A View from Sierra County

A New Adventure Begins

I have mentioned and hinted a few times at the grand new adventure I have been embarking upon this spring, and today is the day to announce widely, and with the help of a contest, just what I have been up to!

My love of all things fibery has been one of my partners through several decades, beginning when I was five and learned to knit.  In my early 20s, while taking spinning lessons and learning to weave Navajo-style, my teacher also introduced our class to natural plant dyes.  I already knew I had a passion for plants, and had been studying herbology for a few years, so it was a natural step, and I have made many 'experiments' over the years.  I did not instantly become a dyer or start a dye business... in fact, you will see it has taken a few decades of 'cooking' to come to the point of sharing this knowledge and love with others. 

This winter, while pondering what to do in the current (read: dismal) economy,  I realized I had a large parcel on our property that I could use to cultivate dye plants.  From that tiny seed thought, I have spent the winter planning to launch the first Natural Dye Plant CSA (Community-Supported Agriculture) venture that I have been able to find advertised anywhere.  One impetus to act now was the localizing that has been taking place in my life for the past five years or so... I realized that while it has become much easier to obtain locally-grown food to eat in my region, clothes are another matter entirely.  I could take one of my loves, gardening, and pair it with a need, for artists to have local color available to help re-clothe our region in locally produced garments!

Today is the Launch Day, meaning that if you go over and visit my new website, Nature's Cauldron, you can become one of my CSA subscriber/supporters by signing up for a share.  My "community" of fiber fanatics is much bigger than just the boundaries of my county or state, so I am going to be drying and mailing out dye plants, as well as a few other goodies, over the course of the harvest season.  You might decide that you and your knitting group want to purchase a share together, so that you can begin to explore natural color options for your future projects.  As my gardens become more productive over the next few years, I will also begin dyeing and offering yarns in the prettiest of natural shades, as well as offering occasional natural dye workshops.  Those of you who have followed my blogging for the past six and a half years will be watching my small farm grow from infancy.  Though most of the farm posts will now move over to the new website, Sustainable Sunday will continue on this blog, sharing my general knowledge about living sustainably with all of you.

I will be growing a wide variety of plants, including Japanese indigo, madder, comfrey (olive green), yarrow (clear yellow), rhubarb (a mordant and pale orange dye), dahlias and hollyhocks, and gathering others from the hills and woods around me, including oak galls, lichens, and toyon.  I live in a rich environment and plan to grow, pick and dry plants all summer in order to prepare four shipments to send to subscribers in the coming fall and winter.  I also plan to include ideas and inspiration on what to make with these plant-dyed yarns.

Not all of my dear fiber friends will want to participate, or to take up natural plant dyeing.  However, all of you have fiber friends as well, and just by tapping into that network of fiber artists, I know that I will be able to gather enough support for this first season of growing and harvesting.  In order to spread the word quickly, I am also launching a contest today to build subscribers to my Natures Cauldron Facebook page, and to get the word out about my adventure.  Each new "like" will be entered into the contest, as well as each individual who comments either here or at the new website.  Of course, if you can get more entries in the contest, you have a better chance at winning the great prize package described below!  So, if you refer someone else, have them tell me you sent them to visit me, and you will get additional entries.

The prize package includes a copy of Harvesting Color, the new book on natural dyeing by Rebecca Burgess of the Fibershed Project (this book will be included in the first of the four CSA shipments!), two ounces of undyed Blue-faced Leicester roving from A Verb for Keeping Warm (local Northern California sheep!), and some naturally-dyed yarns (watch for photos to come).

The contest will run for two weeks, until May 17th, at midnight PDT, so help me spread the word!

An Audience with the Masters

The Old Masters were considered to be the great European painters before the 1800s.  They set the style and tone of what was considered 'fine art' for centuries.  I have spent many afternoons at galleries peering at these fine works of art, imagining how lives differed in those long-ago times and how they were the same as ours.  The works are often rich with color and some of the scenes of happy, domestic life.

However, it was a different group of works of the masters that I visited with on Monday.  This group of fine artists passed on mostly without leaving their names on their works, but the fine quality shines through all the same.   

