After spending so much time focusing on house painting, the garden is really out of control. Today I discovered some of the prunes were ready to pick.
I haven't had a chance to make more paper yet. This is from the indigo batch. The ink in the middle is indigo ink.
It makes a wonderful digital layer.
Still reading Your Brain on Art by Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross and am really enjoying it. Lots of research but easy to read and very interesting. Found this quote yesterday.
We are driven to learn. We long to fit the puzzle pieces together, to solve the mystery, to figure things out. We are a curious and questioning species by nature. Our desire to learn is inate, and if we're lucky, we won't have it tamped out of us. The best kind of learning sparks curiosity and, in return, endless discovery; it's your own renewable energy source."
The calendula will be used for salve and the marigolds for dye.
All of this, but the cheese (and the sugar for the jam), came from the farmer's market. The cheese is local, a smoked scamorza. It's really yummy with apricot jam.
I've started a new project...baby blanket for a coworker. Her favorite color is pink! I also know she likes granny squares so it's a safe bet that she will like this. There is no way that I am going to finish it in time though...the baby is due in September.
This week's collection on some cord that I made. A dried rose from the garden, a shell and a bead from Venice Italy.
Third batch of paper, made with recycled paper, a paper wasp nest (found last year in a shed), and dried rose petals. The next batch is going to include some lichen.
And something else...
Most of my non-work time this week has been spent on the house. One of my brothers is helping me with the upper story. My next task is to sand the rails on the front porch.
This makes me smile.
The first quilt that I made for myself was shades of pink and yellow...
I think I want to set myself a goal of doing this every Sunday. Gathering a few things, assembling them, taking a picture, altering the image when it seems right (this one was altered-a filter for color and a layer to patch a spot) and then sharing what I've done.
I've been reading Your Brain on Art by Ivy Ross and Susan Magsamen. The book makes an argument for the arts/aesthetics being just as important for our health as good nutrition, exercise and rest. That our brains need to make meaning out of our experiences and that the arts (and this is defined very broadly), give us the opportunity to do so.
Which brings me back to paper and ink...
My next batch of paper is drying on the front porch.
Chopped threads and a bit of wool added to some of the paper pulp and water.
What it looked like as paper.
I am wondering at what point would there be too much thread and not enough paper to hold together?
I am also thinking of wet felting. I have added threads to wool to make a textured felt and to make yarn.
This was made by laying the thread on top of the paper pulp while it was on the screen and then flipping it off the screen to dry. I will be doing more of this!
The threads that were placed on top of the wet paper and then pressed into the paper with my fingers didn't stay very well.
Now I know.
And for this one I made a piece of paper as the base, laid strings across the paper and then placed another piece of paper over the top. I have done something similar to this with wool felt.
When I am ready I will drop ink on top.
I am thinking a lot about how felt making and paper making are very similar.
Adding thread to the paper I've been making has been on the to-do list. I tried it this evening.
One strand, as an experiment.
Little ends.
This is mostly what I want to do...as a way to use them.
I tried it two ways. First laying the threads on the wet pulp while it was still on the screen and before flipping it on to the towel and then for the second attempt, just pressing the threads into the wet paper.
This is some of this batch of pulp as dry paper. The indigo rinse water has made a nice soft blue.
I'll share my results tomorrow.
My long term goal is to set up one corner of the covered porch as an outdoor studio...for dyeing, pigment making and paper making. Oh...and basket making. I've signed up for a class on basket making, something I've wanted to do for a long time. There are so many possible basket making materials in my garden. It's another way of connecting to what is local, to place. A kind of field note.
Other things...
Sour cherries at Mom and Dads. I have enough to make jam and plan to do so tomorrow.
A wee little box.
Playing with filters.
The boys are working on their scynchronized head turning.
"And the space you held as a singer is all about the gaps you leave, because that’s the orchestration, that’s the arrangement, that’s where the listener can enter in. That’s the invitation. And learning from those old singers, you know, I really learned a lot in that art, and here was the nightingale doing exactly the same thing, even better, with such grace. And the timing that he leaves between expressions was formidably brave. And in that space, so much is happening. Although it’s silence, you know, it’s a very rich and fertile place for the imagination, for listening deeper into the places that one never knew they could hear, inside and outside."