Yule Log Cabin

A question recently came up on a weaving forum. How do you warp for log cabin patterns? I stared at the screen for a moment and then thought "Same as I always do."

But then I cast my mind back to my first attempt at a log cabin pattern. It seemed to be so complicated and needing way more effort than I thought it should. I could NOT get my head around how to warp it. I looked at books. I looked at videos. Many of the methods involved tying individual warps or creating a direct warp loop then cutting it and tying it to the back beam. Not a simple continuous warp. That was the goal.

In the end, by drawing pictures of the warp loops in the heddle and how they'd split into the pattern, a continuous warp was achieved.

My first attempt was not great. There was not enough contrast between the yarn colours, but it was clear from looking at more successful colour pairings the optical illusion of a log cabin pattern was a goal worth pursuing. But how to get over the tedium of warping it? There had to be a way to simplify the warping: one that avoided lots of cutting and tying, or having to colour in pictures on squared paper.

I applied the Feynman algorithm and thought hard about the problem. How to tie on a log cabin without too much effort? Aided by the magic of Photoshop layers, I mocked up the warp and here is the result. My (slightly) lazy version of a log cabin warp.

A basic log cabin contains two pattern blocks. Both blocks start on one colour and end on another. In each block there are equal numbers of warp threads for each colour.

As you change from one block to the next there are two warps of the same colour. So moving from block 1 to block 2, there are two yellow warps together. Moving from block 2 back to block 1, there are two blue warps together. So how can that pattern be created using a direct warp and without lots and lots of knot tying?

It helps to think of the two blocks as a block of six and a block of four, instead of two blocks of five. So for block one warp three loops of blue in the slots as normal, but skipping every other slot. Next warp three loops of yellow in the holes to the right of the "blue" slots. That's block one complete. Notice how there are an empty slot and hole between each pair of colours and that there are six loops warped up.

For block two, skip a slot and a hole as before. In the next slot, start with yellow, skip a slot and warp the next one. Then add the blue into the holes next to the yellow. This time you only need four warp loops. As before skip a slot and a hole and then repeat block one. Repeat the two blocks across the required width.

Once the warp is complete cut the loop at the warping peg and wind on to the back beam as normal. Then pull the warp threads into the correct holes as per the pattern.

Maybe I should try this out for blocks of different sizes and see if it works for those too. What do you think? Would that be useful? Leave a comment and let me know.

Inspect the Morse

I've always been interested in codes and ciphers. The idea that a message could be encrypted so that only the intended recipient could read it was fascinating to my younger self and well, I still find them fascinating.

A cipher is a series of steps used to encrypt data. Ciphers work at the level of individual letters or numbers, or in electronic terms at the level of a bit, or byte. In general for each one character in the original text there will be one character in the encryption. A key is required as part of the cipher

Codes, on the other hand, may use more or less characters and work at the level of meaning. Whole words or phrases are converted. A codebook might link a random set of letters and or numbers to particular messages. For example HTSU89 might represent "I'm thirsty, bring tea please." OK, not a very likely code, but who wants to get picked up on GCHQ's radar.

Morse Code

In 1836 Samuel Morse, Joseph Henry and Alfred Vail developed a system to send electric pulses along a wire. By 1844 this had developed into a system of dots and dashes (short and long pulses) which were grouped together to represent the English alphabet and the numbers 0 to 9. The dot duration is the basic unit of time measurement in Morse code transmission. The duration of a dash is three times the duration of a dot. Each dot or dash within a character is followed by period of signal absence, called a space, equal to the dot duration. The letters of a word are separated by a space of duration equal to three dots, and the words are separated by a space equal to seven dots.

From telegraph to radio communications, morse code was invaluable during the world wars and was used as an international maritime standard up until 1999. Today it is mostly used by hobbyists.

And crafters.

The Morse Scarf

Using the many online Morse translators it was easy to translate a word into a series of dots and dashes. I chose the word "love." I really liked the idea of making a scarf that would wrap the owner in a warm swirl of love.

Love in Morse is represented by .-.. --- ...- . and using standard Morse spacings would not fit easily on the heddle needed for the chosen yarn. So the code was represented in units of two warp spaces. That gave just the right number of code warps plus a small border at each side of the scarf.

The scarf itself was woven on a rigid heddle loom with a 15 dent heddle. The yarn is the gorgeous laceweight silk and alpaca from "Drops." Each warp is made up of two strands of the yarn to make the letters really stand out.

The resulting scarf is soft, warm and drapes beautifully. It has been one of my most popular makes and on Christmas Day there will be a number of lucky ladies (why no men?) who will be unwrapping a little bit of communications history in textile form.

What word would you choose for a Morse scarf?