Garden cleanup, patio style, larceny and handmade paper

My garden cleanup now that the zinnias are finally done, was to shake the soil off their roots and toss the greenery into the trees to feed the earth.  That's about it. 

On the way back I committed a bit of gardener's larceny, just swiped a bit of Gary's ivy to start in the house. I don't like ivy outside, clawing at the stucco, but I fancy some trailing indoors.

Last year I made soap using ivy Gary gave me when he was pulling it back. That was a bit of fun. Ed: April 6, 2023, but who's counting.

Just boil a bunch of leaves in water until the saponiferous element is released, and it thickens up a bit, let sit a day to gel further, and you've got a soap solution. I did a batch of laundry just to try it out, worked fine.  I imagine it's friendly to the environment, too. 

I do make my laundry liquid, not usually with ivy, but with borax, washing soda and castile soap. No perfumes, additives, unknown brighteners. 

About handmade paper, as promised

This piece, about 24" x 18", is made from first cut cotton linters pulp, the way you get that brilliant white

And below, blogger dropping pictures any old where,  is abaca, banana, fiber molded over toys and numerals, a Fibonacci quilt idea.  About 40"x 30+"

When this was on exhibit, I was there when a little boy studied it for ages then announced to his mom "There's no number 4!" I'm guessing he was four. And no, it's about the Fibonacci sequence, so there isn't a 4.

I had to angle this a bit to avoid reflections, a pulp painting about moonlight. You load tube things with pulp, and paint using them as if with brushes. It dries like a painting, it's not a collage. I added copper wire later.  About 30"x18"

 

Here's a sheet of iris paper from my plants, overprinted with stamps I carved from plastic erasers. That's fun you should try.

Sometimes a sheet of paper is a useful backing piece for small weavings. Here a couple of small four selvage tapestries are mounted on a sheet of abaca mix paper 

And when you've made all the things, you salvage every tiny scrap from the vat and use the bits  to cover photo frames, so your frugal self will consent to finally dumping the vat. Outdoors, okay for the earth, not in the sink, bad for plumbing.

Sunday evening, in anticipation of the temp going to the low 30sf, I reluctantly turned on the furnace.   Set at 68°f.  I hoped to make it to the clock change next weekend, but oh well.

Happy day everyone, make all the things, or read about them, and say not in this life, honey!

Fall walk and handmade paper

Saturday was a wonderful day. I woke at 4am ready to go. Organized the kitchen while the kettle boiled to make coffee 

Then I went back to bed with a snarling strong coffee and a piece of sweet potato apple cake. Got set up with the heating pad warming the bed -- temp in the 50s indoors -- - and a Pargeter mystery.  Five star start to the day. Then I slept a bit before getting up to a second breakfast at about eight. Such luxury, the freedom to just please myself.

This morning was bright and cool, great walking weather, so here's a bit of what was out there 

I like those shadows 

Can anyone identify this little friend? Scuttling busily around the grass. Top end is the head. He didn't look hairy, more shiny.

I had planned today on covering a wonderful program on textile collections by the Textile Museum Associates, and asked them if screenshots and commentary would be okay on my blog with full credit.  I thought I'd better check, since some people aren't too keen, though I'm boosting their signal. 

They're getting back to me. Not yet heard, so if and when that happens, I'll do it because it was wonderful. A huge panorama of collections from all over by a collector who wants them to be seen, by everyone.  He's sensitive to the history of textiles as often an unrecognized women's domestic artform, and honors it.

Meanwhile there's plenty to talk about. First food. I converted a helping of the Ethiopian cabbage and potato stew into soup, added tomato paste, garam masala, and curly pasta and it was pretty good.

S asked about handmade paper, which I've made a lot of over the years, using tools I've put together, and all kinds of pulps including plant fibers from my front yard.

By the time I found I couldn't go ahead with the textile program,the light wasn't very good for wall art pictures, so I'll return to them at some point. 

Meanwhile here's some small stuff. But first, here's the tools I use to make it. Pretty glam.

The frames are molds and deckles I adapted from cheap picture frames. I built a mold and deckle back when I was learning but then I had access to a much bigger vat of pulp. With this dishpan vat I use smaller tools, often just a piece of screening. The bits of interlining are the felts I use to flop out the pulp pages on, before pressing out the water. 

I blogged ages ago about the process, and you might like to do a search on November 6 and 8, 2020, in my art blog. Art, the Beautiful Metaphor is the art blog,  still open to read, but please don't leave comments over there, it's inactive. 

https://beautifulmetaphor.blogspot.com

When I left a live link blogger insisted it was invalid. But you can access it by cut and paste, or a search engine.

These shapes and inserts are from a workshop I did with Sue Smith at Peters Valley years ago. She provided the long Western pine needles 

In this framed mixed media piece , the miniature books have pages made of iris paper. The covers are spun and woven paper. They're about one by one and a half inches. 

