Heddles 'n' Harnesses.

Last night, it was cold and rainy outside and very cold in the garage, so I gathered up the bundle of sixteen harnesses (which were sort of co-tangled, with the Texsolv heddles sticking to any protrusion that they could find) and brought them up to the living room to sort and de-tangle.

It took me about an hour, which was reassuring since I was expecting it to take rather longer.  I gathered all the heddles towards the middle of the harnesses in order to prevent futher tangling. 

The wooden bars of each harness were joined by the heddles, and whoever packed up the harnesses had very carefully tied a fabric apron tie round them to keep it all together.  Amazingness is in the details: the knots on the apron ties were flat and beautiful and made so carefully.  It made me wonder at the skills of the person who had tied those knots.  I wonder when, in the history of this loom, they were tied.  The tiny incidental details of things can be very thrilling - especially when seen in a historical context.  It's the minor things that make me feel so connected to others in the past, remote from me in time.

After I finished detangling the sixteen harnesses, I tied them all together in order to prevent them from tangling until the time I could get them on the loom.  I got back downstairs in the garage and found it too cold, and it was getting late and my body was calling for sleep.  BUT...I really wanted to put those harnesses on the loom! 

I decided that I would mount one harness and then go to bed.  It was a little fiddly getting it on due to the behavior of the sprung lamms below, but I did it.  It's hard to describe exactly, but the sprung lamms operate not unlike a compound bow.   Until I got into the right position, one side kept plopping down with a sonorous DOIIIIIIYYYYING sound, but once I got it right it snapped right into place.  Just for grins, I moved the dobby so that the metal stop on the dobby cable for that harness fit nicely into the dobby bar, which I pulled down to make the harness lift.  It did.  And as I released the dobby bar, I heard the dobby advance with its characteristic clickety-clack sound.

Hopefully tonight I will feel less tired (I slept fitfully last night) and get at least an additional portion of the harnesses mounted.