DD and I spent the day with The Cutest Niece and Granddaughter in the World, going to visit oldest son (Uncle Cody) who lives in Lake Tahoe... his weekends are Mondays and Tuesdays, and we could only manage to squeeze in the one day, but it was worth it!  This year, summer is late in coming to the high country and the crowds were sparse.  It was a bit windy and cool, so we decided to visit the Marion Steinbach Indian Basket Museum, which is operated by the North Lake Tahoe Historical Society in Tahoe City.

This museum is a relatively new addition to the Gatekeeper's Cottage, a landmark where the Truckee River flows out of Lake Tahoe.  A new wing was constructed just for the basket collection.  When Marion, a lifelong collector as well as a basketweaving teacher hoping to preserve the traditional skills of fine basketmaking, passed away in 1991, her family began working with the Historical Society so that the collection could be transferred and displayed together in its entirety in a safe and appropriate manner. 

I had known of Marion Steinbach as the illustrator of my favorite field guide, used extensively over the years when hiking in the Sierras, Wildflower Walking in the Lakes Basin.  Her love of the plants of our home place was apparent in her delicate and faithful drawings; my field guide has gradually been 'colored in' as I met each plant and added color to the drawings to help me memorize the plants.  She applied the same skill to learning about basketmaking, taking painstakingly detailed notes and drawings when she had the opportunity to visit with a master weaver.  She collected baskets for most of her adult life, and the collection on exhibit contains at least a few hundred baskets of all kinds, and from throughout the West.

This particular grouping contains basketry of the Maidu, the native people who would have sat on my hillsides, both in the higher-up country (in summer) and in my foothills home... their migratory routes ran east-west, and seldom did a person travel more than 50 miles in an entire lifetime, all on foot.

As I stood in the rooms with all of these works of art, I was simply in awe of the huge amount of skill amassed through these works.  There were baskets for carrying peaches from the Navajo (who are known for treasuring their peach trees), baskets for leaching acorns, used throughout California. There are baskets woven to serve as hats, and to give as gifts, and many miniatures woven to show fine skills.  There was a piece, much like a gauge swatch, that had been woven by a grandmother as a reference for her just-learning granddaughter.  Many of the pieces were labeled with information about their makers, but most were not.  While the person was lost to history, their artistry remains on display, every summer season, at this wonderful museum, a tribute to the great skills needed for a culture to simply skip over developing pottery because their basket weavers could meet all of their needs!

Here's a sampling of cradleboards in the background, with DD Nikki, son Cody, and Odessa posing in front.

If you are heading to Lake Tahoe this summer, make room in your plans to spend an hour or two at this great museum, taking in the wonder of another kind of fiber artistry, and the amazing works of so many hands.

Marion would be happy to know that this tradition has not died out; rather, there continue to be those preserving fine basketmaking and expanding the art form.

This summer, beaded masterpieces from Paiute-Shoshone artist Rebecca Eagle Lambert are on display.   These baskets are incredibly rich in design, and while for display only, are woven in the traditional manner.  They are some of the most amazing works of art I have ever seen!

Of course, our trip also included walking along the lake's beautiful shore, and introducing our newest family member to one of my family's favorite places.

Learning New Things is Good for the Brain

Scientists who study longevity have stated that we need to exercise our brains to keep them from atrophying, much like we need to work our muscles.  I did my part over the weekend, learning two new skills.

First, on Friday night I filled in at my co-worker Rita's monthly Bunco game... the Camptonville Bunco Gals have been at it for years, meeting once a month to play this fast-paced dice game, and eat and laugh and catch up with each other.  It wasn't too hard for me to catch onto the rules and we all had a fun time.  I was concentrating too hard to even think about taking pictures, but you can learn more about Bunco here (be sure to scroll all the way down!).

Then, after a relaxing Saturday of watching step-grandson's last t-ball game and 'swamping' for DH while he cut down some heavy tree branches that had fallen from the late spring storms at our high country house, I took the opportunity to learn a new skill on Sunday, at a class sponsored by our fiber guild in my neighboring town of North San Juan (how convenient!).

