happy valentine's day

i did a little bit of nail bling for today; nothing too big. it's 24kt gold flecks and a pink heart. i noticed that the 24kt thing was popular in the nail circuit, and remembered i had some flakes left over in a jar from when i was in college and focusing on illuminated manuscripts.

i've got a couple of things i'm messing around with right now, one being spinning on my tulipwood jay spindle. it's bombyx silk and camel. it drafts smoothly and spins with a subtle tawny stripe. the other thing is i traded my violin for a ukulele; just waiting on some better strings, then i'll start to learn how to play it.

for dinner tonight i made vegetarian pot pie filled with asparagus, mushrooms, peas, onion, carrots, and beans, topped with filo dough, and served with rose wine. for dessert i baked white chocolate and cherry scones with strawberry rose champagne tea. the theme was hearts and pink. i used things i found around the house that fit into those subjects. it's really enjoyable setting the table for a special event, i should do it more often.

bits of before

i snapped some photos before i left, and have finally gotten around to posting them. the silk noil and color grown green cotton blend spun up with interesting texture and i think will stay a single. happily, the hue wasn't diluted much at all by the addition of the white silk. this is before fulling and enhancing the color by an alkaline bath.

although it has been finished for awhile, here is the silk cosy for my kuchulu spindle. bright yellow, and soft pink; the influence being from the kumihimo kaitei.

gouache is definitely not gauche

way back in '00 i took a course about color; as part of the itinerary we had to compile a book from our notes and hand paint samples. scale forward to yesterday, while browsing my bookshelf i happened to open it, found i hadn't quite finished it, and decided to haul out the gouache paints.

there's something very fun about the flat hues gouache gives you; about how it goes down dark and as it dries the intensity lightens. the really neat thing is that it behaves like watercolor, but the opacity can be layered like acrylics. i hadn't painted with them for years, something about an instructor telling me that i needed to stay away from them unless i could learn to relax a bit in my painting style. sad to say, but i put them away after that.

as i already had my gouache paint out, i decided to paint the label of a paper bag. it was just a red stamp, kind of calling out to be painted, really. like the outlines in a coloring book. i think i shall paint more things with my brush and my gouache.

can-can

best in show sounded better than 1st place, so that's what i went with. i was being inspired by the more daring and colourful of the victorian tastes, as well as guavas. because the eyepatch is worn on a 3-dimensional surface, you can really see the beetle green backing fabric and deeper pink sheer ribbon peeking through from underneath the top layer; it made me think of petticoats and crinoline, which i love. this is one of my favorites.

in all their variety

i was searching through my ribbon drawers to find material for my latest eyepatch, and started sorting them a little better (purple in the pink drawer! peach which should be in the orange drawer! is this brown?!). the aubergine ribbons looked particularly lovely, so i had to take a snapshot of them. i love the dusky cornflower running into deepest amethyst, with the areas of mauve and fuchsia playing amuck along the borders. so many colours get filed under one name; there's such diversity to them, they're all deserving of being distinguished.

here's a sneak peek of my 5th eyepatch, it has something to do with ribbons...

pinks are lovely

i've been working on a set of headers, link buttons, and icons for the big switch. it's amazing what can be done with photos and preview. i really like the pink and natural tones. the odd guy out is the purple hued flickr profile picture (not in the photo montage), but that's fine. i like the odd duck or two.

mmm...sorbet

after making some adaptations to my flax wheel (mainly replacing the flyer hooks and smoothing the orifice), it spins a little better. i was able to spin up a pink batt i had made the other day; it reminds me mostly of raspberry sorbet.

weekend fun addendum

i spun up two of the batts i carded at the workshop. the batt formerly known as clown vomit was plied with a white alpaca. it was a definite learning experience. i spun it on my ancient flax wheel (which is quite the finicky beast when it comes to spinning anything thicker than fingering, and you can just about forget spinning fat and thin singles) and it may have taken me a few hours. i try not to think of it. the plying was done on a drop spindle (again, the ancient ones' fault, as it absolutely refuses to spin counter-clockwise). not that i don't enjoy plying on a drop spindle, but it is a little awkward to try any fancy art plying. but, in the end, i really like the color play and softness of the yarn.

after borrowing my good friend's schacht matchless spinning wheel, i spun up the purple batt, plied it, and was skeining in about an hour. wee! it's quite lovely, and i really like the flashes of purple silk and amethyst corriedale locks. another lesson learnt; it is true that you shouldn't mix differing lengths of fiber when creating a batt, as the longer fibers all but disappear while spinning (much like a corespun, with the longer fibers acting the part of the core).

