A strap for Dana!

July 13, 2011

I started this warp with only one thing in mind.  A SUCCESSFUL warp.  I was having a dry spell with my creativity AND my warping.  It was supposed to be plain double weave, but I turned it into another double weft double weave piece.  FIVE feet of it.  I am very tired of blue and brown. LOL

In talking to my friend, Dana, I discovered that she needed a strap so she could tie up to various places to do her backstrap weaving.  Mostly to the door knob of her closet.  So I decided to make her one.    Tying up to a door knob is kind of tricky, you need the piece to tie on where it won't slip off when you pull back on the warp with your body.  You also need a way to tie it up to the loom bars themselves.  For those of you who don't know, you really need to do a wider piece to keep it from flipping and flopping around.  Or if you are doing a narrow piece you can use a shorter loom bar at the far end where you use the strap to tie up to the door knob.  

I have not learned how to weave a piece end to end with no waste and no fringe.  You see it is very tough to do this, you eventually end up needle weaving because your shed space is so small at the end.  This also has to do with the fact that I am no longer scared to death of using my sewing machine to hem them.  Not knowing what I was going to do with the strap I really didn't leave enough fringe at the start to use for ties, like I do with my own strap,  The strap is also shorter than mine, so I had to be innovative to make it work.

Here is what I came up with.  After I tied the knot it was even shorter :-(, bummer.  So I braided a 12 ft. long tie and added length to it that way.  I haven't given it to her yet, but hopefully at class we will try it out.  Modifications may have to be made.  

Myself I use c clamps on my dresser to tie up, so I am not sure how it will work.  There are no doorknobs conducive to backstrap weaving in my room.

Here are a few pictures.  I will let you know how it works when she tries it out.