I’m in the middle of prepping for a workshop at JANM but it’s dark now and cold and wet outside so…will catch up with another blog post and see if I can get this one done without too much fuss.
(Picking this up where I left off, so no, I did not get it done!) Honestly, it used to be quiet in the mornings when I liked to write but these days we have planes overhead every 2-3 minutes between 9 am and noon (and at altitudes between 350-750 feet”!). It’s too infuriating- I just can’t concentrate- even with noise cancelling headphones. We now have a GoFundMe for hiring legal counsel. Wish us luck! After the recent storms, we need a new roof and I’m very tempted to put a two tone shingled message up there for all the pilot nutcases that tell us to “just move if you don’t like it!”. I’m taking suggestions…
First, did I mention I dug up the madder bed? Guess I should go back and see. BRB…
OK…I mentioned it in a photo. A little more detail is in order. It’s been about 3 years since I relocated it to it’s current location. Time to check it out and see… It had recently rained so the ground was friendly and easy to dig. Lots of ginko leaves fall here and has added to create the nice loamy dirt. I collected quite a pile of roots and if you have ever dug madder, you know that the fresh roots are very fragile and break easily. It must be hell to get them out of hard soil. I collected them and washed them off, putting them on a windowscreen to dry. Then it rained for several days. Eventually, after a couple of rainstorms here they dried out to a fair degree. I saw online my dyer friend Deb McClintok was doing some tests with roasting and steaming her madder root so I watched and waited on her results. She is much more scientific than I- roasting at various temps, with and without steaming. She keeps copious records. I admire that from afar. The one thing I did like about the roasting was that it allows the root to be ground and broken up much easier than simply drying the roots. At present time, I have a small batch soaking and I hope to dye some cotton with it tomorrow.
Getting back to the madder… all the rain slowed down the drying process and delayed further madder dyeing for now. I was going to impress you with a photo of the difference between the madder on cotton vs silk but couldn’t find the silk piece I dyed. Then I remembered I cut it up and sent it out in the moon circle with the madder and cochineal moons for January. You’ll just have to trust me. The silk was like FIRE! The cotton, not so much. I’ll devote the rest of the madder to silk as it was SO beautiful! Will get back to this soon.
In the meantime, I’m prepping for a new workshop at the Japanese American National Museum. Two actually. But the first one is March 9 & 10 (tickets located here). I’m looking forward to this one as it is all about making whole cloth with scraps. I called it Practical Cloth Making. As many of my workshops, it’s open-ended in that you get to choose what you make with the cloth and each one will be unique. I will have many samples and the kits for this will be very fun. The other day I was going to a movie at a local outdoor mall here and walked by a Levi’s store. In the window they had posters of sashiko stitched indigo cloth patchwork all across the front windows. Also in the front there was a space with sewing machines. We went in and asked what this was all about and the gal there said that they do customizations – such as alterations, hems, distressing, patching, altered logos and so forth. They had a small notebook with examples. I asked what the poster was about and she said that previously they had some table coverings with that boro like sashiko (though she didn’t know the terms) for display purposes and people were always asking if they could cut them up for customizing their jeans. They couldn’t as she said they were very expensive but they were told (or told to say IDK) that they would be getting some fabric like this in stock in the future (no known timeframe). Just thought it was interesting…
Anyway, we will have great fun making whole cloth. Maybe you can join us! This is a workshop to relax, stitch, create and wonder. Spend some worry free time, playfully wondering with us!
In the garden, weeds abound but the color of the moment is YELLOW! A sign of things to come. Of sunshine after rain, of happiness, of Springtime!
The garagio is drying out once again. March moons will begin soon. If you’d like to join the circle, here’s a link.
I started this post on a rainy, wet, dark day and ended it on a sunny bright and breezy one. And the recently dug madder bed is already send up shoots again!