Flea Market report

Oh, my goodness...look what I bought for $5 at the Punk Rock Flea Market!!

It's a bundle of antique scraps from a kimono store!

A lot of these are handwoven silk and a lot of these are shibori dyed in indigo! I love indigo and I love shibori - I flipped when I saw these scraps.

I see an indigo sampler quilt in my future....wouldn't that look great? Then I can showcase each of the prints emphasizing the variation in texture and results from just one dye. I think it would look awesome with red-orange stitching/ties and binding. I can't wait to make it. More photos to come - each scrap is absolutely beautiful and deserves documentation.

Here's me at our Tree Peeps booth.

It was a beautiful, warm, sunny day - the first day we've had temperatures over 70 degrees since last August...and the whole city almost died of heat stroke (including me)! Hilarious.

A sampling of our wares (above) and the rock star seller beans and rice (below) I love how well this goes over every year :)

Project Alabama

(Photo from Alabamachanin.com)
For ten years now I have been in love with Project Alabama, Natalie Chanin's amazing hand sewn clothes.
They are so beautiful. I can't get over each stitch, each bead, the colors, the stenciling, the whole thing - it's too much!
I remember back in 2001 or 2002 (in high school) I saw some of her Project Alabama stenciled and applique rooster shirts in a magazine and immediately wanted to make one.

I actually did make a shirt inspired by her designs, but it wasn't anything as lovely as what she had done. I used her technique of double layering cotton knits (in this case, a shirt), stitching a design (in this case, my name) and then cutting away the top layer. You can create a positive or negative image by cutting out the letters/shapes or cutting away everything but the letters/shapes.
Her company has moved from stenciled/applique shirts to stenciled/applique everything and I love it all! I love the combination of craft, skill, art, and time that each item exudes. She now has some particularly beautiful shirts, dresses, and skirts for ladies.
Here are some inspirational links you must see:
Alabama Chanin website
studio style, her DIY website where you can order kits or supplies
past collections

a Google image search
Her books: Alabama Stitch Book, and Alabama Studio Style
a project bag on Purl Bee
Anyway, about ten times so far I've almost started a real project, but put it aside for something else. This time I'm serious, and I'm blogging to prove it! I'm going to make a beautiful, double layer, applique skirt for myself (after I finish my first quilt that's almost done, Adam's "performance" fleece jacket, and some storage bags for our ice cramp-ons).
I've been collecting supplies for years now (old cotton knit pillow cases and sheets from DI, cotton knit shirts in cool colors, fabric spray paint, lovely stencil ideas that I traced and cut out of acrylic felt (to make them re-usable), I've already got lots of beads. I'm set as far as thrifted/recycled supplies go...just need to actually make something!

Algae

(Above: Volvox carteri, a species from one of my favorite algal genera when I took Phycology -"algae class" - at BYU. Photo from wikipedia.)
Here is an inspiring article about growing algae for food. I recommend reading it. It got me real jazzed about setting up a series of water bottles in my window to grow edible algae.

Here are a few quotes to get you excited about reading the article.

"Aaron Baum is a 40-year-old Harvard graduate and Stanford Physics PhD. After a mid-life crisis of sorts, he spent months researching the types of science that would most benefit the world and concluded that algae are it."

After working as a program manager, Aaron said "I realized I was working my butt off to make computer chips run faster. I kind of lost faith in what I was doing."

"Algae is a way to grow really high quality food in a small area, on the surface of a body of water, or in wastewater."

"Algae as a food is extremely healthy. It's high in complete protein, antioxidants, omega-3 fatty acids, and it's effective against infections....There were dozens of experiments where they fed rats a regular diet and another group with spirulina. They exposed the rats to mercury, lead, pesticides, radiation, and mutagens and found that spirulina-eating rats did much better."

How to eat fresh live spirulina...? "You can spread it on crackers. Or mix it with brown rice and guacamole for a vegan meal. The easiest way is mixed in carrot juice."

"The nice thing about algae is that while they clean water and air, they also produce very valuable things like fuel, fertilizer, food, and precursers to bioplastics, cosmetics, and medicine."

Yahoo! sign me up, sounds fun! I also like the way windows look with green tanks of algae.

Aaron Baum's website: FarmerOnMars

and The Algae Lab

Yes, yes, I know, Volvox is not edible, but it's amazing looking. Here are some more cool photos illustrating the diversity and beauty of algae:

(several species from the Chlorococcales group via wikipedia)

(above: Oedogonium sp. from wikipedia)

And last, here is Spirulina, the commonly eaten algae:

The Sprawl

We saw/heard Calexico and Arcade Fire last night! Wow, what a great show. We wiggled, foot tapped, and eventually rocked out with our fellow Seattleites in a giant basketball arena. Beside the throngs of 20-30 year olds, there were many multi-generational families; the kids, the parents, and the grandparentsjoined forces last night.

