Inkle Craze

I'm trying to remember when I discovered inkle loom weaving. And who showed me how, but my memory refuses to cooperate. I am grateful to whomever it was. Inkle weaving is such fun

Warping up my first pattern, more than the basic strap

Sometimes I take longer to finish than I should as I spend time just enjoying process,

 and looking at the progress

Finished, about to cut it off the loom

I /may/ have got carried away, that first week....

 Using a pattern from about 1945, I made John a double breasted, brass buttoned, sailor coat with a shawl collar. The inkle piece is made with the same 4 ply pure machine washable merino. It helps the collar to sit nicely and adds a nice, fine, detail to the garment.
John wore it from age 3 months to about seven months. We just unrolled the sleeves gradually.

Babies never sit still 😄

Having fun

Project pending

One of our camp challenges was to make any item, in any manner, as long as it had something about a farm animal. I took a long time to think of something. (We have a year from learning the challenge to when the camp is held.) My idea was to try and create something totally unrelated to what you might expect, such as a chook tea cosy, a cow beanie, or sheep toy. 

How about a necklace? I remembered a pattern my mum sent me. It was to make colourful, miniature birds using fine crochet cotton. I just needed the yellow and orange. I used fabric glue on the tails, feet, and the felt comb. It needed a highlight, so I made up a pattern for the eggs. The only way to get them to sit correctly was to make a choker. I wanted to keep a farming theme, so devised a basic inkle pattern to remind one of citrus orchards, using one type of green, three types of orange, and three types of yellow. 

🐤It is certainly a statement piece 🐤

Cluck, cluck

I had made John a duffle coat for the winter. I asked hubby if he thought it was ok. He said it needed stripes. Ok. Where? Here, and here. And some here. Ok, I can make one long strip..... No, They have to be different widths! .....ok.....

So. Three different widths it is then, 5mm, 1cm, 1.3cm. The main body ones had to go all the way up and over the shoulder, and down the other side. All had to be hand sewn as the sewing machine would be too tight on the thick yarn.
When he wore it, it was like cuddling  a warm, wriggly, teddy bear 😊

Another year, our camp challenge was to make a bag, in any way, as long as there was some leather in it (I'll do a full post on that later).
I was inspired after a trip to a craft store, and I found Wonder Woman fabric, and at a quilting store, I found yarn and needles fabric. Aha... my secret super power. I had a satchel pattern. WW on the outside, knit fabric as lining. Added leather straps to hold the buckles. Then, wht to do about the strap? Trawling the craftstore- black, beige, pink.... what to do? Inkle loom. I used my floor inkle loom which can make a 3 metre length (you can just see it behind John in the sailor jacket above). Find a pattern in my books. Dig through my stash of 80 ct cotton for matching colours. Warping up took some time. Ninety-two threads wide. Weaving it was fun. And so very happy with the result.