When you have lovely scraps left, you can make landscapes like this lampshade, never waste a bit 

This is an artist book made from daylily paper with daylily stems laminated into the cover.  A kind of visual title.

I've sold and given and exchanged and bartered many handmade artist books over the years.

So that's us for now. I'll take pictures in daylight of a few large wall pieces if you'd like to see them. Lemme know.

Happy day, everyone, do what you'd like today even for a while. Important to keep our spirits up. For me it's walking around trees and making stuff, different folks different things.

Food Friday

Friday was mainly about food. I made an Ethiopian casserole -- cabbage, red onion, potatoes and spices. Pretty good, and I added salt after I'd tasted. 

On a roll with baking, after Thursday's chocolate walnut cake, some of which was well received next door, Friday was a sweet potato and apple cake.

I made a kind of dam with parchment paper, because I needed to reduce the size of the dish. That worked fine.

And the cook got the first slice, with full fat plain yogurt.

So I have supplies in the freezer ready for visitors as well as me.

Then a bit of kitchen diy, as I was washing yet another sink of dishes, baking makes a lot of dishes,  I noticed my glove had sprung a leak. So here's what happened 

I now have a set of fingercots and an assortment of rubber bands.

Then there was walking and plant care including potting up an indoor coleus, and reading Pargeter, Barnes and a serious nonfiction book

There was a nap among all this too. And I ordered a batch of clothes online, resale goods, mystery grab bag, several items for $25 total, still with price tags. 

Arriving Monday, and I'll show you then. After I'd looked over the Landsend sale, and noted the prices, even on sale,  I figured the grab bag approach could be worth a try, fun anyway. My whistles have shipped,too. Monday will be a funfest. And in this wild, mad spending spree I gave myself an early birthday/Christmas gift, an online advent calendar, which I'll activate near December 1. Big spender.

Happy day everyone, you in a mood to grab something??  Maybe don't tell us..

Still my flag, too.

Misfits, knee weirdness, ACECO

Misfits was a bit disorganized. The tracker gave me three different times of delivery and arrived at a different time from all of them, but still good, mid morning, handy for lunch. 

The box arrived partly open, tape hadn't been applied evenly, and one item didn't arrive, but I doubt if it fell out, too big for that gap. I reported the open box and missing item but insisted it wasn't Rameer the driver's doing.

Canned goods for the food pantry, at least some of them, yogurt because it's a permanent staple here, sweet potatoes and yellow potatoes. Sweets for soup and sides, and cake,  yellow for roasting. In fact I added in a couple of yellows to boil ready to roast for lunch with the last of the hake.

Can of ramen noodle soup mix, not ordered, probably a marketing move.  Mushrooms for no end of use, in Yeung Man Cooking recipes or mushroom omelette, or added to soup. Wiped and sliced then frozen ready. They thaw fast.  Cane sugar because it's good and it's fair trade. Cheddar cheese for toasted cheese, or tomato bake, or cheese omelette or something. Bread for the lazy baker.

I've started taking the Misfits food prep further. Beyond washing and wiping and slicing and freezing, I'm cooking items such as sweet potatoes because they'll freeze and be very handy for baking and soup and sides. Future Me will thank Now Me.

My panko didn't arrive, so no breading for now, no big deal.  Plenty of options.

I called Gary to see if he's okay, and found he's had yet another battery of tests but feels good. I wanted to check if he'd like some of the chocolate cake I'm baking today. I didn't want to torment him with a favorite food if he wasn't up to enjoying it, current digestive issues. Apparently fine, so it's on.

And here's my share, afternoon tea with chocolate walnut cake 

Wednesday evening as I was going upstairs, my knee started doing weird stuff. Instead of taking my weight smoothly, it jerked into place, and tried to give way on each step. Pretty unnerving. This is the non-Hippolyta side. Some pain in the thigh.

Then Thursday morning it started again.  I decided to ice and do leg weights in case it was out of shape. It wasn't hurting, I wasn't  working through pain, and I did half a dozen leg exercises with 10lbs, 10 reps each. Then I tried the stairs, with significant improvement. 

I'd been walking, stretching,  using  resistance bands lately, not leg weights. So I need to get back into it. Anyway, I think it's more or less okay for now. End of organ recital.

And here's the website of the company busy tearing out the East Wing, horrendous in itself and especially without covering or asbestos precautions. It was built in the early 1900s, added to in the 1940s, very likely asbestos was used.

They'll be lucky if they ever get more work after this. They've deleted their LinkedIn page and this is their own website Thursday morning 

Happy day everyone, show no mercy to evil doers. Reserve that for the good people, of whom there are billions!

 

Today's resistance, now we know whistles are being effectively used as anti ICE devices -- warnings and deterrents -- I've ordered a dozen. My friend BBG on Spoutible checked out the company to ensure no gop involvement. 

I ordered a dozen in yellow, the color of No Kings, I'll keep one to wear as a symbol of resistance and send the rest to people who need defense against ICE