lace is fantastic

while glancing through a piecework magazine i came across some needlelace. i'm always entranced by needlelace when i see it; it's really pretty, with delicate webbing, curving arabesques, tiny areas of transparency. venetian rose point lace, italian reticella, 17th/18th century italian lace, coraline, 17th century gros point de venise, point de neige, punto in aria, are all gorgeous examples. i decided to try my hand at making some, and found it quite mesmerizing, with lots of possibilities (you can't get more travel easy, it's just a needle and thread). my first tries are a little wonky, but i find them charming anyways.

one of the pieces i wove awhile back needed something more; needlelace in green would be just the thing. i went for a bit of playful flora, and attached it with a small brad which i painted with nail polish. i find it strange that antique lace was mostly made in white thread (some exceptions being black lace for mourning, and spanish mantilla lace). it would make it easier to change between clothing, and it would be punchier against the rich hues of the fabric, but i think lace could be so much more modern if it were done in color.

little weavings

i've been struggling with my last couple of warps. i get an image in my head, not clear or precise, just go with it, and put planning aside. pretty much just warping first and thinking about the weft later. with this set of weavings it worked out well, as i was able to experiment with a variety of warp threads and techniques.

using a fine paper yarn and a strip of bunny fur created a light, tiny weave with open spaces woven in silk. i need to frame this one, but am still working on that part.

this one was a mixture of kasuri remnants from a previous piece; very speckled.

the curly weft threads all but lost the linen warp, which is cool, as it brought focus to the pile weavings. it was quite fun to try these surface embellishments, hopefully i can use them in future pieces.

linen on linen can be boring, but the pattern really comes through, and the shots of cochineal dyed cotton add interest.

this yellow thread was really fun, so chunky, and made the pattern huge compared to the first one. i played with some pile weaves and a chain stitch like weave in purple yarn.

there was a tiny bit of warp left, so i finished off with some cottolin and bamboo.

i have another linen warp now on the loom, but i'm a little lost as to what weft will be going on it. i had wanted to use a tsumugi silk yarn, but it completely overwhelms the warp, so i need to do some planning. i shall spin some wool, and think some more.

creative organizing

i started a natural dye sample book to keep track of what i've done so far. when i was working on my kasuri piece i added those yarns to it right after i was done; mostly the tiny remnants which were left after weaving. then, today, while waiting for the mistletoe to simmer, i decided to add cuts of the material i had dyed last year. it's filling up nicely, and i realize that pinks, oranges, yellows, and greens are the only colors i've made as of yet. i need to do some dyeing with purples, greys, and blues.

while i was at it, i made some cuttings to do a lightfastness test. they looked really pretty in the window. i hope they don't fade, or only slightly. i think a part of me likes to remain in denial of the dyes fading, so i didn't do any testing till now. which is a bad way to go about creating things; knowledge gained is never such a horrid thing.

things we create

well, as i await the necessary unbuffered acid free tissue paper so that i may mail it off to japan, i thought i would finally unveil the piece i've been working on. i'm quite fond of it, and would like to keep it forever, as it's the first truly artistic piece i feel i've done in awhile.

i used cochineal and osage orange on a tin mordanted silk to get the various salmon hues, cochineal for the raspberry color, and osage orange for the weft kasuri. the binding process took awhile, as there were many lengths of fiber that needed to be resisted. dyeing was an interesting experiment, as i wanted a soft gradation of lighter to darker pink near the top. this was the first serious natural dyeing that i did without a clear formula for proceeding. i used my notes from japan, the book indigo, madder and marigold, and random recollections from my memory of things i've read. now, my hope is that the dye colors will all hold up to time and the environment. well, fingers crossed.

glimpses of the whole

i'm not quite ready to show you the entire piece yet, but here are some glimpses of my naturally dyed kasuri weaving. i am in love with the texture and feel of the viscose silk, and really want to create more pieces from it. it took the dye really well, considering the stiffness and texture. the dye worked itself into the core of the silk, so i think it will last okay. i will be mailing this piece off to japan next month to be in an exhibit of work by students of the kawashima textile school, where i studied a few months ago. i'm very excited, as it will be first piece in an exhibit.

rings and things

i like creating jewellery when i really had no such intention of doing so. while contemplating my current weaving project, i was fiddling around with a bit of wool i had attempted to dye, and ended up creating a fuzzy ring. it covered my gold ring very well, and put me in mind of a book i read a long time ago where the main character hid a ring with a bit of scrap so as not to be separated from it. the ring was quite crucial to the entire four book story, many things relied on it and what it kept secret. and, no, it wasn't the tolkein series, but another fantastical series, memory, sorrow, and thorn by tad williams.

