Threading and Dyeing

Those are activities that can be a challenge to have going at the same time. However, I find that I'd rather not sit too long at a stretch threading a warp, and try to work in spurts on the threading and on something else. The past few days, I've been threading the Water Series warp, and when I need a break, I throw a skein of weft yarn into a dye pot and let it simmer while I thread the next section on the beam.

The new kitten, Gracie, makes a surprisingly good lap companion while I'm threading, although she gets miffed when I get up to check the temperature of the dye pot. But as long as I stay sat, she just curls up and purrs. As far as she's concerned, this world is short on laps and she's determined to take advantage of every lap she finds.

Gracie is now almost half again the weight she was when I got her from Animal Services only a few weeks ago; 5.5 pounds then, 7.5 now. She's got the long body and longer legs of a gangly teenager, not a kitten any more. She's a bottomless pit. Never stops eating. And the throughput rate!!! Whew!

Here are the two warps, each suspended from their own pair of lease sticks behind the shafts. You can see the roll of roof sheathing I use as warp separator at the lower left of the picture.



At this point, I've threaded the heddles and am in the process of sleying the reed.



And here are the weft skeins - a blue-violet, a deep blue-green, a sort of navy-with-green-undertones, and a light aqua.



None of them are an exact match to the hues in either the solid warp or the painted warp, although some are close, but I think there will be sufficient contrast to ensure that the pattern shows even where weft and warp are similar.