Big Rain yesterday. Big.
Picked the rest of the indigo, which seems to ever renew. Most of it anyway. Figuring it would get crushed in the downpour.
Indigo, the salt method over previously dyed scrap, Pom and oak. I like an earthy color. A colored base layer helps.
This morning. Indigo, the salt method take 2, to deepen the color, promising.
The pineapple top is sprouting, can't even remember how many times I tried this. Enough I guess.
There she is, holding the earth and the sky (and me) all at once.
Indian Summer has taken hold, at least for a bit. The most glorious of days.
Just to test the water really, the water that rises from this earth.
Here, almost dry. (there is a little video over at Instagram of the same) This was a quick, (impatient) bundle around a can, silk noil. Dogwood leaf, Oak leaf, Coreopsis, fresh Indigo, some flowering Weed. The bath, soaked acorns plus some concentrated leftover walnut brew that I actually carried here because I have not found a source here yet. A quick cook, like 20 minutes, a quick cool and unroll. Just to see, actually. The water here is way different and I don't remember getting these great turquoises from bundling indigo before. I will continue leisurely as windfall increases here. Let them cook longer and cure a bit. Just to know. The Japanese Maple is turning.
I cooked this in the kitchen, the windows were open yesterday. Maybe we can build a little outside fireplace while it is still warm. There is certainly enough rock to work with. It is awfully dry here though, at the moment. I keep that in mind.
My energy is surging. Perhaps I have just accepted this unlikely spot as home. Acceptance is powerful. Loose the baggage I say to myself.
Also, there was a quick sketch.
Jar 1, Rainwater and whatever fell in there since we moved here 8 months ago. Oak droppings mostly. a penny I found in between the boards on the deck, along with some loose moss scraped from the steps.
Jar 2. A few weeks of tea bags, some coffee grounds, oak galls that fell to the ground, a piece of muslin wrapped around an old metal key wrapped with copper wire, some of what was in jar 1, and oh, 2 wildflower blooms at the last minute. Heated once and set out to brew for a weeks.
Jar one is still there.
Below, came out of Jar 2:
Trying to connect. Still a stranger here.
Today just tired of trying to say.
Maybe snow tomorrow.
The season's first Earth Yellows. Saving them for something.
Feeling it...
We had to replace the old stovepipe joint last spring.
There it is like a big root vegetable in a summer soup. Looks ready for something.
The little stone house we wanted to buy got snatched up before we could get it together.
And walnuts are dropping.
Cloth Weaving with plant dyed scrap.
Dyed here. This place.
A kind of Home Base then. For the shop. And then not. Because it became a place to be for a while.
Nine. Nine dujour. I think it's a habit work keeping.
Dots. Like an excavation. This is turned reverse applique which you find in the Applique Lesson of Spirit Cloth 101. Here.
Cloth Weaving makes the the layering element(a kind of alignment) in the weaving process more apparent. When you weave with thread or yarn it is hard to notice how it is the process of appearing and disappearing that creates the structure as well as the pattern possibility, the magic. And with the cloth method, the layers can be manipulated in a different way. I like this built in layering of cloth. Being able to sense it, it lures me into playing with it. There is new form always waiting when a technique is reconsidered.
I have a bit of work to do, to put the process index back on track for Feel Free. But it will be ok. Just tweaking things and keeping it more simple and less ambitious (that disease that has to be kept in check). The Feel Free site will be back up in a month or so. As simply a methods index. A Glossary. Just to make things easier to find. I'm sorry, this stuff takes a while to settle. And again thanks for kind donations to those folks that I never seem to find by responding through Paypal. Love you all.
Just thinking how I feel lately like there is no time for anything.
Nothing is getting done.
But in the course of a day, so many things get done. It's hard actually, to find the time to count them all.
The surroundings are doing a lot of the doing at the moment. I'm drinking it in.
This is the ninth trial. So guess I can say, yes, avocado leaves print green. On old silk, wrapped around a can and steamed for about an hour. I'm not seeing any fading or color change. I'm going to do another round. My avocado tree is now 11 feet tall. From a pit! Too big to put outside this season. It drops leaves now and then. Thank you.
Sometimes.
What we want need needs rethinking.
Confusion continues as we rethink so many things here. Mostly triggered by aging and what that might mean in terms of comfort and challenge. We speak to each other about how being two makes that different than being alone. We openly acknowledge that two is probably temporary no matter which way things go. So we talk about the importance of independence as it relates to relocating.
I did close the studio. It's cold. If we find some cheap wood maybe I'll crank up the old stove once again.
For now, Soul-o has found a place in between in and out. He thinks it's just swell.
I cut up a lot of old starts that weren't going anywhere and threw them in the last remaining dye liquid overnight. New bases maybe. Old ideas are never useless. I like how they seem to be returning into earth.
If the path before you is clear,
you are probably on
someone else's.
-Carl Jung
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