I’m so fortunate that two of my three children live in my hometown. Not only do my girls live nearby, we all share a love of anything crafty. For the past few years Kassie and Lizzie have focused their creative energy on their pottery. They both have Etsy shops and have been selling their items at craft fairs. They’ve watched me weave, but it was just a little difficult to add in a new hobby into their busy schedules. That is until recently when both have expressed an interest in weaving. This interest was motivated, in part, by their friends having babies. So we’ve been weaving a whole lot of baby blankets lately. I’d like to share a blanket that Lizzie designed totally by herself and wove on our AVL compudobby.
Designing the Baby Blanket
As a young child, Lizzie’s style could be described as “eclectic”. She was always dressed in clothing that was floral, fluorescent, or furry- often at the same time and, most of the time, not matching at all. She lit up a room- not only with her bubbly personality, but with her bold clothing choices. As an adult, however, her essence swung drastically the other way. Now her style is simplistic and clean. This project is not her first. Her past projects were all neutral colors and woven in plain weave although recently she ventured into the world of twill. I’ve been trying to get her to stretch a little bit and trying something new while still staying true to her style. Let’s see how we did.
Lizzie will be weaving baby blankets for two friends who do not know the gender of their little ones. She wanted the blankets to be appropriate for either a little girl or boy. The babies will be born in early summer so she wanted them to be relatively light weight. We chose to use Maurice Brassard 8/4 cotton in the following colors: Honey (5212), Dark Khaki (3044), Medium Brown (1313), a hand dyed lighter brown dyed with MX Reactive Dye from Prochem (camouflage mixed with chocolate brown) and Natural. The color choice stayed true to Lizzie’s style.
Lizzie decided that the blanket will be woven in primarily in twill with the color sections separated by natural woven using basket weave. She used a sett of 12 epi. Each color was woven in a different twill tie up. The treadling was the same (4321234321) throughout the blanket using only Natural. Because this was a four shaft pattern with no color changes I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to introduce Lizzie to the AVL compudobby.
This project was 429 ends making it 35.75 inches on the loom. Below is her pattern:
Lizzie wove an approximately 3 to 3 1/2 inch hem in basketweave (not possible to weave plain weave when your tie up contains basketweave) and then wove about 45-50 inches in twill followed again by the basketweave hem. After washing, the length of the blankets differed. One blanket was 34 inches in length and the other 46. I have to say the blankets are way softer than what I anticipated. They are absolutely beautiful. Here are pictures of the Lizzie’s handwoven blankets.
I’m super lucky to be able to share my love of weaving with my daughters. I love teaching them to weave and enjoy watching them develop their own creative style. Lizzie is a quick study. The AVL could be a little intimidating, but Lizzie took on the challenge like a champ. I also love that Lizzie is so particular about her color choices. If there’s a color that she wants and it’s not commercially available she’ll spend the time in the dye studio experimenting with different dyes to get the one she wants. Can’t wait for our next project.
