Introducing Judy Kavanagh: hand spinning and knitting

One of the things that is good about belonging to a Guild such as the Ottawa Valley Weavers and Spinners Guild is that you meet such interesting people. Judy Kavanagh is one such person. Judy is shown here with the Handy Basket she purchased from me today at the Guild's Exhibition and Sale.

Judy's business card reads, "Judy Kavanagh: hand spinning and knitting." It really does not do her justice. When I looked at the display of her work, I saw hand spun wools made from a wide variety of sources. And her finished items included scarves made from these exotic sources. A very finely woven scarf, for example, was labelled as being made from the wool (?) of Husky dogs. Other products were from fibres provided from Persian cats. And no, she does not shave them! She collects the wool as she combs the dogs and cats (and has others collecting the fibres too.)

Judy also gave me a small tubful of wallnuts so I can use these in the future as a natural dye for my cane. She sent me to another Guild member, Elizabeth Watt, to learn how to process these nuts so as to produce the dye. There I was told to put these in a bucket of water and to store them in an outside shed over the winter. There the freeze-thaw process will do the preparation. The bucket must also have a lid to prevent the squirrels from stealing them.

I am to contact Elizabeth in the spring to learn step two. At least two other Guild members stressed that I MUST wear rubber gloves in the dyeing process, and also mentioned a stink. What a task to look forward to in the spring. Thanks, Judy!

At the Ottawa Valley Weavers and Spinners Guild 60th Anniversary Exhibition and Sale

My booth at the Exhibition and Sale had three tables, so I was able to arrange my baskets in categories rather than massing them all in a disarray.







The rib baskets, with the sign, were all placed together. This made for better organisation.







Similarly, I was able to cluster all the trays, tray kits and trivets on the one table.







My seven sewing baskets could all be placed together, with a sign describing the upcoming classes to make such baskets.








There was even space to set up my line of Greeting Cards.







And the coffee cup sleeves has a place to themselves.

Market basket: its "D" handle

This is the latest basket that I added to my Etsy shop. It is a basket made from flat rattan cane of varying widths and colours. Its structure comes from the interweaving of that cane, not from any ribs or stakes. The handle, purchased from WH Baskets of Port Rowan, Onario, is an added feature to the basket.

To purchase such a "D" frame and other basketry items go to www.whbaskets.com. The father of Wanda of WHBaskets makes these frames.

Catherine Gutsche: Mixed Media Artist

Today's featured Etsian is the person that introduced me to Etsy, mixed Media Artist, Catherine Gutsche. It is her work that is in the sidebars of this blog. Extracts from her artist's biography follow:








Catherine Gutsche is an Ottawa mixed media artist and graphic designer with paintings in private collections in Canada, the United States and Europe. She studied Fine Art at York University in Toronto, earning an Honours Bachelor of Fine Art degree with a major in graphic design. She worked for several years as a graphic designer in the downtown Toronto arts market.











Since moving to Ottawa Catherine has made time to return to her beloved roots in painting, enjoying again an intimate relationship with colour and pattern.








Travel has always played an importnat role in Catherine's life, starting at the age of 16 with a trip to China during the period of Mao Tse-Tung. China showed Catherine the importnace of pattern. She was inspired by the Chinese ability to manipulate designs and colours to form intricate repetitions that are flipped or rotated to create masterpieces - often seen on walls, floors, ceilings and household objects. Exposure to the capitals of Europe gave her an appreciation for the masters in all their glory - size, colour and textures - none of which translate in flat books that fit on coffee tables. But it was in Australia that she gained a feel for the impact of colour where Uluru (Ayers Rock) changed from earthy reds to silvery-greys, with streaks of charcoal black algae. Nowhere else in the world are there colours that extend as far as the eye can see.

Enjoy the work of the person that introduced me to Etsy. Click on her work in the sidebars to be taken to her Etsy shop.

Sleeves for take-out coffee cups

The cups in which you receive take-out coffee are often uncomforatble to hold. One solution is to hold the cup in a wicker sleeve. The first step in designing such a sleeve was to form the template for its construction. In this stage I drew a circle on a piece of plywood and then drilled twelve holes on the circle's circumference. Twelve lengths of cane were then poked through these holes.


These twelve canes were then locked into place on the underside of the plywood template as shown.








I then wove four rounds of round cane on the top side of the plywood before placing two rounds of flat cane. I then wove four more rounds of round cane. To finish the top-side I wove the upper border.





The last stage, not shown here, was to unlock the base weaving, remove the plywood and weave a finishing lower border. The end result looks fine and serves its purpose well.

These sleeves are available in my Etsy shop.

