There's a Cricket in the House!

A cricket in the house is good luck. Right? Well. . . this cricket that entered the house is wooden, needed assembly and eats yarn. 

That’s right!  A new 10 inch Schacht Cricket Rigid Heddle Loom now resides in our home. The Cricket is cute and small. It was a gift from some friends who know that I like knitting and yarn. And they also know that there is a lot of yarn in our home. The Cricket is supposed to eat through large piles of yarn very quickly. Supposed to. 

Schacht Cricket Loom (picture from Schachtspindle.com)

The first project on the loom has been completed. I used some yarn left over Cascade Luna from Lucy to make a dish cloth and to practice plain weaving. The solid yarn was lovingly warped between the loom and the warping peg to make two cloths. Then, the variegated yarn was used in the weft.

Plain weave on left and looped dishcloth on right.

The first cloth was woven way too tightly, but has a neat stripe that was unexpected. The second was woven into a looped dishcloth using a straight size US 8 (5.0 mm) knitting needle. This method makes a great cloth, but it is quite slow. 

The next project on the Cricket was made with Sugar and Cream cones in ecru and green.  The project used all the slots and holes to utilize the entire width of the loom. I alternated two ends white and two ends green on the warp.  I also alternated two picks white and two picks green on the weft.  This makes a wonderful houndstooth cloth. I wove the dishcloth 9 inches square. I hemstitched the beginning and end of the cloth while still on the loom. 

Houndtooth Fabric

Hemstitched edge and cardboard spacer

Loom ready for to weave. 

Supposed to use up stash. Well . . . I had the ecru in stash but bought the green cone yesterday. Hmmmm.

Having fun with the new Cricket, but I can see that this might not burn through the stash as much as had been hoped.

We’ll see.

Until next time. . . . . .