The guild program committee had collaborated with Starlight Compost, one of our members and a basketmaker extraordinaire, to offer two concurrent classes... an Appalachian Butt Basket and a Cattail-wrapped drinking bottle.  I had wanted to take the bottle wrap class last year, when Star's friend had taught it, and I also wasn't sure I wanted to commit my hands to the level required to turn out a Butt Basket.  I signed up and began the search for a creative bottle to wrap and use as a drinking jar all summer, abandoning my choices at the last minute yesterday morning in favor of a quart mason jar with a good, tightly screwed-on lid!

Sue F. had chosen a chianti-type bottle, which made several of us feel very nostalgic, however the shaping is a bit more complex.  We started with a length of cordage made from the pre-dried and then re-soaked cattail fronds, of a length to go around the neck of our bottles.  Mine was wider, so I had to fold over more 'ribs', which are fronds that will serve as the warp portion, however Sue would have to insert additional ribs later when getting to the fat part of the bottle, if she wanted.

She decided not to want to, as she opted for a looser twined weaving around her bottle, partly to get finished, and partly for the nostalgia...

The next photo shows Lindsey doing the twill weave... she really had to work around her flask-shaped bottle, doing what we knitters call 'short rows' to incorporate the glass thumb handle and the flatter shape.

I ended up being thankful for my quart mason jar, a straightforward shape!

Karla worked beside me, only she had a half-gallon mason jar; I finished first, but her's was neater... the procress was fun and interesting, and I would repeat it if I could work with such a lively group!

While we wove, Starlight gave a lot of detailed information about selecting basketry materials and when to harvest them.  Did you know that ALL parts of the cattail plant are edible?  Some are better-tasting than others... the pollen can be used along with flour in baking, the roots can be roasted and processed into flour, the fronds of course are excellent for weaving that doesn't require lots of strength.

Before our day was over, Starlight demonstrated how to make a cord the circumference of your head, then begin braiding a flat three-strand braid which can be stitched around in a circle for a sun hat.  The next photo shows her wearing her hat, while demonstrating how to de-thorn blackberry canes, which are also good basketry materials!

I have always admired her hats, which are available occasionally for sale locally. Star teaches at several primitive living skills events throughout the year, and was going to demonstrate acorn preparation at one of our local schools today. She described that process as well; acorns are very prolific throughout California (and the world!), and were a primary food source for the native peoples here. They could be stored indefinitely, mostly protected by the tannins in their outer hulls, and the various steps of processing could be done by family members of different ages and skill levels. She uses a modern day leaching bucket instead of the old time sand pits and a hand grain mill rather than stone grinding rock to leach the tannin out of the nuts and grind them into flour, and had brought along a yummy cake made from acorn flour and other ingredients, which resembled a torte in texture and taste. If you are interested in reading more about acorn technology, you can search the web, but the best information I have ever found is It Will Live Forever: Traditional Yosemite Acorn Preparation, a book by Julia Parker (a native docent at Yosemite Village that I had the great fortune to see in person about a decade ago).

About the time the four of us bottle-wrappers were launched on our project, the students for the Butt Basket class began arriving, and Star's apprentice, Jed, got them started making the hoops that would be heaven and earth (handle and base) of their baskets.

 

Stephanie appears to be staring out into space here, but really, she was concentrating as she began filling in one side of her basket end.

I can't explain much about the construction of her basket, as I was concentrating on my twining by this point, but it involved selecting materials for both strength and color... some of the materials the seven Butt Basketmakers chose included red osier dogwood, willow, deer brush, blackberry and green cattail fronds (which were only used for decorative color accents, as they aren't strong enough for the weight-bearing portions).

Star explained how stands of specific trees can be managed for best growth by basketmakers.  If you wanted to manage  a stand of redbud, willow or deer brush to harvest basketmaking canes regularly, you would 'coppice' it, by cutting the shrub to the ground in fall and the following year it would put out lots of new, straight growth that could be harvested, rather than tangled and tough old branches.  This practice has been used around the world by basketmakers, and could be employed by any of us in the Sierra foothills, though some agreed they weren't ready to sacrifice their favorite redbud tree yet.