Dyeing cane

Dyeing rattan cane is a relatively easy task. In this I use "Rit" dye or "Dylon" dye. I add the powder to a pot of hot water on my lit BBQ and then dip the cane through that hot , dye infused water.

Here, Evening Blue is the dye of choice.






Tan was another colour for this dye session.








Tangerine completed the trio of colours chosen today.







The cane is then hung to dry. Today the temperature just got above freezing, but is is the only day for a while where no rain is in the forecast. And with Fall weather, one never knows when there will be another relatively warm, rainless day!

Rattan cane coffee cup

Nancy Jacobs, basketweaver from New Mexico, showed two wicker tea cups in a recent blog. I said to myself, "Those looks easy to make. I can do that." So I did.

Here is the result with a juice glass inside so it can be used as a flower vase. I added it to my Etsy shop.

Step one in flood prevention

The first stage of flood prevention at our home is almost complete. A back-flow prevention valve is now istalled on the sanitary sewer pipe. Currently, the plumber who installed this is mixing cement to fill the hole and allow access to this valve. It is a one-way valve that lets the sewage water exit the house to the sanitary sewer but prevents water from that sewer backing up and entering the house.

Also shown in this photo is the water line that enters the house too and the storm water sewer pipe. Both sewer pipes are about one foot below the basement floor and perhaps five feet below the surface of our lot.



The plumbing company asked that we have a five foot by five foot area of the basement floor cleared of any sub-flooring or carpet. As you can see that 25 square foot area really was needed.






Our home is described as a High Ranch style home. As such the basement windows are larger than the norm for regular basements while the basement itself sits higher in the ground.

A second back-flow prevention valve will be installed later today (we hope) on the storm water sewage pipe. This has to be installed outside the home, somewhere on the line between the house and the sidewalk. I will blog about this when that work is done.

Steps in making a rib basket

In a rib basket with willow ribs, it is essential to soak the willow before you begin. White willow, that is willow with its bark removed, needs perhaps an hour of soaking to make it supple. If I had used brown willow (willow with its bark still on) it would need to be soaked for 24 hours at least.



While the willow was soaking, I prepared the other materials. Two grapevine hoops of roughly equal size were found, and, in this case, pink rattan cane soaked in water to ready it for weaving.







With a long piece of flat rattan cane, I wove one God's eye to join the two grapvine hoops together. With a second long piece of cane I then wove the second God's eye. I then selected which segmant would be the handle to the basket, ensuring the horizontal hoop would be inside the handle hoop. This aids in developing the strength of the basket since that inside hoop is tightly held.


The next step is to place the initial sets of ribs in place held by the God's eyes. I usually place five ribs on each side of the basket at this stage.







After weaving several rows to fix these ribs in place, I added many more ribs. The basket-makers crede is, "The more ribs the better." For this basket I twinned the initial five ribs on each side and added two more to each sement too.





For these additional ribs, I decided to weave with natural, undyed cane. The end result is quite satisfactory.


Since I used 3/8" and 1/2" cane for this basket the weaving went much faster than in the case of yesterday's basket where I used 1/4" cane.

Harvesting the grapevine

Today was the day to begin harvesting the grapvines. Several nights of frost had left the vines with most of the leaves off. They were now ready for me to cut them down to make more hoops for rib baskets.





Today I had enough time to cut down one of the grapevines. The remains of the plant are shown here.







The leaves and the discarded branches here were composted. The leaves went to my composters and the branches to the City's composters.






These are the branches I felt were usable to create the hoops: thick enough and long enough.







This photo shows the next stage in preparing the vines: stripping off the loose outer bark, a laborious process.








Once the vine has had its outer bark removed, it can be formed into a hoop. This is easily done at this stage before the vine branch has dried out.





After an hours work in the sunshine at 9 degreees celcius I had stripped and prepared a total of seven vines. There are many more to come. Two of these hoops are needed to form the core for a rib basket.

A new rib basket

I added this new rib basket to my Etsy store today. It is made from homegrown grapevine and willow and imported rattan cane. The grapevine is twisted together to make two hoops. These are then joined with woven God's eyes to form the structure of the basket. For this basket I used undyed rattan cane to weave the God's eyes.

For the ribs I used "white" willow harvested last spring from my garden. White willow is willow whips with their bark stripped off. This is best accomplished after the first flush of leaves appears.

The weaving on the body features rattan cane dyed blue. This was dyed on my BBQ so that when the dye splashed I did not have to do any clean-up.

The low down on Fanny baskets

Recently, during Etsy chat group sessions, I have been asked what the term "Fanny" means in relation to my Fanny baskets. British chatters find the term somewaht vulgar, while North American chatters seem to comprehend it. The photo here shows one of my Fanny baskets, illustrating the "cheeks" that make up its fanny shape.



