Coats have *two* sleeves.

Math and I, we are not best friends.

Today I got the second body panel finished, the hood woven, and one sleeve …  I didn’t put enough warp on for both sleeves. And now I’m second guessing the sleeve length calculations anyway, so that’s fine, I’ll add some more warp and do two proper sleeves next time I am weaving.

The two body pieces are presently in the washer, fulling. Anxiety provoking? Yes. :)

So let me tell you the other trick I used when warping this project. The body panels are the widest, they need almost the full width of the loom. But the hood is narrower, and the sleeves narrower still, and there’d be either a lot of wasted warp or some futzing around trying to make it all fit on the same width of warp. So, I improvised.

Because I have a sectional warp beam, I wound the widest part of the warp just long enough to do the body panels. Then the middle part was long enough to do the body panels plus the hood, and the very centre was long enough to do the body panels plus the hood plus (one, but shoulda been two) sleeves. When I finished weaving the second body panel, the outer warp sections were all used up, so I just cut them free and let the fabric hang loose. The centre threads used for the hood were all still connected and under tension, so it worked out fine. When the hood was done, same trick … cut a few more threads at the back and I was left with just enough warp to do the sleeve. A little bit of futzing and I can get the last sleeve woven off as well, then it’ll be a matter of piecing everything together properly.

The pattern called for weaving a slit into the coat body where the arms go, but I forgot to do that, and with the heavy fulling I think cutting the fabric and stabilizing the edges with stitching is going to be fine. That also allows for a bit more flexibility in how things go together, too, and it’s the way the Hudson’s Bay blanket coats are done.

The machine is spinning.

Maybe it’s almost done.

… pace … pace … pace

BEEPITY BEEP!

…

…

WHEW! It worked!

(bad lighting indoors at night, sorry)

The panels are almost *exactly* the size called for in the pattern: 25” wide instead of 25.5” (but there is a lot of ease in the pattern so that’s fine) and 51” long (pattern calls for 45”, and I could clearly have gone shorter, this’ll be nearly ground length). The fringes felted up nicely, just like they did on the horse blanket. There’s a pattern error or two, but nothing horribly noticeable and hey, it’s hand woven and it’s the first one, so … that’s fine by me.

I have the hood and the part of a sleeve / possibly a full sleeve, depending how things work out in the washer now, so that I have all the measurements I need for when I warp up the loom next.

It’s progress!

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Okay I got the hood and the ‘possible sleeve’ out of the washer and measured. I need to do the sleeves differently, they’ll be the same width as the hood on the loom, so that makes warping a bit simpler. I’ll warp up for just two sleeves the day after tomorrow and get those woven up, then I can sew!

On tomorrow’s to do list: buy button thread. :)