weftember weaving

The garden harvest has been getting ahead of me. Every third day I pick and for the next two days, I pack or process. There isn't much time for fun things like spinning or weaving. Moments are snatched.



Usually, those moments come in the morning. This happens, mostly, because I have been waking before the sun is up. We have been having chilly mornings, filled with fog. I make a small pot of coffee, and reach for the distaff and spindle. There is a purpose, a plan, to spin enough linen to weave some cloth.

While at the Endless Mountains Fiber Festival, I picked up some Hemp Sliver in a sort of roving type package. I was told it was imported from Romania. It spins up very well, and I've been amazed at how very much it resembles some of the better flax that I've spun.



Can you tell which spindle holds the spun hemp?



This image shows linen and hemp singles, side by side on the nod. It is difficult to tell the difference.



After finishing these singles will take a trip to the warping board (gulp).



And weaving on the Double Hole Tape Loom has filled some moments in the afternoon. Grace has added some wonderful handmade 4 and 6 inch maple shuttles to the Etsy shop!

hold everything - it's time to snap

Grab an apron and pull up an Adirondack chair. We can sit on the deck and listen to the river go by while we snap beans.



There are some 700 and some odd steps from the garden to the kitchen. This is the route I travel several times a day, in and out of the garden, with baskets full of beans.



These are Haricots Verts, they grow longer, skinny - tender and crisper than your ordinary bush bean. I raised them from seed I've saved over the years, and this year's harvest is exceptional.



The yield so far is over a bushel in weight. A good year for the beans.



Having picked the majority of them at the peak of their perfection, I will leave the rest to mature for seed, or possibly the bean pot. What comes in on top will be used for fresh eating. Handfuls-steamed then sauteed in minced garlic, olive oil and almonds.



pick, wash, sort, snap, chop, measure, steam, pack, process and store. only ten steps there. repeat as many times as necessary.

producing

As a verb, the word produce means to make or manufacture from components or raw materials.

So in that sense of the word, I've been producing lots of different types of things these days.



Trying my hand and producing a distaff or two, and adding designs to the copper and other elements to the staff.



This one is from a piece of a nearby maple tree that needed to be trimmed out. It is a pleasing task to make a distaff!

As a noun, the word produce means things that have been produced or grown, especially by farming.



So in that sense of the word, I've actually been producing jam from produce! Lots of nice fresh red currants from the garden!



My friend, Judy, stopped by and dropped off some of the Nanking Cherries from her garden. Thank You! A bowl of cherries is always good to keep nearby, when one is spindling linen. keep those juices flowing. The rest were turned into jam.



When my spindle is at rest, I tuck it inside the distaff, for easy storage. As I look at it, it appears to be a cocoon of sorts.



Summer is in full swing! I'm enjoying the view~

a garden walk in June

The chickens will escort us as far as the garden gate, so be sure to lock it after you enter.



The garden demands a lot of time to keep up with the growing season. There is always something that needs work. This year, a new frame and netting were constructed to protect the currants and blackberries. On the opposite side of the garden, another frame protects the blueberries and cherries.



The peas are finally coming into blossom. It is tempting to add the flowers to a salad....



especially, since they are growing next to the lettuce and onions...



The next row is full of potatoes.



And the next row is full of potatoes, also. There is another row of potatoes up near the rhubarb. There are a lot of potatoes growing along the riverrim this year!



The Russian Red Zinna are so bold in their color and fortitude. The cool nights don't seem to bother them at all and I'm surprised to see flower this early in the season.



Two rows of bush beans are doing well. There are Verts and Wax. One row is from saved seed, and is healthier than the newly purchased seed. Always something interesting to observe and wonder about! Behind the beans, there are two rows of peppers. One row of Sweet Hungarian, and another row of Bell Peppers. Some are red, and some will be orange and some will be green.



Walking down to the hill to the last bed, we find the corn starting to take hold. There are six rows of corn, with the last two rows planted with winter squash. I'm hoping the winter squash will take off and grow up the fence.



And here is a promised photo of a monster hosta. I don't recall the name or where it came from...but it is happier growing inside the fence where the deer cannot nibble on it.



Finally, the ox-eye. For my mother. The wild areas are full of their white petals and gold buttons. They are tall this year, taller than I've ever seen them before.

the basics

finally

bluettes!



phoebe!



frogger...



an oriole in the quincy...



yep. it is finally here! springtime in the mountains!

phenological events March 2014

6th bluebirds on rosehips
17th starting seeds
herbs, tomato, pepper
20th snowdrops & daffs up
22nd skunkcabbage
23rd chipmunks
26th redwing blackbirds

the bandwagon

A couple of years ago, I hopped on the band-weaving bandwagon. My efforts were stymied by not having a good band lock. Since I made one a few months ago, I've been doing more weaving. It really is amazing how having the right tools for the job can make such a big difference.

