festival (https://birchwoodfiberfestival.com/).

One aspect of this was to see if I could actually build a marudai with just rudimentary woodworking tools (I don’t have a lathe). So to make things easy I went straight to Hobby Lobby and bought a couple of ‘clock faces’ – the raw start for someone wanting to produce hand painted or other decorative faces along with the appropriate clock parts and cases. I only needed a round, and an oblong to start with. While these are very minimally finished white pine, they were enough for a trial. Along with some poplar dowels from Lowes, where Anne works I got to work.

Certainly not the good looking wood grain of my NZ marudai, but much easier to work with and structurally the same. Smaller in size, but this was designed for just the purpose of testing out beaded kumihimo. The next job was to start shaping the mirror (the top circular part).

The mirror also has a concave shape surrounding the center hole, all part of the overall ability to balance the center weight, the outer tamas (bobbins and yarn) with the friction as it passes over the outside edge and is made into the braid and is pulled down the central hole.

With the shaping done the whole thing was sanded through various grades of sandpaper up to 220 then multiple coats of varnish to give it a more resistant to abrasion finish. This won’t be a problem in future versions which will use a harder wood. It was just that I didn’t want to go buying expensive wood shapes only to find it didn’t work!

The only thing after this was to test it with some braiding.

The test without beads and then this one all worked out fine so I have reasonable confidence that I can put together workable marudais. If we go ahead with the class – not me, but Anne and Carla who is another local fiber artist and has already produced beaded kumihimo for sale – there will be an option for students to buy a marudai and tama set if they want, at the end of the course. For the weighted tamas I bought a whole lot of small wooden yarn bobbins and have experimented with drilling the center hole larger and then hammering lead shot into the hole and sealing the ends. The combined weight of yarn and bobbins (8 typically) is balanced with the weight of the bag that is attached to the end of the braid and pulls it down through the hole (another blog entry for that – but so far seems like it too will work).

Baby Blanket project + (updated)

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Anne’s niece has recently had her second child, so I am racing to get this project finished and mailed. I’m following a design which I have made before. It used 4 colors of Vintage DK which I get from Yarn Barn of Kansas. Anne chose the colors which arrived quickly.

The skeins were converted to center fed balls prior to warping. I chose the color order of the stripes.

There are three repeats of these stripes in the blanket. With the same sequence in the weft for a checkerboard mix of colors. It also has a fringe all the way around the outside.

I’m weaving on ‘Big Mac’ which is another reason I am hurrying. I’ll need this loom for the 2026 Christmas towels. I have all the yarn for them but need this loom as it has the required 8 shafts.

Also underway was some further work on the hot tub. I know it’s not strictly fiber related, but as the hot tub is right behind the studio/workshop I can load up the fire then back in to the studio work so the jobs work in parallel. I have just made an improvement to the tub by adding some insulation around the outside. The last major upgrade was to put insulation underneath which helped with heat retention. The extra outside insulation has cut the amount of heat in half which means quicker re-heat and use further in to winter. Sadly is does take away the ‘wood’ look, but we can live with that.

Left to right is; the heat exchanger, the new insulation fitted, and the old look.

The blanket is now finished. Weaving was completed in a day, then once off the loom the fringes had to be trimmed up to be uniform (mostly) then each group of 4 was twisted and knotted. Finally it went through a gentle cycle in the washing machine and dried flat.

Spinning Wheel Repair

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I was at work a little while back and received a call from a guy who wanted to know if I/we (the store) knew anyone who might be able to repair a spinning wheel!! Well, I was able to say, that’s exactly what I do. Not as part of my work at R&M Yarns, but as part of the Oak & Fern package of services. He said he would be able to bring it to me at work to look at, but he did also say that he was guilty of the damage as he had somehow dropped the wheel.

Very shortly thereafter he turned up with the wheel in the back of the car which we quickly brought in for a quick look. It was a Kromski Prelude, a very popular small saxony wheel, great for beginners and established spinners who don’t have the room for larger wheels. It had definitely been dropped! It was mostly in pieces, but I was able to re-assemble it into a spinning wheel shaped thing.

