Baby blanket blues

Actually, there would be two reasons to ask Dr. Fantabulous about the sex of the baby. In addition to the whole male name drama, there's the baby blanket situation. I wove this baby blanket for the Small Boy

and I want to weave a blanket for this baby as well. But it's been very difficult find a yarn to work with. I'm not a terribly advanced weaver and I only have a four-shaft loom; what this means is that the patterns I'm capable of working with - as a result of limitations of both skill and technology - are quite basic. I rely on color and texture to produce interesting work. Small Boy's blanket uses the most basic of all weave structures, a plain weave, but by working with a nubby yarn in multiple colors I was able to put together a blanket that's far more interesting than the underlying weave structure could ever be.

I've had a heck of a time finding a good yarn this time around. There's not a lot textured out there - a good nubby popcorn yarn can make almost anything interesting - or I can't find the right combination of gender-neutral colors, or both. I thought I found a nice yarn to work with (it's the one called Pearl on this page), but when I put it on the loom to weave a sample, three of my warp threads broke under tension and as a result of friction from the beater; I know there is a fix to this problem (probably involving fewer ends per inch), but I don't really have the time or inclination to find it just now. Another interesting yarn (the mohair at the very bottom of this page) turns out to look far too fragile and etherial for a baby blanket (and might be scratchy for the little one), though it would make a lovely scarf for me.

I decided to go back to a yarn I've worked with before (it's the one called Zoom); I know exactly how it behaves on the loom so I only need to make the smallest of samples to see how the colors work together (I am running out of time on this, after all). There are some nice colors available and by scouring this book I was able to find a pattern that appears complex but can still be woven on a four-shaft loom. I picked my gender-neutral colors, wove my sample, drew up my final pattern draft, did my warp and weft calculations, and went to buy the yarn.

And there's not enough of one of the colors I need, one of the colors that I really need, and it could take up to four weeks to order it (that would put me at week 38 before I could even start the thing, for those of you not keeping track at home). I can't deal with picking out an entirely different yarn at this point; I'd have to recalculate the sett and weave a real sample to see how the yarn behaves on the loom and I really don't feel like doing that; hunching over a loom threading heddles with this bulging belly is no fun and I'd like to do it as little as possible. There are, however, three shades of blue in the Zoom that would make a splendid blanket for a boy. (There are not, however, three equally splendid stereotypical girl colors; in fact, in the absence of the purple I really need I'm having a hard time finding three gender-neutral colors I want to work with.) If it's a boy, I could make a really really nice baby blanket. If it's a boy.

This is not a good reason to call Dr. Fantabulous's office and ask for the sex, is it?