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Mullien and Willow at 7 AM this morning.
This is mullien too. If I can find some red clover I'm going to make a salve with some of this. Another herb I am growing for a salve:
Yarrow, just about to bloom.
And another guest in the garden...
Hummingbird on the grape vine at at 6:00 last night. He's a shy one and won't let me come too close.
"If we teach young people to run away from the darkness rather than to open to the light in the darkness, to be candles, the sign posts, then we are doing great harm to them and the communities that they have come out of." Vincent Harding
From an interview on "On Being."
Spun on my drop spindle.
Wool in onion skin dye bath. I strained out the skins before placing the wool into the container.
and storage for wool and yarn:
I made the polka dot bag today to store the wool fleece I've been washing and drying.
New post at bee creative cooking.
My horoscope says that the next couple weeks will be a good time to "build a buzz"...hmmm. The garden seems to be doing that all by itself.
I've decided that my weekly posts for bee creative cooking will be on Sundays for the summer. Just works better.
But I do have something to share. This year I set myself the goal to try some new things, to revisit old things. To reflect on what is important to me and how I spend my time. One of the things I decided to try was a writing class. And so I am writing fiction and poetry again. Something I did as a teenager and in college but not so much over the last 20 years.
Over the last couple months I've gone back and forth about sharing. And how to share. I started another blog specifically for fiction and poetry.
It makes more sense to me to keep it separate from what is here. Posts will probably be pretty sporadic. I'll place a link here when I do post something new.
Here it is: mythic bee
Hooray the fermentation indigo vat (that I learned how to do here) is still working:
Testing with cotton and wool (before and after). It is very subtle on the wool, but oh so pretty.
Pots, pans, and tubs that I keep using:
The pot the keeps my fermenting indigo dye bath, next to the old phone book that I use to absorb wet messes. With a lid from another pot.
Other pots I use for dyeing.
The salad spinner I soak and dry wool fleece in.
The wash tub that I am growing indigo in to be used like this or this.
All containers that are finding use after their original jobs.
Thinking about Kevin Kling's story about the cracked pot that talks and says, "Please replace me." And the man replies, "You don't understand. As you spill, you water the wildflowers by the side of the path."
A butterfly (red admiral) and a wildflower (Dame's Rocket):
I wish these were in my garden...
"Gone to the fields to be lovely. Be back when I'm through blooming."
Lynn Ungar, found here.
Not done blooming, but I'll be back tomorrow.
Ideas come from community and so
woman with a moon face
or
maybe a beast about to swallow the moon.
Depends on perspective.
In this case a 90 degree turn.
Yellow wool dyed with onion peels.
Brown dyed with hazelnut leaves.
Blue layer dyed with homegrown indigo.
Polk-a-dots made with black beans.
#1 I read about using wine bottles to make raised beds in a local publication. I don't have enough bottles yet so for now I'm using them as dividers. Cucumbers were planted in this space.
#2 One of the few things I buy in plastic is distilled vinegar for cleaning. Usually I cut the top off to use as a mini-hot cap for plants. They also work great as a scoop if the top is left on. The bottoms I use for dyeing small batches of fabric.
#3 Cardboard and burlap coffee bags for mulch.
I hope my squash plants survive the slugs...
Field notes: Today's high, 76 degrees F., visibility 10 miles, winds calm. Time the chickens rise: 5:31 Time the chickens go to bed: 8:42 PM