This photo shows most of our group hard at work!  In the foreground, there's a tray of acorns waiting to be peeled... warming them in the sun makes it easier to get their red skins off.

BJ (in teal shirt) is adding in a rib selected from some of the lengths of branches which were pre-soaked (a day per foot of length) and are wrapped in the brown plastic tarp behind her.

Not everyone worked on a basket... Rowen spun the entire time.  We met at Willow Springs, the non-profit center where she has her fiber studio, and her little daughter worked on a bottle.

Here's a photo of my finished weaving... I need to trim up the loose ends to pretty it up, and have it filled with water to weight it down, so that the bottom, where the finished ends of the weaving have come together, can harden and seal up... don't think I will show you that part, as it definitely is 'beginner quality'!

While we worked, our group discussed joining the Tour De Fleece, sponsored this year through Ravelry.  We decided to field a Foothill Fiber Guild team, dubbed the Team Sierra Spinderellas, which Stephanie set up on Rav today... for those on the fence about trying to spin through the entire Tour de France, consider joining a no-pressure team such as ours!

We are a fun-loving group, and will be gathering back at Willow Springs to demonstrate spinning for a Living Skills Day on June 26th from 1-6 PM.

Once I was finished with my bottle, I decided to spend some more time with my new favorite toy, a chopstick spindle with a jade whorl that allows me to produce a lovely, fine yarn from a rambouillet/angora blend from Wooly Wonka Fibers... yes, I really do lead a magical life, and I try to be grateful for it every day!

Saturday Sky

Our sky has been a little close around the ears all week... hopefully, we will see some sun today! I am off to spend the day with Marilyn, doing Navajo-style weaving, and maybe even getting close to finishing my small piece from the workshop back last September. Have a great weekend, everyone!

 

Weaving in The Navajo Tradition

Some of you might remember this post... but then, it was clear back in January.  Some ideas take a long while to come to fruition, but this weekend I was able to take a beginning weaving workshop with Marilyn Greaves and Mel Silva, in weaving in the Navajo tradition.  Both of them have been weaving since 1995, and have taken workshops from Navajo weavers, but not being native Navajos themselves, do not bill their trainings as "Navajo weaving".  With that disclaimer, we went on to learn many traditional techniques over the three days, all while warping the small looms they had built for us and weaving a sample mini-rug.

First, we started warping by flipping our looms over and using the warping pegs that can be inserted on the back side... a great way to multi-task a piece of equipment.  What sounds so simple, and required only one sentence actually took most of the morning, and then adding selvedge cords and tying our warps onto the front of the looms took most of the rest of the afternoon!  This is the part where I will have to refer back repeatedly to my notes in order to warp on my own.  Marilyn is helping Roma with her warp spacing in the above photo.  The towel on the table keeps the loom from slipping as we pull and tug to adjust our warps and later beat our weft into place.  Who knew weaving was so violent?!

This close-up shows my completed selvedge on one end and how the weft has been tied on to the large dowel.

The warp ends up taut on the front of the loom, with small turnbuckles for tensioning at the top.  I realized as I started assembling this post that I didn't get ONE good photo of the entire loom set up and in process, only photos showing my weaving updates... I will try and do that in the next few days, so you can get a better idea how this works.

Here's my weaving, at the end of day one... several of the bottom stripes completed.  The stick with the loopy strings around it is the 'pull shed', and the loops are heddles catching every other thread.  Navajo-style weaving is similar to tapestry weaving, in that it is completely weft-faced, meaning once the weaving is done, none of the warp threads show.  Therefore, many design elements can be incorporated into the piece as you go along.  The stripes set a base for a later design... which I was able to start by mid-morning on Saturday.