This is how it was dropped off to me – in bits and there was definitely evidence of a drop. There were some minor breakages and as it turned out once I really started to look into it, some missing parts. The wood was very dry, so throughout the project as I cleaned I applied Howard’s Feed and Wax wherever needed. The major ‘restoration’ was where the mounts for the main wheel bearing had been broken, presumably in the accident. I told the guy who brought it in (it was his wife’s wheel) that I wouldn’t be aiming for restoring it to pristine original which would have meant finding original parts or making replacements. I would instead make functional parts that would restore the original operation but not look like original. He was happy with that.

Another part that slowed me down was a missing main bearing shim on one side. Luckily I could measure from the original and order some some brass tubing with the correct inner and outer dimensions.

The left photo is of the main bearing with the replacement shim and the small wooden part that now holds it in place which replaces the broken original . The right photo is the first re-assembly of the wheel with everything cleaned and most repairs done.

Once everything was back together there was a need to actually test it. As it didn’t have a bobbin on the flyer I had to make do with using one of my own bobbins that was a close fit. The owner had bobbins for the wheel, but they didn’t come with it to me. With some adjustments to get the tensions etc correct I was able to spin some fiber.

A mini 2 ply skein hung on a flyer hook. A few of the flyer hooks had suffered and had to be re-bent and aligned properly. At this stage the job was pretty well done.

The wheel all restored to working, clean, new drive band and to the right – the payment. And on a comic note – I rang the guy to say the wheel was ready, and he was working that day (he’s a para-medic) so came to the store pretty well straight away. Took the wheel and paid me. What’s funny though – the neighbor across the road who has known my boss for many years called her to ask if ‘they guy’ who works in her store was all right as he’d just seen an ambulance pull up then quickly head away! That notwithstanding, hopefully the husband is now back in good standing as his wife can now continue with her spinning hobby on a very nice ‘small’ wheel that will now last for many years to come.

Kumihimo

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I was given (free to a good home/owner who would use it) a complete kumihimo set up some time back and have been using it sporadically when I have time. After some quick tests I started focusing on making shoe laces.

So, some background, kumihimo is Japanese braiding and goes back centuries. Used on Samurai armor and high end kimonos and everything in between. Traditionally braiding is carried out on a marudai which is a small table type thing with a round top with a hole in it on a larger base. In Japan you would likely kneel on the ground to braid, but old age and arthritic knees mean I stand and raise the marudai!

Braids would most often be done in silk with the number of strands for each tama (bobbin) and the length all being part of the initial calculations. Good record keeping is essential if you need to repeat! I have been using a cheaper option than silk, with 20/2 pearl cotton at 6 to 8 strands per tama depending how thick the eventual lace needs to be. Several books came with the equipment and all but one being by Jacqui Carey are the best to be had. The one booklet that is not hers I have since found out came with the Majacraft marudai and tama sets and is by a well known, but sadly no longer with us NZ expert on kumihimo.

This picture shows the marudai, tama, booklet, and the box (with the Majacraft logo) for the tama of which there are two should you need to go beyond 8 strand braids. I haven’t yet! Majacraft no longer sell these items, but I did touch base with them and they confirmed that this was indeed manufactured in NZ and was most likely made of NZ rimu.

The first laces I made were for my ‘work’ shoes and served a dual purpose as well as being unique. Since I have demonstrated and talked about kumihimo braiding I can show my shoes with laces and tell them that they were ‘Christmas’ laces (red/green) but also from my Navy history they are ‘Port’ and ‘Starbord’ so that I know which shoe to put on which foot!!

We’ve made many pairs for gifts and experimented with putting the laces in a custom sewn cloth drawstring bag. The following were laces in the ‘Red, White, and Blue’ series done around the 4th of July then packaged up for birthday gifts for Jack and Sue.

When I started braiding it was taking a number of days to complete a set. Since then, and with some strategies in place I can make a set of laces in just one day. Nowhere near any sort of return for the amount of work, but I think I can happily sell them at a price that should be attractive to festival buyers. If there is any interest I’ll aim at making some laces for sale on line, as they’re small enough to be posted relatively cheaply, notwithstanding the every increasing cost of shipping here in the US.

As I continue with my laces, Anne is going to develop a more specialized product in beaded kumihimo (see an earlier blog). We have a large collection of yarn and there are an enormous amount of variations of braids (at the level I can braid – a newbie) that will work as laces. I’ll post more photo’s periodically as new laces appear.

