Thursday, July 8, 2010

Triloom weaving with Sensations "Sumptuous" yarn


A friend of mine put in a request for one of my triangle loom shawls. She wanted a warm blanket weight, in earthy greens and white, in a yarn that had no wool in it. I hunted around for a bit, and came upon Joann's store brand, Sensations 'Sumptuous' yarn. The pegs on my loom are set rather far apart, so I was going for the bulkiest yarn I could get my hands on. This yarn bills itself as 'Super soft and bulky acrylic yarn', and they had the colors I wanted. They were on sale too! However, the store was sold out. The nice ladies kindly put in a special order for me. I asked for two skeins of green, one of variegated green, and bought the skein of white that they had on hand.

A few weeks later, my yarn came in. I trotted over to the store to pick it up...and noticed that the variegated green skein looked kind of puny. Sure enough, though the price was same, the yardage for variegated was less than for solid colors. I grumbled, and got another skein to be sure I had enough. Then I went home and started weaving.

The yarn was in fact soft to the touch, quite bulky, and kind of spongy. Lovely! But I soon found that it was really just bit too thick for easy weaving on my loom. And the bouncy spongy texture made it a bear to try to beat into place. It took some extra care and fiddling, but I eventually got the body of the shawl done. (I'm glad this wasn't my first attempt at weaving on a triloom, though! I might have given up on a fun hobby if this was my first impression.)

When I went to measure out the yarn for the fringe, I realized that I didn't have enough yarn left over from the weaving process. I looked...and sure enough, though the skeins look bigger than the skeins of yarn I usually use (Lion brand Homespun, or Wool-Ease), there is less yardage on each skein. I had to go back to Joann's and pick up another skein of white, and another of green. Luckily, they had them in stock this time. Tip to the wise: know how much you need before you start! Don't assume a skein is a skein is a skein.

Once I had enough materials, the fringing process went pretty easily. I usually double the fringe when I'm using Homespun yarn, but this yarn is thick enough that that wasn't necessary. The shawl is now off the loom, and waiting to go into the wash for wet finishing. And it is, in fact, a blanket weight fabric that is soft to the touch. This will definitely keep her shoulders warm on cool autumn nights!

However, I don't think I'll use this yarn on my loom again soon. The bulk and texture make for difficult weaving, and the relatively small yardage on each skein means I had to spend more in materials than I had intended.

I could see that this yarn would knit or crochet quickly into nice chunky scarves or lap robes, though, and they would feel great against the skin. If I take up those crafts, I'll revisit this yarn.

7 comments:

  1. Wow. I've never seen a loom that looked like that. I hate that the variegated yarns have less yardage than their solid counterparts. I love working with Hobby Lobby's I Love This Yarn, but don't like that the pretty ochres and striped are less yardage.

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  2. I think it turned out just gorgeous! Sorry that it was a bear, but hey at least you learned something! It really is lovely :))

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  3. Deanna, the loom is really just a frame of wood with pegs in it--kind of like the little potholder looms that folks played with as kids. It uses a continuous piece of yarn, so you're warping and weaving all at the same time. Lots of fun, in a very low-tech style of weaving.

    Glad you like it, Bird Girl. :) It was a great opportunity to experiment with a new yarn.

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  4. Very pretty. Fun I had the same problem with some yarn I bought at JoAnn's too. The yarn I bought was even from the same company with the same name on it. Makes me wonder!!

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  6. What a beautiful shawl! Did you create the pattern or does it come with the yarn, so to speak?

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  7. Thank you! No, I created the pattern. When you use the triangle loom, every time you change a color that new color gets carried down, over, and back up the other side. That makes weaving plaids really simple. I used three colors of yarn here--the solid green, the cream, and a green/cream variegated.

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