Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Waulking 2007










We did it again, this time with blues, golds, rusts, and browns. Thirteen weavers wove off 15 yards of Harrisville Highland in a plaid over the last two weeks. On this past Saturday, the 28th of September, we waulked it, the old fashioned Scottish way. Miss Knitty had her paws in it as well, when we measured the fabric after we took it off the loom; the take up measured the fabric to 13 yards.





We started shortly after 2:00 PM with much enthusiasm, everyone seated in their chairs. The process only takes about 20 minutes. Taylor joined us and sang Gaelic Waulking songs from Scotland. So cool and generous of him to do this for us!




After about 20 minutes "beat, pull, pass, Beat, pull, pass" someone said, " Can we be done? Let's look at it and see if we are done!" So we spread it open, looked at the structure of the fulled fabric, and YES, decided it was done!




Traditionally, the women would have cut the cirlce of the fabric open, and then rolled it over a beam. Traditionally, we at NW Handspun Yarns have paraded it around the block by a few courageous souls, and so, keeping is tradition, for the 2nd year, that's just what we did!




Culturally, in Scotland, it's not something that's done anymore, as Taylor said, there are machines that full wool fabric now. But there are groups all over the world now that remind us of our past, and the way things were once done. We will continue to do this activity each year in the fall at our anniversary sale, to bring back a little bit of history, from the world of fiber!
Thank YOU! To everyone who wove and participated in this year's waulking!