My stripes look a little wavy in this photo, but they really are straight... frequent measuring, both of length and width is necessary to assure that the sides aren't pulling in, and the piece stays consistent.  We learned the "turned joint", meaning that when two colors meet, they turn to do the next row on the same warp.  I loved this part, and the strings of weft hanging down reminded me of using bobbins in intarsia knitting (though less trouble), so I picked up speed.  The three days of the workshop, the temps ranged in the mid-90s, and though we were in this wonderful, shaded structure, with overhead fans, and lots of ice water provided by our teachers, we were still sweltering by noon each day.  Marilyn and Mel use this space, The Elegant Goat Ranch in Auburn, twice a year, and the spring workshop was just the opposite, held on a cold and rainy weekend!

Here's a peek inside our classroom, showing three of my fellow students hard at work, and one of Mel's small rugs folded in the foreground to the right.  He frequently uses the C Cactus mini and maxi looms to make small rugs of different styles, or using different techniques.  I was sorely tempted to buy one and start a second project (I know, sounds just like a knitter, doesn't it?) but resisted and told myself I could consider it when I finished the first piece!

Intermediate students joined us the second day, spreading out to the upstairs deck and studio building.  There were five beginners and seven intermediate weavers over the course of the weekend, making for a fun time.  Anni Redding of Canyon Creek Colors joined us for lunch on Sunday, regaling us with tales and yarn samples of the many colors possible from natural dyes... she will be teaching a workshop in El Dorado Hills on October 23rd in case any of you are interested and close enough to attend.  Mel will be teaching Navajo spindle spinning at Lambtown next Saturday as well.

Both of our teachers were warm, nurturing and encouraging... in fact, I don't think I have ever gotten so much out of a fiber workshop!  Here, Mel is showing Ray how to get started with the basketweave that forms the foundation of each weaving.

Now, I do have to reveal that I had prior experience with Navajo-style weaving... however, it was over thirty years ago!  I took a class in the fall of 1976, and my roommate and I each set out to make two free-standing looms, in our garage... the first woman-powered woodworking project for either of us.  I lived in Southern Oregon at the time, and had taken a natural dye class from the same teacher the previous spring.  I had some funky handspuns of my own to use as weft, though I never got all that far on what was probably too large a piece for a beginner to tackle alone once the class was over.  I have felt a connection with this style of weaving and with Navajo culture ever since, and even had the good fortune to view museum-quality pieces several times over the years, but hadn't set my own hands to a loom since.

By Saturday evening, I had completed a good part of the first half of my design feature.. a geometric representation of a squash blossom.  I met my dear friend Laura for dinner before heading home and collapsing.

Getting up and heading back to the third day was a bit harder, as the heat and the long days were taking their toll.  The workshop was about an hour and fifteen minutes away from home for me, but I had decided to commute each day to take care of our critters, as DH is away on a fire in Oregon.  However, I was excited, as I knew my design was going to expand.... I also turned the loom 'upside down' and wove the basketweave and about a half inch of brown at the top end, so that completing the final inch or so will be easier... at least I won't be constantly whacking my hands on the top dowel.  Those clever weavers who have preceded me!

While I was hard at work, my fellow students were too... here is Roma's weaving by the middle of Sunday... note the weaving comb in the left corner, used to beat down the wefts.

This rug was being woven by an intermediate student whose name I never learned...

I did manage to get to the middle of my design by the late afternoon, and will do several rows until truly at the half-way point, before reversing my design as I do the second half.  I will post an update very soon!

Wonderful Woven Rugs

I have always had a strong fascination for and affinity with Navajo rugs, so I was delighted that Marilyn Greaves would be presenting a program to our guild on weaving in the Navajo tradition last night.  Angela and I traveled down together, which made the ride seem very short, and the program was well worth it.

Marilyn has been weaving in traditional Navajo style for something like two decades and teaching her weaving techniques for the past 12 years.  She lives in Fair Oaks, a suburb of Sacramento, and will be demonstrating at the Sacramento Weavers and Spinners Guild show this weekend, if you happen to be in the area and able to stop in... it will be worth it!

Here's a photo showing two different sizes of the looms she makes and sells, incorporating both traditional weaving features and modernizations (especially the three turnbuckles to tension the weaving at the top, which is both sturdier and easier to manage than traditional rope lashing).  The weaving in front was started this past weekend... she puts the speediest knitters to shame!

