How to Finish Your Triloom Woven Shawl

The last weaving pass is run, the center yarn is clipped and your shawl is done! Yippee!

Oh yeah, the weaving is done, now there's the finishing. 

How do you go from that triangle shaped weaving on the wall to the beautiful, drapey, shawl to wrap around your shoulders?

Follow along on the pictures below, and if you have any questions, you can contact me via messenger from our Havencroft Farm Homestead Facebook page.

The weaving is done! This is a twill/tabby combo pattern done with 100% Havencroft Farm grown Jacob sheep wool (Patchwork Cowboy and Havencroft Lauren's fleeces) processed into yarn at Yampa Valley Fiberworks and hand-dyed by me.)

Pretty as it looks from a distance, there are still some spacing issues that need fixing.

Spend time lining up yarns with your trusty weaving comb. (Not to recommend Walmart, but this is the comb I use.)

Once your weaving is all evened-up to your liking, crochet off the top. This shawl is not fringed, so the color changes are along the top. I'll weave those in later. The chain I use to take a shawl off the loom is; pull the corner loop of the shawl onto your hook; pull a loop of your finishing color through that loop; pull the next shawl loop off the nail and through the loop on the hook; pull another loop of finishing yarn through that loop; and all the way across, shawl loop, yarn loop. You should only ever have one loop on your hook. You can see the pattern in the picture above. At the end of the top edge of the shawl, pull up your last loop, cut the thread in the middle and pull it back through, then knot the starting thread for the shawl and the ending thread of the finishing yarn together.

The top edge is crocheted off the loom. Now to lift the bottom two edges.

Just gently lift the yarn off the pegs, or nails, starting at the bottom corner.

This shawl is now attached to the loom only at the top two corners. This is where you can see floats or any other issues that may need to be fixed by stitching them in. 

Take off the finished shawl, hang up your loom and start the next shawl. I always put the next shawl on the loom right after I pull the shawl I'm finishing off. I've planned it while weaving the last one, and I'm eager to get started on it, plus I hate seeing a naked loom!

I weave in all the color join ends with a crochet hook. Some people use a yarn needle. What ever works for you. I take out the knot that I used to join the colors (why I knot the joins loosly), make sure the yarns are crossed over so there are no awkward holes at the top of the shawl, and tuck the ends in, weaving them down their own color run.

Some shawls I crochet a decorative border, and strenghthener on the top, other shawls don't seem to need it. This one needed a bit of straightening on the top edge, which is provided by the crochet border.

Once you are happy with your finishing on the shawl, it's time to wash it. This "wet-finishes" the shawl, allows the yarns to bloom and meld together and sets it as one garment, instead of a lot of woven yarn. It also assures me that the piece does not have any flaws that I missed in the planning or weaving. Hand wash, gently in cool water with wool safe soap. I do the same - lather, rinse, repeat that I do to wash most things. Make sure you fill the basin first and dissolve the soap before adding your garment. Take the garment out to drain while you rinse the basin and prepare the next water bath.

After washing and rinsing, roll your shawl up in a towel and gently squeeze out the excess water. 

Lay your shawl flat and shape it how you want it to dry. I put a king sized sheet over a few towels on our queen sized bed to block my shawls. It's a big enough space, and the door is closed to our bedroom, so it is a cat-free zone, too.

Give it a bit to dry and then wear your beautiful new shawl. This particular shawl is for a friend, if you want to see a picture of her wearing it (give me a few days to get it delivered!) visit our Havencroft Farm Homestead Facebook page.

The Story of Story Scarves

I started making story scarves several years ago. I met the delightful, energetic, flamboyant Ezra Phillips at an Interpreter workshop. I always spin yarn and crochet at workshop. Ezra was fascinated. I showed him how to spin. We had fun and at the end of the week, he said, "I want you to make me a scarf with EVERY COLOR!"

I was intrigued by the challenge. It sat in the back of my mind. I saw Ezra a few months later at a training. "Do you have my scarf done?" He asked. "It's starting to get cold!"

I went home that day and dipped into my yarn stash. As a weaver and crocheter, I often have a bit of a skein of yarn left when I finish weaving a shawl or making a hat or...