Calexico is a rockin' "southwestern" band of guitars and trumpets. We loved it.
Arcade Fire is amazing. It's like they are already legendary. How do they know exactly what it's all about and then project that feeling through music in such a perfect way? consistently over the last ten years?! sigh....

I love their new album "The Suburbs" and I loved hearing all the new and old songs played together in one night. The songs all flow together so well. I love their themes of growing up, neighborhoods, and friends. They perfectly capture that fiery feeling of wanting to bust out and do something but you're still figuring out what that something is.
Arcade Fire really fits the description of good art being like a mirror; everyone can identify with what they produce, though it is slightly different for each person.
They put on a great show, too. The stage backdrop was a picture from under a freeway overpass, so it felt like we had all met up under the freeway in the suburbs to hear them play. They had great video clips taken from old silent films, kids hanging out, and live black and white footage of the band playing - but it was instantly processed in a high contrast way that gave it a gritty, old movie feel.
They are so cool....

Fall 2010

My sister is going to NYC in a few weeks and asked me if it would be during fashion week. I wasn't sure so I said I'd look it up. I'm home sick today surfing the internet and saw on Carmen Marc Valvo's website that their Spring 2011 runway show is TODAY!

I got excited about runway shows because I was thinking about all the ideas, design, story-crafting, and preparation that has gone into the show that will be later today. Carmen is a family friend and he generously invited me to New York for an informal internship with his evening wear design house. I interned with him for a month in August 2001 and then again in February 2002; I was 16! (I have awesome photos from this time, but sadly due to space issues they are all in storage right now. I'll dig them out someday and share; they are hilarious!)

(side note...I missed the September 2001 runway show because high school was starting and I didn't want to miss too many days and get behind. It's interesting because if I would have stayed, I would have been in the middle of Times Square NYC when the planes crashed into the WTC towers. Carmen's show was like the 12th or 13th of September and he said he was driving to work, looked up at a digital billboard in Times Square and saw a real-time video of the unexpected second plane crashing into the second tower. Pretty amazing. It would have been an interesting part of history to experience. I'm glad I was safe and my heart goes out to all those who lost friends and family in September 2001).

It's funny to look back 9 years and remember what it was like to be a 16 year old Tess. I was completely consumed by fashion. I obsessively visually devoured fashion magazines like Vogue, Elle, Harper's Bazaar, etc. I knew all the good designers and I knew all the good models' names! I created an extensive filing system - which I still have - to store my favorite ideas from magazines. I wasn't a big shopper, though. I wore vintage clothes and loved the 1960's. What I loved about fashion was the drama and imagination evident in couture and runway shows. I also loved the craft of garment construction and the skill of working with different fabrics.

Hahah, I just got sidetracked thinking of what a closet drama queen I am! If I wasn't so shy, I would love to be a performer. I guess my interest in frivolous high fashion is similar to my love of David Bowie and Prince Poppycock...

It's funny because people who knew me in high school are shocked that I now love and study fungi...and people who know me now are usually shocked to learn that as a teen ager I was on my way to being a fashion designer.

I just had a fun time looking through the current Fall 2010 Carmen Marc Valvo runway show.

Here are a few of my favorite looks:

I'm excited to see photos of the Spring 2011 show from today. I think I'll write Carmen a letter getting him caught up on what I have been up to (graduating college, being a mycologist, getting married...) and thanking him for his generosity and kindness in letting 16-year-old me into his home and work place to experience and learn more about the fashion industry.

dreaming

I woke up this morning after some awesome mushroom dreams.

As a wedding gift, our friends, Kate and Neil, gave us two incredible pillow cases. They screen printed original artwork of each of us asleep and dreaming. Adam is dreaming about Tess, and Tess is dreaming about mushrooms!
Their gift has been surprisingly accurate (though I, of course, also dream about Adam).
I'll share a few bits from my latest mushroom dream (in case you are wondering what a mushroom dream is like...):
I was at my grandma's old house in Merced, California. I went outside through the screen door onto a porch and saw golden fields of hay/wheat. Some migrant workers passed on the road. Slowly, I started to find more and more mushrooms. Eventually, I was in a suburban neighborhood (Beacon Hill) I recognized from my childhood in Laguna Niguel, California. It was dark/night and the roads were actually water - like a still lake at night. I was traveling around by canoe finding TONS of mushrooms. I could paddle up to the river banks in front of the houses and see the mushrooms growing off stumps, and logs and in the soil. I distinctly remember a huge cluster of Letioporus "Chicken of the Woods." It was flat and fan-like at the base of a tree. I remember being very happy and excited because I was finding so many mushrooms I liked! After I had scoped out the area, I was going to paddle back around to gather the ones I wanted into my canoe. Everything was dark, quiet, and still like night time and there were other people there. There were a few other girls looking for mushrooms, but I didn't know them. I remember my dad was in this dream, but I can't remember in what way; I think near the end of the dream.
I woke up, made a salad for mine and Adam's lunch, rode the bus to work, and then had the most inspiring day. I was very busy, and had lists and lists of things I had to do before the end of the day. With my mind racing, as it does when you are busy, I came up with wonderful art and sewing projects. Like I said, my mind was racing, and I kept imagining all these things I was making, how beautiful they were, how they were a satisfying, artful combination of fungi, natural dyeing, and stitch witchery.
I look forward to actualizing these visions someday soon...

