Linen Huck Lace Runner

I recently wove a gift for another wedding. This bride is very feminine and traditional. She and her new husband love antiques and have a home that he restored. So, I naturally chose a lace weave for them. I used Bockens 16/2 linen sett at 18 epi. I chose to weave it on my Baby Wolf. I have two reeds that will fit that loom: 8 dpi and 12 dpi. With the 8 dpi, I could sley 2/2/2/3 for 18 epi, and with the 12 dpi, I could sley 1/2 for 18 epi. Thinking it looked more even overall, I chose the 8 dpi reed. In retrospect, I see that this was the wrong choice. I could see reed marks after finishing the runner. I'm sure they weren't noticeable to the bride and groom, but I could see them. I see now that sleying 1/2 would have allowed the warp ends to move more evenly during finishing than the 2/2/2/3 allowed the one odd end en every fourth dent to move. The draft is from page 12 of The best of Weaver's Huck Lace.

I wove a sample as well, and used part of it to make a card to go with the gift:

This was my first experience in weaving with linen. After hearing horror stories about it, I was a little apprehensive, but the apprehension was unnecessary. It behaved very well. I didn't spray the warp with water or soak the bobbins. The weft did have a tendency to jump off the bobbin when it was full. I think either soaking the bobbin or using an EFS would have taken care of that. I should also note that we had a humidifier running in the next room, as we normally do in the winter.

Spring Serendipity Scarves

Last summer I used part of my economic stimulus check to buy the Earthues natural dye kit in the colors collection. I've always been drawn to the warm, soft colors from natural dyes. I had also been wanting to try my hand at warp painting, so the natural dye extracts seemed to be the way to go. Last summer, I painted a bunch of silk hankies and two silk warps. I finall got around to weaving one of the warps. It is a 20/2 silk noile, and I wove it in a 4-shaft huck. I do like the colors, and the noile yarn along with the huck weave structure gave the scarves a nice, airy feel. It was a lot of fun to see the colors change as I wove, and I am happy with the end results.