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September 27, 2022 newsletter

Mohair Blankies!

I have woven more mohair blankets in my life than any other item, over 1000 by the time I moved on 🤣. They were the foundation of my livelihood. I mastered them technically by developing my ability to get a warp on with ease, wind a bobbin with ease and throw a sticky, fuzzing bobbin with ease. It flew inside the shed and out the other side without any snagging. I share everything I know about weaving with mohair in the School of Weaving but in this newsletter I will share all the written documentation about it. 

I wove them all on a 45″ 4 shaft Fanny counter-balance loom. There were 270 warp threads in each blanket at 6 EPI and 7 PPI and I tied on to a dummy warp so I wouldn’t lose any of that expensive yarn as loom loss. I allowed 2.5 yards of warp per blanket because there really was no loom loss and I never made a warp longer than 7.5 yards because then my system started to lose ground as stickiness was building up. Five yards is perfect for two blankets. I played with colour till the cows came home and never ever got tired of putting new colours together. You need 800 grams of our brushed mohair to weave one blanket.

I hope you enjoy this documentation and if you want to see me warp a mohair loom, weave a mohair blanket and full one in a top loader you can watch it all in Season 1: Episode 9 & Episode 10 of the School of Weaving. Download your copy of the Mohair Blankie!

Jane

Level of Difficulty: Advanced Beginner
Weave structure: Plain Weave
Material: Brushed Mohair
Each pattern makes: 1 Blanket 41″ X 74″ plus fringes

Shafts: 4
Reed: 6 dent (do not use a 12 dent reed as 0,1 will strip the mohair)
Weaving width: 45″

Brushed Mohair

Choose your own colours!
You’ll need 800 grams of brushed mohair.

Our line of brushed mohair comes in such a range of colours that’s it’s hard not to choose some of each 😉  Instead, play with a stripe design, drop different colours into your sketch and imagine the amazing blankies you could create – and go for it!


Mohair Blankie Kit

You can purchase a Mohair Blankie Kit in a variety of colourways – all you have to do is decide which one is calling to you!

Each kit makes: 1 Blanket 41″ X 74″ plus fringes. Kit comes with the all the yarn needed and the printed pattern.

Royal, Turquoise

Learn to weave our own Mohair Blankie!

The best way to learn how to weave your very own Mohair Blankie is to watch the expert at work! In Season 1: Episode 9 – Making a Mohair Blankie – Jane leads us step by step through the whole process. You’ll learn how to create a Pseudo Warp (Dummy Warp) which will protect the wonderful Mohair warp that you are putting on your loom. Jane explains that she uses a Skeletal tie-up for her Mohair blankets – tieing on 1 treadle to 1 harness. She shares her experience with mohair with her weaving techniques. Finally in Season 1: Episode 10 shows us how to finish our fabulous new blankies – from fulling them in our top loading washing machines to brushing them when they are still damp. Just think of the magic you could create by designing your own blanket.

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From Our Inbox


WOW – the future of weaving is looking great….. The following email popped into our Inbox from Susan Wright in Gig Harbor, WA. I loved the story – being a new grandmother myself – and know that all the Mom’s and Grandmom’s out there will be impressed by Mara’s desire to learn to weave that matches her Grandmother’s! Thank you for sharing your inspiring story, Susan!
  I bought my first floor loom, a Schacht 8 shaft, taking delivery of it in late January 2020 – just in time for COVID. Prior to this I had not tried, nor even seen, a multi-shaft loom (but did a lot of research first). Thanks to the recommendation of my friend, Joan, I joined the School of Weaving and the JST Study Group, part of the Olympia, WA Weavers Guild. I am now in Year 5 (Laces) and enjoying it tremendously.