one thing i noticed about wearing wool jewellery, is the warmth; my hand remained quite toasty all day. another, is that for such a large piece the softness prevented it from hurting when grasping something hard, or from weighing the hand down and cutting off circulation. neat.

process as a start

i've become a green tea addict, and to further encourage this obsession i keep some yummy genmaicha extra green tea triangles in my studio. storing them was going to be an issue until i came upon a wooden cigar box at the local wine/beer/cigar store which didn't smell, removed the so-so label and replaced it with pretty paper where it was still sticky. i'm quite happy with my $2 find, and it fits 30 tea envelopes at a time.

i finished my cotton kasuri sampler today, and have begun the weaving process on my first project since coming home. i have the loom mostly threaded now, but i thought i would post some photos of the progress.

my inspiration board has a photo of a flamingo along with some fabric swatches to give myself an indication of what color direction i wanted to head in while dyeing. this was a starting point mostly; i also drew up a version on graph paper and a color drawing to get a more exact idea of placement and measurements.

the dye process took two days, and i learned a lot from this; i'm thinking exact notes on what i did are going to be a problem, as i tinkered with the dyeing as i went along in order to get the colors i wanted at that moment, depending on what was happening in the pot. but with everything dry, i think it will work out. the hardest point i had was developing a gradient range of one hue; it was moderately successful, i won't know for sure until i've woven with them.

hopefully tomorrows work goes well, and i will try to remember to take photos as i go along. i won't say anything as corny as "new year's goal".

happenings of the strange

i awoke quite early this morning, rather unexpectedly, as it is not my usual way; i prefer to be awoken when the sun shines brightly into my face. what met my eyes was something eerie, though pretty; the paper shades which cover my windows was aglow in a magnificent pink light. i took a photo of it, and watched it fade into a pink-lavender shade, then into the crisp blue of a cool morning as the sun ascended into the sky.

still going strong

the solar dyed avocado took up about the same amount of dye as heating it on the stove in the second bath, so that's interesting. there seams to be a significant amount of dyestuff in the avocado, so it's a good thing that i've been saving up the skins.

the shibori experiment went well, i'm really enjoying the calla lily-like patterning of the second piece (some bead work to enhance it would be pretty, or possibly some metallic thread embroidery). i will set these pieces aside and work on them more later.

stitching together

well, i decided to go ahead and just do some simple stitching on the mini quilt to finish it. there really weren't any disastrous needle incidents; besides the moment i sewed my thumb, but luckily there was no loss of blood involved.

i quite like the rippling texture, it's very much like viewing the crops lined up in fields while one is in a plane overhead. the backside came out okay, but not really photo worthy. i decided to create the whole piece by hand sewing; it's so small as to be a completely accomplishable task.

will i do another one? i'm not really sure, perhaps not anytime soon. but there is a stack of wheat and lavender fabrics i've been collecting.

mini quilt in progress

i was a little bored the other day, so i put together the lottis jansdotter lavender sachet i received as a subscription gift from selvedge. the linen is so soft and fine, i wish i could have more of it.

i also started on a miniature quilt that i had been mentally processing for awhile. i felt it was time. so i cut the scrap pieces i had, rather randomly into squares and rectangles, arranged them nicely and hand sewed them together. it went together quickly and i was able to reuse the natural linen pouch my gift came in as the backing.

now that i have it pinned together i'm rather at a loss for what to do. should i quilt it with little crosses, use a sashiko technique of scallops, hand stitch rectangles and squares in mimic of the patches?

part of me wants to save it for the long plane trip i have ahead of me in four weeks, but part of me wants to just go ahead and finish. i think perhaps i shall set it aside for now, let it simmer in the recesses of my mind, and come back to it when the time is right.

underneath

i'm really enjoying my experiments with natural dyestuffs. the exhaust baths are incredible! the first soak in the avocado skins gave me a cool medium pink, but when i reused the dyebath a second time the cloth became a warm pinky peach, mostly pale in saturation.

with the red onion skins the first fiber batch came out a yellow green shade, and the second dyebath was a rich olive green. i wasn't able to reuse the marigold dyebath, as i poured it down the drain foolishly. but i'm hard at work collecting every bloom my little plant throws forth!

i wonder what would happen if i were to change the ph of the dyebath? i must pick up ph strips when i go grocery shopping again, and do some reading research. i would also like to collect more local dyestuffs. i'm on the lookout for sumac berries (which aren't ready yet), eucalyptus leaves, and anything else that would yield somewhat colorful material. i would love to dye some purples, for instance. anyone in the south east have any good sources or plants i whould look out for?