I came up with the idea of using these little bits of yarn, some only 10 yards long, others hundreds of yards, to make a l-o-n-g, multicolor, scrappy scarf for Ezra.

I crocheted it as we traveled while Shawn drove. As we went north, through corn fields and farmland, I though about the stories of the yarns I was working into this scarf. Some were handspun from our critters fleeces. Some were hand-me-overs from friends who were destashing. Some were bright novelty yarns from gypsy-style shawls I wove. The stories of the yarns wove themselves into the story of our trip. And the concept of story scarves was born. 

Ezra loved his scarf as much as I loved creating it. He shared pictures of where he traveled in that scarf. His stories added themselves to the fiber of the first story scarf. 

It was a concept that found its home in my heart. Every time I finish a big project, the little bits of left over yarn go into my project bag. That bag travels with me everywhere. 

I crochet story scarves at conferences, in hospital waiting rooms, on the plane, and in the passenger seat of the car. I've given them to nurses who went out of their way to care for family members. I've given them to friends who expressed an interest in the project. I've donated them to auctions for scholarships and causes. 

My word for 2019 is "Focus"  (to me that means "be present where I am and work on the thing that is in front of me at the moment") and to that end, I am focusing story scarves on a cause. 

Crafts people across the US are aging. It's hard to make a living with your hands. It's hard to find the time to focus in a craft enough to achieve a mastery of that craft. We have craft masters in more than 20 crafts at the Ozark Folk Center State Park. This year I am focusing on growing our exsisting apprentice program into one that will help young people connect with our craft masters, learn their skills and perpetuate our Ozark tradition of craftsmanship. 

To that end, I'm donating 50% of the sales price of each story scarf to the Committee of One Hundred for the Ozark Folk Center. Their craft scholarships have helped create many of the master craft artisans in our park over the last 45 years. We are going to bring that tradition to a new generation. 

This story scarf in the picture, crocheted on the plane to Winter Market in Las Vegas, and any others I create this year will be available in my Havencroft Farm etsy store, along with its story. The donation to the Committee will be in the scarf buyers name.

The Story of this Scarf

This story scarf was crocheted on the plane to Las Vegas in January of 2019. We were headed out on a buying trip to Las Vegas Winter Market. 

The base yarn in this scarf is the center handspun gray, it is from Cowslip's wool. She is currently our eldest Jacob Sheep ewe. She was born in February of 2003. She is quite the pet and comes out of the retired sheep yard every morning and evening to get her own special grain mix.

The next yarn is a bright red wool. I dyed it to make a hat for an runner friend. I never could get the hat right, and the yarn has been used in several projects. I ought to get back to that. Maybe I'll try some alpaca yarn this time.

The heathered green yarn is from a dear friend who was destashing her very delicious yarns. I let most of the bag go to our Sit & Stitch friends, and to the project basket for the Fiber Arts shop at the Ozark Folk Center, but I liked the feel of this one, and wanted a chance to work with it.

The fall multi colored cotton is from a shawl I wove, as is the blue/green/black thick-thin, the shiny ribbon, and the pale lavendar fuzzy. And there's a light gray alpaca in the mix that Lena used in knitting a pair of socks.

Havencroft Homestead Handspun Yarns

Just a few of the Havencroft Homestead Handspun Yarns off my spinning wheel. Many of these are listed in the Havencroft Farm etsy store.

I love to spin. I enjoy the feel of the fleece in my hand. Watching, petting and cuddling the animal friends who grow the fleece makes me happy. I love deciding what I want to ply the single yarn with and the unique beauty of each skein as it winds off the bobbin and on to the niddy-noddy, ready for washing.

Spinning is also what I do to relax. People often ask me how I keep up with the pace of my daily life. I have built in relaxation in my spinning, weaving, crochet, animal care, and sometimes, writing.