Meanwhile, my granddaughter Mara wanted to learn to weave. Since she was 5 when I got my loom, her feet couldn’t reach the treadles, but of course she grew. I took delivery of a used Schacht Baby Wolf which now fits her perfectly. At age 7 she is still a little young to handle the ins and outs of dressing the loom, so I warped up a simple scarf for her. Other than putting the header on and showing her how to weave on the first inch, she wove the rest herself. When she made mistakes, she told me, “I can fix them myself!” She also became quite competent in advancing her warp, then adjusting it to the correct tension. At the end, she attempted to learn hemstitching although got a little frustrated. She also learned to twist a fringe and use a steam iron (“the steam is scary!”). I wish someone had introduced me to weaving at that age! The pictures show Mara proudly holding her finished scarf, as well as a closeup of her work. Her selvedges are amazing, in my opinion, for a first-ever project. The skills I have learned over the past couple of years taught by Jane in a relaxed, approachable manner carried over in introducing Mara to weaving. Of course, I will be introducing her to the School of Weaving as soon as her interest progresses! –Susan Wright

We offer FREE shipping on all Louet looms within Continental North America. We also offer the option to pay a $1000.00 CAD deposit on your loom with the balance due when the loom ships out to you. This gives you the flexibility to make smaller payments towards your balance, at your convenience.

Here to help

Have a weaving question? Find us on the Jane Stafford School of Weaving Forum and on Weave with Jane Stafford on Ravelry.

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March 29, 2022 newsletter

Whole Lotta Huggin’

Three blankets in one kit!

Our wonderful Sharon Broadley, @colourwoven on Instagram, designed these gorgeous blankets for the special people in her life that needed a hug. Once again, she has nailed it….so drapey and cuddly, with perfect, simple, elegant graphics. I am always so happy to share her projects. Sharon wove these lovely blankets out of Québécoise 100% Wool, which is a yarn that is durable, washable and softens with brushing!

 And … they are now available as a kit!

The first blanket is woven with repeats of Natural Greys with Turquoise and Cypress Green stripes.

The second blanket is woven using 1-inch stripes.

The third blanket has 3-inch squares of Natural Grey with stripe repeats of Olive Green & Cypress Green.


Last of our Old Tussah Line

The semi-bleached Tussah we use for our hand-dyed 20/2 Tussah line has been discontinued through our supplier. These skeins are the last colours available using this particular Tussah. Once they are gone, we will be out of stock of hand-dyed Tussah for a couple of months while our dyer re-dyes the entire Tussah line using bleached Tussah. The new colours will be more vibrant and very similar to our hand-dyed Bombyx silk line. All of our silks are hand-dyed right here on Salt Spring Island.

Our 20/2 Bombyx & 30/2 Bombyx remains the same and our shelves are well stocked!


3/2 Organic Cotton Now Available in 1 lb cones!


From Our Inbox

We love receiving photos of your weaving projects. When Janet sent us this photo of the beautiful blanket she wove for a friend’s mother, who loves pink, we just had to share. We asked her to write a little blurb about her experience weaving with mohair. Fabulous job, Janet!

Do you talk to your warp yarn? Maybe I do that when I’m frustrated or when it seems like the threads are breaking due to some unknown force. But generally, I’m pretty quiet with them…until I started my first mohair blanket.

The threads are so lovely—soft as a kitten and diaphanous as a cloud—but they also have a wicked sense of sticking together. Just off the warping mill, they looked innocent enough. I spread them through the raddle and pulled them to separate as Jane teaches us. I lost one in the forest of fiber but it worked out by the time I tied it onto the front beam. Perhaps the best lesson was about splicing within the main fabric because the threads stick together. So, the stickiness can be a plus.

Once I got that, I started talking with them and letting them know I appreciate them for being both soft and sticky, good and tricky. We came to an understanding. You must raise one harness at a time to let them move, and occasionally they gang together around the heddles, but are fine if you gently separate them. Fulling and brushing are absolutely the best part. The halo that develops blends the colors like watercolor and reminds us that softness is queen. I don’t know if I’ll keep that level of conversation with future warps but I know that the second mohair blanket is about to go on the loom.

f you are a subscriber to School of Weaving and would like to weave a mohair blanket, we have a whole episode on weaving with this lovely but sticky yarn. Jane has woven hundreds of mohair blankets over the years and she shares all of her tips and tricks with us in Season 1 Episode 9 – Making a Mohair Blankie… Yes!

Here to help

Have a weaving question? Find us on the Jane Stafford School of Weaving Forum and on Weave with Jane Stafford at Ravelry.