Warping my Double Hole tape loom has become easier since I've enlisted the help of my husband's old wooden C-Clamps. Set up on either side of the loom, they hold it in an upright position and I can see both sides of the loom. I use my handmade threading tool to pass the warp threads through the slots and holes. Once I have it warped, I can move the C-Clamp over to the shelf near the window, and it becomes an anchor for one end of the warp.



I've been weaving with different size DMC cotton, and silk, playing around with what works best. So far, I like the results of the #5 the best.



Keeping the wpi in mind, I've been spinning my own silk to use for weaving. I hope to use it as pattern threads for the linen tapes I will make. It has taken me longer than it should to learn some of the finer details of band weaving, but it is starting to come together. This past week I tried warping for a simple back-strap loom.



It is very interesting to compare the Double Hole Rigid Heddle Loom with a Backstrap loom, and the ways that patterns are achieved. Now that I've gotten acquainted with the basic set up, I'll move onto trying to do some patterns.



From where I sit when I'm weaving, I have nice light from the window and warmth from the coal/wood stove. The view out the window lets me take notice of the slowly disappearing snowbank, and snowdrops that have started to grow. They are more like "snowdrips", as the blossom is still closed up tight against the cold. They seem to know that the temps are still too cold for the pollinators.



The chickens are very glad to find areas where the sun has melted away the snow to expose the dry dirt!



Nothing like a good dust bath after a long winter.

They dig their holes and kick the dirt up. The kick it all around and over themselves. Then they bask in the sun and dirt.



Other signs of spring I've noticed include: skunks and skunkcabbages, redwing blackbirds, and chipmunks. Still no Eastern Phoebe. We are expecting rain on Friday. They should be along soon after that.

conical cotyledons

Windy weather is good for threshing seed, and so it was that I found myself sorting through and threshing last years string beans in preparation for this years planting. The harvest from last fall included beans of several different varieties, including my favorite, haricot verts (or french style green beans).



With the pod shell removed, the hard and shiny bean seeds fell easily into the container, and I tossed them in the air to let the wind carry away any bits of chaff, leaving me with a nice tray of seed.

At closer inspection, I noticed something strange.

I've been collecting my bean seed for years. There are times I order new varieties to plant, but I normally save the last harvest of the fall. Threshing and sorting bean seed allows time to look at and admire their beauty. This is the first time I've ever noticed this oddity. The cotyledons are not, ahem, normal. They are conical or tapered at the tips. They are pointy. So pointy, in fact, that they have split their seed coats. Look:



Efforts to find information about the cause of this peculiarity have been fruitless. In an attempt to see if the seed would be viable, I slipped them in between a damp paper towel and they entered the zip lock chamber for a germination test.



No problems there! Inside of 3 days, the embryos emerged and the beans seed appeared healthy and ready to grow.



Since I only had a handful of these, I decided to feed them to the chickens (who, btw, were very happy that they were tossed in their direction). And just as the last one was eaten, I had the thought that I should have saved a few seeds to plant (isolated from the regular patch) just to see what the next generation's seed would have looked like.



Too late now!

chambers

The icicles that surround our cabin are slow to melt. I see the world outside my window through frozen bars of ice. Ice Jail. I am ready to be freed from my indoor chambers.




Even though the morning thermometer readings are close to zero, my calendar helps keep track of the days, and gives me encouragement. Spring will come, and it will be time to plant. I need to be ready. I reach for the jar of Hungarian Flax seed that I rippled from the plants I raised last fall. It is time to free the seeds from the boll.

The USDA sent me only 200 seeds to start with. Flax seed is generally self pollinating, but cross and even outcrossing can occur. I'm not sure these seeds will all be true to type. There was another variety of flax (Elektra) that was going nearby, and though most of it matured earlier, there is a chance they cross pollinated.



I open each boll by crushing it with a spoon. The base of the boll shows the different segments (they look like little chambers), the wall that separates the segments is called the septum. On average, I'm finding about 7 seeds per boll, and have found as many as 9. Occasionally, there will be only 1 seed in the entire boll.



The color of the seed is lighter than I expected. See the shiny coating? That is the mucilage. If you soak the seeds in water, the mucilage is released and makes a sort of jell that is silky and slippery. Flax mucilage is used when spinning flax to smooth down the wispy ends and hairy surface of the spun linen thread. The mucilage maybe also be used to dress or treat the warp on the loom when weaving with linen. The dressing (when dry) helps to prevent the warp threads from sticking together.

After about an hour of this task of crushing the bolls, I have counted 370 seeds. I have only removed about half of the bolls from the jar so far....so I am very happy with the number. I at least doubled the count that I originally started with. Now remains the test of germination.



So, yes. Spring is coming and although the landscape outside does not show much of a change, the extended daylight hours are upon us! The sun gives me great pleasure on those days that it chooses to shine. I find a spot to soak up the warmth and light and bathe in its goodness.