I spin lots of yarn, I love the challenge of sitting down to spin a whole fleece. But, it is all one - or maybe four or five - of a kind skeins of yarn. Many people like to follow patterns, and set guages, and predictable results. They want to know the item they are spending all these many hours making will turn out to be the item that they liked the picture of and wanted. I understand that, but my world is one of creative directions, happy accidents, design elements and excitement in seeing how the latest project turned out. Yep, I'm a double gemini in a house full of gemini's. Life is endlessly entertaining.

To that end, I needed to figure out how my one-of-a-kind skeins of yarn, grown by my wonderful Jacob Sheep, colored angora goats, goofy alpacas and guardian llama fit into the greater world of fibery fun so that I could connect them with people who would like to use them in their projects. That's where the concept for Havencroft Homestead Handspun Yarns came in. All of my yarns are from fibers grown on our homestead, with a few accents like dyed silk (don't raise silk worms), star fire or angelina, and metallic thread.

A skein of Luna's Jacob Sheep wool, all natural colors.

Havencroft Homestead Handspun Yarns are one-of-a-kind, individual skeins of yarn, grown by pampered critters, spun and dyed with love in the Ozarks.

These yarns are great as accents for scarves, shawls, hats and many other projects. Also, I'll be working on developing crochet patterns for small skein projects and have a few pattern testers lined up.

If you'd like to check out some of my yarns, they are listed in our Havencroft Farm etsy store; we are on the Off The Beaten Path Studio Tour, if you want to come meet the critters, too. We also do the Arkansas Craft Guild Christmas Showcase in Little Rock.

I have several goals for this year, one is to work only with our homegrown fleeces in my fiber arts. I worried about that one, because as much as I love the natural colors of fibers our critters grow, color is what sells. But then I spun the yarn below, all from wool, mohair and alpaca grown on Havencroft Farm and dyed by me. I'm not worried about having novelty yarn any more!

Havencroft Homestead Handspun Yarn, an art yarn skein of wool, mohair and alpaca.

Why I love to spin raw fleece

I love to spin yarn. The flow of the fleece in my hands, the twist of the fibers, the tug of the wheel. It's my meditation, my relaxation, my joy. I spin almost every night. It's how I unwind, pun intended. Rough days at work, worries on the farm, health issues with family and friends - these all wind away onto the bobbin. 

This Spinolution Firefly 32 oz bobbin holds most of Havencroft Luna's 2018 Jacob Sheep wool fleece spun into a 2 ply, 5 wpi yarn. It was spun raw - unwashed and uncarded, right out of the bag.

But I have a dirty little secret. 

I love to spin raw wool. Yep, unwashed, uncarded, with little bits of vegetable matter (vm) to pick out on the way. 

There are many reasons for this.

• I weave and crochet with my finished yarns. I love the unique texture that spinning unprepared fleece gives the yarns. 
• I love the feel of the lanolin. It makes my hands soft. 
• I love the heathery look of random color blends from each of my spotted sheep's fleeces.
• It gives my spinning wheel a nice patina. (yes, I do have to clean it periodically)
• I hate washing fleece.
• I feel like it helps me connect to and appreciate my sheep and angora goats and goofy alpaca boys.
• Strong, healthy sheep equals strong yarn. If there are health issues, problems in the yarn are one more way for me to find them.
• I learn first hand what weeds are hidden in our hay or pasture.

A few of our Havencroft Jacob Sheep ewes grazing on the front pasture, summer 2018. From left to right, Judith, Hester, Ipswich, Molly, Nexxus, Nebula.

It's still quite a process to go from sheep to yarn.

My daughter and I do all our shearing by hand here on Havencroft Farm. We shear each sheep up on a stand, and put the fleece in a pillow case after it rolls off the sheep. We skirt out the really dirty bits as we shear, they don't go into the bag. After shearing, and after the sheep has had her toenails trimmed (mani-pedi with her hair cut, the full beauty salon treatment), the sheep bounces off to scratch and enjoy not wearing her full wool blanket, then I label the bag with the name of the sheep, the date, and the intended use of the fleece. The soft, buttery, silky fleeces are destined for my spinning stash. The coarser fleeces are woven into Fleecyful Rugs.