Marilyn showed us one smaller rug that she had made entirely from her own handspun, but then confessed that her passion is the weaving and that she buys most of her (Churro) rug yarns from Burnham's Trading Post, all vegetal-dyed.  She explained some of her techniques and described what she covered in the workshops she co-teaches with Mel Silva.

One of the interesting things that .... described was attending the Crownpoint Rug Auction, which takes place monthly in Crownpoint, New Mexico, linking artist and consumer directly.  I hope someday to be able to spend time in the Four Corners area and attend it in person!

Looking at the looms made me nostalgic, as my first construction project, where I went out and bought the wood and assembled something following plans, was two Navajo looms that my roommate and I constructed for ourselves when I was 21.  I did manage to weave several inches, using my own handspuns as weft, including some natural-colored yarns, and some vegetable dyed, but the wool moths and carpet beetles took their toll on that sample piece... nice to reminisce, enjoy her beautiful work and speculate on whether weaving will ever return to my life.

Loving the Knitter's Loom

I have mentioned that Fibers, the LYS where I work on Saturdays, decided to start carrying the Ashford Knitters Loom for our customers.  I have been delighted with the four scarves that owner Allison has brought into the shop, particularly the houndstooth pattern she made using two neutrals in alpaca.  I am on fall break this year (the first time I have been connected with a school district that takes a week off at the end of the first quarter of school, and I am liking it).  I decided to bring home one of the store models of the loom, and try it out, so that I could instruct customers..... I love it!

First off, I have to let you all in on a secret from my earlier life... I already know how to weave.  I learned cardweaving as a pre-teen, then went on to learn backstrap weaving and tapestry weaving, which led to spinning, natural dye classes and a class in making and weaving on a Navajo loom (my first construction project, back when I was 21).  Armed with past knowledge and excellent visual instruction, I warped the loom yesterday, using Rowan Felted Tweed leftover from a hat I made for DH last winter.

One of the best features about the instructions written by Rowena Hart, the expert weaver-in-residence at Ashford, is that she uses a continuous warping method, through the slots of the rigid heddle and to a supplied warping peg, that bypasses the need or extra work of using a warping board and then transferring the warp to the loom.  I was able to warp for a five inch wide scarf and be weaving in less than an hour.

This photo shows how I wound all the warp in place, using kitchen parchment paper that was on sale at my local Grocery Outlet to keep each layer of the warp separate as it was wound on.  Another very nice feature of this loom is the brakes on the front and back bar knobs that keep a nice, even tension on each end with the warp strung in between.  These are a heavy-duty plastic, which might make them one of the potential weak points, though I do admire the longstanding Ashford tradition of craftsmanship.

Close up of the warp tied in place on the front bar, and ready for active weaving to commence.

I used two colors of bulky alpaca that I had stashed a few years back, thinking to make something to put into the crafts co-op's shop... they are working very well together and weaving is proceeding quite quickly.

This photo shows the two in a stripey section where I was trying out alternating two colors together.

Another really nifty feature is that the loom is designed to allow you to unscrew one knob in the middle, and fold it in half to carry places with you.  A tote bag with shoulder straps designed for this purpose is an option when purchasing.  I tried that feature out and spent the day at my high country house today, and have to rave about being able to fold and easily carry ANY loom.  My past experiences with portable models such as cardweaving and backstrap were that tying to a support reduced their real portability... not always could I find the right support where I wanted to sit and weave.  This model truly is portable and easy to use.

I would love to add some weaving to my project queue, but have decided I need to wait until after the first of the year to buy much of anything.  I know that financial hard times mean doing more for yourself, and handcrafts have always been a big part of my life for that very reason.  Weaving with this loom is a great use for leftover halves of balls, and allows for playing with color in a new way.

I got to thinking that maybe rather than encourage each of you to go out and get the Knitters Loom (you can order them from us!), I would suggest that you get together with your knitting group or fiber guild and buy one or two as a cooperative group... that would reduce the cost and everyone could take turns.  Our guild has a triangle loom that can be reserved and checked out for two weeks at a time, as an example of equipment sharing.  Hard times call for creative solutions.