The illustration here shows a "Very full-fannied Egg (basket) with four point lashing (god's eye). That is the style of basket I call a fanny basket. This illustration is from "The Basket Book" by Lyn Siler, Sterling Publishing, New York, 1988.

My 1994 Oxford Paperback Dictionary lends some clarity to the source of the cross-Atlantic confusion over the term, "Fanny".

"Fanny", noun, 1. (Amer. slang) The buttocks

2. (Vulgar) The female genitals.

I hope this low down on the differences in meaning to the term "fanny" will assauge any discomfort over my descriptive usage of this term.

Thanksgiving

This is part of the beautiful and bountiful display before the Communion Table of Glen Cairn United Church yesterday. The upper edge of the cornucopia I made for the church can just be seen in the centre of the display. Thanks must go to Faye Adams for her creativity in setting up this artistic display.

A large, empty cardboard box was placed at the entrance to the sanctuary. People placed gifts for the Kanata Food Bank in this before they entered. At the end of the service this box was, like a cornucopia, filled to the brim and overflowing. Thanks indeed.

The Senior Choir's anthem was a song of Thanksgiving, "Kwimba Asante". This was a rousing anthem of praise in an echo and response style where the bases sang the Swahili words and the tenors, altos and sopranos sang the English translation. Additional words of thanks in Japanese, Russian and Spanish were then sung by the altos and sopranos which the tenors and bases translated into, "We thank you," "We thank you." Drum accompanyment added to the pleasure of this rythmic song of joy.

(Photo courtesy of Robert Tate.)

Preparing for the West Carleton Art Society's Exhibition and Sale.

On a rainy Fall day when the leaves were at their best, I met with Lis Allison of the West Carleton Arts Society at the Nepean Sportsplex to pick up "grids" for this weeeks Exhibition and Sale at the Carp Agricultural Hall.






It did not take long to load over 50 of the grids in the back of Lis's pick-up. What took a little longer was gaining access to the loading area as huge transport trucks had the advantage and priority over a small truck.





We took and the grids to Carp and off loaded them. We returned for another 50 or so. After loading these the way out was blocked by more trucks. The loading area we used was under the three windows shown behind the backed-up truck.





Later I set up my basket display in the hall. Sales are tonight, tomorrow and Sunday.







Other artists also were in process of setting up too. I hope to have a successful weekend.

Adrian's primary careworker resigns.

Tonight as is usual I visited Adrian at his home to take him to the library, a store of his choice, then Tim Hortons (for a doughnut) and a twenty-minute walk for exercise. His primary care worker asked me to stop by and see him when I brought Adrian back to his home.

It was then that I received the news that he has resigned from Tamir, and is taking up a position with the Catholic School board as a teaching assistant. This was quite a shock since this person has been a strong advocate for Adrian. "Ask Allan," is a phrase we have used with Adrian for a number of years now as he obsesses about particular purchases he wants (such as his current obsession for an iPOD palyer.)

I wished Allan well and thanked him for his devotion to Adrian. He asked if he could drop by to our home when Adrian is with us. Of course I said that was fine. We will keep in touch.

We hope Adrian is not too disturbed by this change. Change is not easy for him to handle. There is a good core of staff who work with him and who will work with him to help him through this time of change. Time will tell.

Renovations have a down side!

On Monday of last week, the renovations to clean up the flood damage began. This was two months after the July 24th flood. But our house is well ahead of many others in the community!



My storage area shown here was the first to have the dry wall replaced and mudding begin. The subfloor was also insatlled. A 5' by 5" area of that subfloor will have to be removed so a plumber can jack-hammer the concrete floor to install anti-flood valves on the sewer and storm water drains.






This is where our eldest son sleeps. It is not the most salubrious of areas at the moment. Still, he does have access by 4 30 pm. He works an early morning shift loading trucks for UPS and so leaves for work at 2 00 am each day.












His bathrom area is not functional. The toilet was removed from its wax ring so the dry wall behind could be installed and mudded. While the tub and shower are fuctional, they are not usable. The 20l flush toilet will be replaced with a low flush dual toilet.













The downstairs living room is a mass of piled up material. Somewhere in there is Anne's piano. No practicing! When I search for basketry supplies and tools, I sometimes despair at finding what I need.












The laundry room and downstairs kitchen leaves a lot to be desired. Anne did manage to do some laundry this weekend, but it was a struggle.











This is the area of my "Studio" in which I normally work. Lately I have worked on baskets and my new line of cards upstairs in the dining area.











All my finished baskets are stored temporarily in the upstairs dining area. I hope to be able to sort out baskets I need for next weekends West Carleton Arts Society's Exhibition and Show from this assortment.