(This blog post was originally published September 11, 2012 on my first blog site, which is no longer in existence.)

The weaving projects chez moi have been far between. The last one, the diversified plain weave version of a crackle design, came off the loom in June. I was all set to do something completely different.

In early summer I was reading Weaving Today, and it seems the Handwoven folks had just put together an e-book compilation of projects using 10/2 cotton. I thought, just the ticket! I have a bunch of mini-cones of 10/2 cotton that I acquired in the, uh, mid-90’s. (They don’t go bad. Really.) So I bought it and downloaded it to my iPad. I liked the Turned Taquete Tea Towels project and I’ve seen other towels in the same technique, so I went ahead and wound a warp for a couple towels. Starting small.

But. The warp was going to be 20″ wide, and my inclination was to go ahead and order a temple to keep the weaving at an even width while weaving. I remember struggling with drawing-in cotton warps in years gone by, and really didn’t want to deal with those kind of problems any more. So I did order the temple, which is a whole other saga, and took a month+ to be delivered in one piece and in a box that didn’t fly open in transit. (They know who they are.)

So now it’s the end of July, and HOT. My sister is visiting, and we are suffering in 100+ heat. My studio is the sun room, on the south side of the house, and with no air conditioning. ‘Nuff said. No loom work going on then.

In mid-August the husband and I traveled to California for 12 days. On Day 5 I stumbled on stairs, going down to use the bathroom, and whacked my left hand on the bannister. I was so sleepy that I didn’t notice pain until I was sitting down and, you know…

I thought my pinkie was sprained. Really. It swelled, bruised up, but wasn’t really immobilizing. I could still function and attend fun vacation-type events. When I got back home, I scheduled a doctor visit as soon as I could, and got it x-rayed. Yup.

Fractured.

So what you see here is the total progress I’ve made threading this warp through the reed. I have threaded 3 bouts out of 5. Each bout has 120 threads and the grand total is 600. Hovering in blurry close-up is my hand, with my pinkie and 4th finger splinted together. I am in the 3rd week of 4 weeks of splinting. It’s anybody’s guess what will happen after that. I hope, fervently, that I can take it off for good and get some hand therapy for a while.

And don’t get me started about how much golf I’m missing.

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