sowing seeds

Almost everything begins from a seed.  Today I collected seeds from the garden-edible seeds. The flowers of the nigella plant look like this:

nigella flowers

I originally collected these seeds in Santa Cruz at Nat’s house. She doesn’t live there anymore but is moving again and maybe next year she can plant some of the seeds I have collected.  They are very easy to grow. And lovely.

The seed pods form and are as interesting as the flowers- shibori striped even!

nigella pods

The pods ripen and begin to dry, each pod opening into a star shaped pattern to spill forth its bounty of very black seeds-a single seed springs forth a plant of many flowers, pods and seeds. Such is the nature of harvest’s bounty.

nigella seeds

and close up- they are marvelous looking. and tiny.

seed detail

They are edible and taste like tropical fruit! very delicate…Maura says to add them to potatoes with a bit of tumeric like a stir fry. Apparently common in India.  I was attracted to them for their interesting seed pods and blue flowers and only later discovered what they were and that they were edible.

-but back to sowing seeds…. I’m paying more attention to my harvests this time of year.  Thinking of future harvests and the seeds I sow today. Much patience is required. And some planning.

The garden is a perfect metaphor for my work I think. I have been sowing many kinds of seeds this year. The indigo, for example, began as a seed and has grown into this-

indigo harvest-so far, 2 cuttings. one more to go.

Even the silkworm eggs are called “seeds” by the Japanese. I have been practicing my mawata making with the cocoons. and dyeing some of them-

mawata from my own cocoons, dyed

Some of them I have been using to integrate felting into the shibori ribbon and flower work. It is working out well.  Some new things are on the horizon.  Ideas can be seeds too. Sowing ideas.

I received several emails today that had me thinking in various directions. More on that later. Tomorrow even. Intentions are to keep the blog more up to date. In shorter posts more likely, as there is a lot of work to be done.