Dressing the Loom, Part One

It's up, it's dressed and ready to begin the weaving!  I am beat or I'd be in there weaving right now.  I am pretty sure I made enough mistakes and had to take them back out again to add at least 3 hours to the process, but boy have I learned a ton.  Next time won't take so long.  This is a very careful and delicate process.  I kept track of the hours I have spent and to get the whole loom up and dressed, ready to begin weaving has taken 14 hours.  My goal next time is to cut that WAY back!! With all that I learned, I'm pretty sure I can do it.

I decided to use the loom for the warping frame instead of making a separate piece. This worked just okay, sitting on the floor for hours was pretty hard on my body.

I marked the warping dowels in one inch increments to help me space the warp ends.

The dowels I bought were not nearly stout enough and you can see them beginning to bow in the middles.

If I had known at this point that the places along the shed sticks that look not quite right were going to cause me trouble, I'd have fixed the problem at this point.  Unknowingly, I had let some of the warp threads cross over each other on the warping dowel.  If I had gone through and put each end in the order it was warped in RIGHT HERE, I'd have been a much happier camper.  Next time, I will know.  Great way to learn something that will stick with me.

Here is another thing I will never do again.  The bow in the center should have never happened.  I have purchased much stronger dowels for the next time I warp and will not have the uneven warp ends I had to deal with today.