Each fleece goes into a pillow case for storage after shearing.
I spin right out of the pillow case

I've always loved to spin an entire fleece at a time. I've enjoyed doing that since I started spinning about 2001 or '02. Jacobs are small sheep, so a spinning fleece, which is often a lamb fleece, will net 400 - 1,000 yards of 2-ply worsted or bulky yarn. Spinning in the evenings, it can take me a month to spin and ply an entire fleece. 

Luna 2-ply Jacob Sheep wool yarn, 5 wpi. Spun right from the bag.

After spinning, then plying, winding the yarn off into skeins, and tying each skein securely in four places - Then I wash the yarn. It takes seven water baths to wash most yarns. I wash them in warm water in my kitchen sink. I handle the yarn gently to prevent felting and allow lots of soaking time to ease out dirt and vm. For soaps I use Orvus or Dharma Proffesional Textile Detergent. In the past I have used Dawn or people shampoos and creme rinses.

Raw spun yarn washing steps

Always fill the sink first, and take the yarn out of the sink for draining and filling. 

1. Soak the yarn in a sink full of warm rinse water for about 20 minutes, to wet the yarn down.
2. Remove yarn from sink, squeezing out the water. drain and wash down sink
3. Wash - Fill sink with warm water, add 2X normal amount of detergent after sink is done filling. Disperse soap completely before adding yarn, one skein at a time. Make sure the yarn can move freely. Do not try to wash too much at once.
4. Let soak for another 20 minutes, turning, swishing and squeezing gently every time you walk past the sink.
5. Pull yarns from water bath, gently squeezing out the soapy water.
6. Rinse - Drain and clean sink, and refill with warm water.
7. Again, one at a time add skeins to sink, gently swirling and squeezing the yarn. GENTLY is the key. Wool, alpaca and mohair yarns are very happy to felt.
8. Repeat the wash and rinse cycle one more time, or twice if the yarn is still dirty. 
9. I usually do a double rinse at the end, the next to the last rinse has 1/4 cup of white vinegar in it to remove the last of the soap. 
10. Then I finish with one more plain water rinse.

Luna's washed skeins of yarn, ready for listing in the Havencroft etsy store.

Birdsong and painted skeins

A new batch of painted handspun Jacob sheep wool yarn in the predawn blue light

The bird and insect symphony was so rich in this morning's predawn blue light, as I was hanging newly painted skeins of yarn out to dry. I wished I could share the whole experience with everyone. But even if I had video'd it, the richness of the morning air, the deep blueness of the light and the unique harmonies of the morning chorus would not have come through.

So, just grab a cuppa your favorite morning beverage, (mine is Dean's Beans Mocha Sumatra coffee, cold with goat's milk) take a deep breath and imagine sharing this beautiful blue morning here on Havencroft farm.

Have a delicious day.

Red mohair

The swirls in the dyepot as the colors blend

Lucious reds in mohair, drying on the porch

I rarely take custom orders or commissions any longer. I stress over them too much. I also tend to work on what I'm enjoying a the moment. Sometimes, I really want to weave rugs on the big loom, other times, I love the fiddly-fuss of weaving shawls and frequently I just want to sit at my wheels and spin (yarn).

But, I tell people, I will take suggestions and inspirations. Then, when they check back with me at Off the Beaten Path Studio Tour, or Christmas Showcase or look in the Common Threads etsy store or visit our Shearing Days Open House, maybe, just maybe, they'll find just what they've been looking for.

During our Shearing Days open house on March 31, someone mentioned that she'd been looking for a quality yarn for a Christmas project. She needed a red and white candy striped yarn. Well, that stuck in my mind. I'm spinning a super soft white lamb's wool fleece (Poncho's) on my Louie Wheel at work and I just sheared a very shiny, if not quite the softest white mohair from Tillie. Hmm, dye that red, spin the yarns, ply the two textures... gotta try it.

So, I cranked up the dyepot yesterday and did several versions of red, ranging from bright red-red to purpley-pink. Give it a few days to dry and I'll be spinning the red at home. In the meantime, I've just finished Lefty's lamb's wool fleece into 4 skeins of nice two ply Jacob wool yarn and I've started spinning Fritillary's divine cloudy mohair. It must be a Spring for spinning.