Finished blanket

Well sorry I've not written to you for a while. Busy weaving, you see. The Brighton honeycomb blanket felted up nice and thick, although its waffle structure isn't very obvious. It got a lot smaller after the fulling but it is big enough to cover a single bed - here it is hanging over a door, to give an idea of the size. Mistakes became less glaring after the finishing, too, thank goodness. The plaits along the top and bottom edges took ages to make - thank goodness for a boring job where no one wants to know what you're doing! (I jest of course, kind employer).

Amazing success

I thought I had taken on more than I could manage and that this was doomed, but it seems to be going fantastically well.

After a lot of trouble - the putting onto the loom has taken at least two weeks (of course that was in the bits of time that were spare when not at work, doing household chores etc) - the weaving is finally underway.

The challenge was that this is 50" wide on the loom at 16 ends per inch (800 ends). The wool warp is about 108" long if I remember correctly, wound alternately blue then green two threads at a time in four batches. It is on eight shafts, but a straight 12345678 threading. It has a purple wool weft which is too thin so I have got a shuttle with space for two pirns and that seems to be working just fine. I have tried to wind two threads together on the same bobbin in the past and it just ended in tears.

The draw in is a bit too much I think, at two inches, but I am not sure how to avoid it. At 50" there is not enough room to make a big enough angle with my weft before beating it.

I am sorry that the photo of the actual weaving is a bit blurry - I will post again when I have woven a bit more and when there is more daylight. I really am mightily proud.