Abundance...dance

WL...working on this felted stictched piece for an "art in the garden"show....have several pieces to put a small assemblage together...then of course there was eco printing! And I was really p,eased with the results....having even printed ferns...and of course, walnut, eucs, and some geranium...busy days of summer...

Um...

New best friend.....

Loving how the plants are printing this time of year....this first one is like a japanese water colour, and the eucatus are so generous ...the third pic is my new best friend , i am in love with every part of the cotinus plant it is particularly beautiful to me and is in full bush right now...still looking for something to give me lines in the printing but am thrilled with what i am getting, even did a cotton tee and although paler print,, came out quite distinct...the air is abuzz with bees and creative energy, i am exhausting myself each day and loving it....

On a roll or ten!!,

Sweet eucalyptus.....such a generous plant, and oak leaves....who knew? Experimenting with different plants and different mordants and having lots of fun, must document, which isn't my favourite thing, i get lost in the doing and work spontaneously with whatever surfaces....exciting for me but not very consistent....but i am really open to whatever happens, perhaps too much...

Spring plants, I thought were not noted for there giving up of colour, usually I hear fall plants, freshly fallen. But these seem to be working and I have more experiments on the workbench, plus some logwood and madder chips soaking....

Continuing to try and make housework and cooking as joyful as my workbench, but not too successful,yet ;))

Zip it up.....

Welll zippers seem to have found there way onto my workbench through the fabulous wooly fabulous, who has been working with zippers for eons and is a master at it....so another obsession which fits in with the felting venue and is small, portable, and fun and is helping me get over my glue blockage.... Small brooches with brass zippers and wet celted pieces....am having soooo much fun doing these...

Snakes and ladders

More from Mother

The tie lines with cochineal and plants...snakes and ladders revisited...can't seem to get enough of those euc buds. Love the look on top of geranium...last a simply simple euc leaf...so clear and generous...happy holidays all...

Spring frenzy

My life is full of processes, colour, pollen, hummingbirds, eucalyptus, and fibers....so many things Ilove doing ,hard to sit still...carpe diem!!,

Abundance!!!

this is my past week's adventure, with a little gardening and seedling transplanting on the side....dyed with madder and cochineal , the top photo, finished a spring iris coloured blanket, with brushed mohair and mushroom dyed warp, cooking up some madder warp for the next blanket and dyeing some lamb's wool that is old but still looks good....local lamb which is about fifteen years old, also dyed some in a vat with lac/madder combo, came out a lavender pink shade...so spring is definitely showing itself and the greens and pink blossoms are breathtaking.now for more dyeing and some eco printing.  New plants to try for eco printing....and more to be learnt....must keep notes, apparently I have no goal of consistency in my work, working on a "wing and a prayer" seems ot be my natural course, of course, I do jot down notes in my journal but don't seem to read them when I am working,!! Lol. It does make for a lot of variety and endless lessons.....

Tea cozies

getting cozy with tea cozies and workbench frenzies

Here are my latest obsession....very cool tea cozies., lined with silk, trimmed out with melton cloth hand sewn, wet felted merino wool...have six, and apparently have few more calling...in between times mice are happening, which began with Bamboo the cat, finding a piece of felt cordage and going crazy, so long tailed mice are a big hit and are a pretty cute edition to the table!!lol. I imagine a small 

Herd of mice occupying my market space this summer..the other photo is of my workbench, havng just given a workshop on resists inclusions, and flowers with wemsleydale fleece...all did amazing work and I always learn a ton, had a visiting felter from Prince rupert, Jenny, who did amazing felts, and was great with colour, all of them were experienced felters who did great work, making it so easy to have a class with...we covered tons of different techniques, and even managed to squeeze in lunch....so spring has definitely sprung here, daffodils blooming, herring have spawned, rufus hummers are rlacing the anna's at the feeder, and I am creative like crazy....all signs of spring....bring it on!!!!!

