Folding my Warp in Half

Now, before I started all that warp painting, what was I working on?

Towels for our guest bathroom.

I was stuck after making a silly mistake.

When I finished winding one cone of yarn on my warping board, I realized I only had 1/4 of the warp ends needed. Oops!!! I'd used half of my yarn already. Not good.

I went back to check my math. I made a simple mistake. I assumed that each cone of yarn held 1 pound of yarn, when in reality each held 1/2 a pound.

I felt bad about that assumption, but after winding all of those warps for warp painting, I realized that 1 pound cones are very common.

But still, what to do about my warp?

I decided that rather than buy more yarn, I'd fold the warp in half.

Some people fold a warp in half on purpose, particularly when setting up a complicated color sequence that will be symmetrical. In that case, you'd wind the warp twice as long as needed, put a cross at both ends, and fold the warp in half when you're dressing the loom.

End with cross on left and end with counting tie on right

In my case, I didn't have a cross at both ends, but I did have a cross at one end and a counting tie every 1/2 inch at the other end. I decided that was good enough.

I marked the center of the warp with a new counting tie, then folded the warp.

I decided to dress the loom front to back. For the portion of the warp that had a cross, I used the cross. For the portion that just had the counting tie, I selected my threads out of the counting tie.

Section with cross sleyed, starting on section with counting tie

Each segment within the counting tie isn't too hard to divide up

It worked surprisingly well.

After threading and beaming on, here's the fold

Phew!! That much closer to weaving!!

Related posts:
Ordering more yarn for warp
Getting started