A Busy Bee

I took a break from weaving and painted my first scroll.  It’s not perfect, but I think it’s not bad.

And Now For Something Completely Different

While digging through my computer I found an old photo of my first attempt at calligraphy (also my last, I’m sad to say).  This was done in 2003 or 2004 (I think).

Uncial script

I’ve been thinking about doing some scribal-type stuff.  So expect more pictures of stuff I’ve made to show up here over time.

Linen Warped

The linen is warped!

So far, I’ve found the sizing made a tremendous difference. The string was much more manageable that it was unsized.

I have high hopes.

Sizing the Linen Warp

Because of the troubles I had with the wool fraying more than expected I am very sure that I am going to have problems with the linen, which is notorious for it.  To help combat this, I am sizing the warp to increase it’s strength.

I haven’t been able to find any hard evidence of what sizing would have been used in period, I’ve opted to go with linseed.  My assumption is that if they had access to the flax fibre, they would probably also have access to the seeds.

After searching around on the internet it seems a common formula is eight parts water to one part seeds, heated until the mixture has a consistency between coffee cream and egg white.  After 30 minutes, I had what was closer to a very runny hair gel, and stopped there.

The sizing mixture. The dark colour is from the brown flaxseeds in the bottom.

After straining I dipped my warp chains in the mixture.  Boy oh boy what a goopy mess!  I wrung them out as best I could and hung them up to dry.

The warp chains hanging to dry.

Once dry I will warp up the loom as usual, and weave using a temple to help even out the draw in.