Holy Eco Prints

well apparently yet another avenue to follow, ecoprinting  on merino as the snow falls on the crocus flowers, we are having snow for the second time this winter, mild days and heavy wet snow, power outages have been minimal and that is a good thing...am able to felt and am getting a lot of experimenting done with resists and holy shawls lol, and eco prints...let the snow fall i have lots of wool to keep me warm...

w

Obsessions

Just can't get enough felting these days, must be spring springing as my vreative juices are ramped up big time...my mind seems to be full of new ideas and new techniques and no housework is being done at all... Thought i would be spring cleaning right now, but ...obsessions rule.  The obsession with the brick wall ...as i call them, is still happening, and have several pieces and wall hangings.  I think next obsession I will work in one tone or two then can mix and match into a vest perhaps, I think this technique would work well for a vest with texture, and I am now busy embedding between layers of felt. And experimenting with different type of embedding materials...this has been fun and I see pins clasps etc in their future...small, sit in my chair at night work....so spring fever seems have hit, although I have yet to see anyspring lambs  here, or any herring yet, but the sea lions are gathering and roaring all day and night, and crocii are blooming..I love the West coast of Canada...

Mother nature wins

Here is my latest experiment with felting, hoping to duplicate or at least get some semblance to the rocks on the beach here....this is the first of many to come, as the process isvery addictive...the wind is howling and the power threatening to go off, but so far everything isnholding...the anna's hummingbird that has been with us all winter, is gathering fluff from the bullrush we collected at the pond, they love nest building with the soft innards....amazing to see them building nests so early in he spring but that is what the anna's do here at this time of year.  I have cut some soft lincoln natural curls for her also but so far she prefers the bullrush. Laid and rolld two more silk eco scarves today and have them steaming as I write,erhaps more photos tomorrow, if they are fit to print.  

Tooooooooo long

So much time and so many fibers have passed through since my last post....here are a few photos of where i have been...

High fiber diet....

The season continues and now I am using the fibers I recently dyed, so that i can make room for more..it's getting a little thick around here with fiber, vars, dryers and spinning and felting...or like i prefer to call it "high fiber diet":))

: Boletopsis leucomelaena

Found the name of thatmystery boleotopsis.....yes'!!!!

Boleotopsis grisea or????

This is the one that dyed the yarns in the previous post...somehow this picture got lost in posting...if anyone has a better idea I am eager to find out what this is...

Boleotopsis grisea

It's my best guess so far and giving wonderful colours...very generous with giving up colour, the silver grey is on alum mordanted mohair, no additives, and the bronze green is on alum mordanted wensleydale locks and mohair, with ammonia....loving both colours and the exhaipust was a soft beige

having a hard time figuring out what it is for sure, so my best guess would be boletopsis grisea,and is fast becoming a favourite...let the mycelium keep blooming....

Sometimes more is better!

Mushrooms,  polypores, and more...the season continues to give up a bounty of dyeing supplies, love mother nature and her generosity.  I have been processing the bounty of last week  for the past three days, and now the fibres are being labeled and trying to keep them all straight ..which is not an easy job when you have about ten different  vats  on the go... But. Think I have them all sorted and really appreciate having premordanted fibers to test with.  I mordanted some commercially spun wool with, alum, another with iron and one undpmordanted.  I keep the three yarns in separate bags and when I want to test a dye bath I put one knot in the end of one six inch piece of alum mordanted wool, two knots in a similar length of iron mordant, and no knots in the unmordanted and then I just tie the three together and put in the pot as a tester, the. I can cut pieces of this to put in an after mordant bath or akaline and acid, and that way I can see the results without using a whole skein of fiber...it is a traditional way of testing and one which I so like having on hand.

Now the fibers are all put to rest I shall post pics of the results..

Abun. Dance

What a dance of gathering , soaking, dyeing, eating, it is endless this time of year.....lobster mushrooms, and sanguinea, phalelos, and paxillus, all creating amazing colours...what a time of year this is, and loving it all