I’ve been thinking about weaving for the last year or two… but since we moved from a good-sized house into a shithole apartment and I’m under-employed, buying a loom is very stupid on many counts at the moment – besides I don’t even know where to start with the various kinds/types/styles of looms and what I ultimately might like best.
I was a very crafty child and was fortunate to have parents who encouraged it, so I would get various tools and supplies for my birthday – rug hooking kits, cross stitch stuff, beads, millions of yards of embroidery floss for friendship bracelets, and the like. I can’t remember the details of when I got this loom – maybe the late 1970s or early ’80s? It is German or Germanic and I can’t imagine where my mom found it in the Midwest back then. Fast forward to a few months ago, and I found it in their basement where it had miraculously survived their last slash and burn move, and voila! I have a loom. So ok, it is a kiddie toy, but I’ve made a couple of smallish strips of fabric from it and they have promise to become part a larger item – I’m thinking of incorporating them into bags. And the loom has a good slot size (actual term?) for handspun, so it’s great for using up leftovers not much good for anything else – I’m pleasantly surprised how much further yardage goes in weaving rather than knitting.
But now I think I’ve been bitten by a small weaving bug… I wish there was a loom fairy or I’d be lucky enough to find one thrifting – I’ve heard tales of that actually happening (the thrifting bit, not the fairy)…
ASTITCHMATISM 
A: It is awesome that you “found” a loom and B: that you actually made a kids toy work! I looked up a lot of “make your own loom” stuff on YouTube, made something out of cardboard and the end result looks like a Blair Witch prop, so Bravo ,YOU!
Thank you! Yeah, a lot of those DIY tools and equipment are tempting to attempt – I’d love to make a spinning wheel from an old bicycle!
Maybe put some yarn under your pillow to entice the loom fairy…just a suggestion!
Ah if only… I had a cheap-ass tooth fairy, so if they’re in cahoots, I’d probably just get one of those plastic potholder looms…
Loom fairies are out there!
I was holding a casual conversation with a customer while at work. Somehow the conversation went from kaleidoscopes to weaving and it turned out the lady was an ex weaver trying to get rid of a loom!! She had a Nilus Leclerc loom and nobody wanted it….. and said that I could have it for free if I could figure out how to get it from Southern California to Arizona.
I did some fast thinking and talking, and found a friend who was traveling to her area to visit family. I paid my friend for her gas for the trip….. and she hauled the loom back here for me!
Believe in loom fairies….. who knows what will turn up!
Thank you for the wonderful story – it gives me hope!