Oh! and later that day I actually did find some mushrooms! On my way home, I found Agaricus augustus - The Prince. It has a distinct, sweet almond scent and flavor. The stipes (stems) are often fairly deep in the soil; the cap has small scales and stains yellow; the veil is heavy and there are chunky scales along the stipe. I found it under true Cedars (Cedrus sp.), a "textbook" location. Last year I made a sweet mushroom dessert, this year...I'm still deciding what to do. I think I'll eat a few in scrambled eggs and slice and dry the others for later.

Resurrection Fern

One of my favorite sites to check is the Resurrection Fern.
She creates little micro-worlds and photographs them. Using leaves, flowers, seeds, ferns, rocks, snails, kitties, water (etc.) combined with handmade elements like embroidery, crochet, knitting, and sewing she makes beautiful collections of objects that have a common shape, texture, color...or just look good together. Anyway, hard to explain, just check out her site.
What I wanted to say about it today is that she has posted a tutorial at The Purl Bee on how to make her most recognizable - almost trademark - object: crochet covered stones.
They are so beautiful.
If you know how to crochet, it's very simple. You can follow any doily pattern or invent your own. Crochet it the size and shape of a particular smooth stone. Once it fits over the top of the stone, use a strong thread in matching color to crochet it to the stone by making progressively shorter crochet rows as you round the edge of the stone and work your way to the underside. Hard to explain in words, but check out her site and tutorial for more information and inspiration.
Happy crocheting!
I was excited to find this tutorial since I have recently gotten back into crochet, as posted here.
Oh, one time, for Christmas, I made my sister a crochet acorn holder necklace as per Resurrection Fern's inspiration! It is adorable and hilarious; Briana got a kick out of it!

new game!

My favorite animation company, Amanita Design, has made a new game for kids called Questionaut.


I just played it for two hours!

Shape and color

I love the shape and color of this design!

March

I love March :)
for many reasons.
Here are some of the things i have done so far in March:

My sister came to visit:


And we made lots of food:



I checked on my winter garden:


and it is doing pretty well:

I made squash raviolis:

I went to my first rugby game, and i liked it:

I went to girls' night:

I saw the first crocus flower of spring:

I saw a beautiful art exhibit:

I love this!

I hung out with little Elijah. He gets cuter and older everyday.

This is brie in my bed:

three or four

Annalisa and I have narrowed our big ideas down to three or four.
doily skirt and some kind of top.
denim bones dress.
recycled knitwear with nesting pocket.
and linen skirts with batiked branches (see earlier post for picture)

this is the nesting pocket thing. It is made by layering necklines from t-shirts.

More later!

ideas

this is what we have so far:



this is what i want everything to look like:

I'm also thinking about:

hand felting wool onto silk for a shirt.

finishing my pieced antique doily skirt idea.

making a skirt covered in pintucks.

using the necklines from t-shirts to make a nest-pocket.

Annalisa had the good idea to use seams from old jeans. I think it would be cool as a sculpted "bustier." Every show needs a bustier, right? wrong! but I don't know what else i want to be sculpted...

my dream world

I'm serious about the websites i posted a few posts ago. They are so cool.

There is a great video here at http://samorost2.net/plantage/ and two smart games called samorost1 and samorost2. They are smart because they creatively use plants, animals, and fungi :) in the design. I love it!

I play them all the time. And I haven't even beat samorost2. yet.

amanita design

A friend showed me this great site by amanita design. First, great name. Second, great animations. Here is my favorite video, "plantage"

http://samorost2.net/plantage/

(they also have funny interactive games, so give those a look at http://www.amanitadesign.com/)

painting

I wish i had made this beautiful painting, it is by Brian Kershisnik.

Instead i have been making veg stew, christmas decorations :) and celebrating 87% on CALCULUS final. yes, wahoo, yay, yay!