Tennessee Valley Fair

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Anne and I jumped into the car and headed north to visit the fair. Not to take rides or eat hot dogs, but to demonstrate along with other members of the Tennessee Valley Handspinners Guild https://tnvalleyhandspinners.org/ A member of the guild has been a long time attendee, as she raised her kids and her farm animals in particular sheep. It’s been two years since the last group demonstrated there – I’ve done it numerous times so when the chance came up we took it.

The organizer of the group know we drive from Old Fort to Knoxville so just has us there for a couple of hours after lunch which gives plenty of time to soak up the sights and sounds of the sheep pavilion or in Anne’s case further afield to check out some of the animals and food options.

Just one of the lineups with very enthusiastic kids and remarkably well behaved sheep. Needless to say these animals have received VERY special attention for the show. No quick shearing with a couple of cuts and tufts resulting.

The winning fleece.

We headed out to a local Knoxville brew pub for lunch and then headed south for home – with some traffic delays and quite a bit of rain. The latter we hoped also occurred in Old Fort, but sadly the drought continues. If there was any it was not even enough to settle the dust and nothing really forecast for another week. The gardens are surviving but only because we water them daily or more.

Podcast Episode: Spinning Wheel Milestones

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Pip: Spinning wheels, rare island sheep, and jam with bourbon pickles — kiwiweave’s corner of the internet contains multitudes.

Mara: This episode covers two territories: a wheel upgrade that solved a bobbin-size problem years in the making, and the completion of a two-year spinning project built around some genuinely unusual wool.

Pip: Let’s start with the wheel itself, and why the bobbins were the bottleneck.

Wheel Upgrades And Bobbin Limits

Mara: Older spinning wheels have a ceiling on how much yarn fits on a single bobbin — and for wheels like the Ashford Traditional, that ceiling sits around two ounces, well short of the five-plus-ounce skeins common in handspun work.

Pip: The fix was a drop-in replacement: “The solution was to order an Ashford Sliding Hook Flyer, which just drops in neatly in place of my original flyer.”

Mara: What that gets in practice is the ability to ply two fully loaded original bobbins onto the new one and produce a five-ounce skein — without buying a fleet of large bobbins.

Pip: Though the flyer that arrived had its hooks oriented the wrong way, a legacy of pre-2015 production stock sitting in a warehouse. Ashford and the retailer both sorted it quickly — but a newer spinner might never have figured out why the bobbin wouldn’t fill.

Mara: Worth noting: the post also shares a side from the Oak and Fern garden — blueberry jam in two varieties and bourbon okra pickles. Fiber and preserves, same afternoon.

Pip: The bobbin problem and the jam problem both required patience. One of them is more delicious. Onto the yarn that took two years.

Long-Term Spinning Project Finished

Mara: The post titled “Huge Milestone” opens a story that spans two years, two continents, and one very unusual sheep: the North Ronaldsay, whose flock grazes almost entirely on seaweed along the shore of a small Scottish island.

Pip: The wool arrived as a gift — brought back from a cruise around the north of the UK — and it sat waiting for a plan worthy of it.

Mara: The plan came together at a guild stash-buster sale: “Anne and I had just bought some fiber at a guild stash buster sale. It is a Merino/Targhee blend roving in natural white and was 2.2lbs in total. The cost on the original docket was $80 and we paid $20.”

Pip: So the North Ronaldsay skein becomes accent stripes, and 2.2 pounds of bargain Merino-Targhee becomes the body — two woven shawls, one for Anne, one for the sister-in-law who brought the wool home in the first place.

Mara: The spinning was done mostly at Tennessee Valley Handspinners Guild meetings and festivals rather than at home — which explains the two-year timeline. The resulting skeins run mostly two ounces, with some larger ones produced after the new flyer upgrade came into play mid-project.

Pip: There’s still red highlight yarn to spin, and a small sample already woven to confirm the sett for a point twill. The loom stage, as the post puts it, is the much quicker part.

Mara: Two years of spinning to set up what might be a few weeks of weaving. That ratio is either humbling or motivating depending on your disposition.

Pip: Probably both, at the same time, on a Tuesday at guild.

Mara: A bobbin limit solved, a two-year project finally off the wheel — the loom is next.