100º in the shade

We're home from the lake and it's still beastly hot.  The cat was asleep for a day and a half in the culvert under the woodshed. We discovered a burr oak leaf skeletonized by unknowns, insects, we suspect. I have a brand new library card because I found a book I wanted to read for the title alone,  What There Is to Say We Have Said,  letters of Eudora Welty and her editor, William Maxwell.  The librarian issued me my new plastic card, that can be punched and added to my key ring, saying, with a radiant smile, Welcome Back! as if a lamb had returned to the fold. Eudora Welty, love, always.

Spoons for sale in the store,  purchased from a little old lady (as she calls herself) who carves them in Ely, MN.  Lilac, Maple, Lilac.

Wild

The kitten is feral tonight. Bright eyed, his fur smells like dirt, moss, tree bark, fog, and most likely, small rodent blood. When we open the screen door where he is hanging by his claws, he charges in under the rug, crazed and purring loud. Right away he wants us to let him out again.  Yesterday in the morning, a deer and fawn were drinking from the creek, and right between them was the half-grown kitten, lapping.

Last night, my husband saw a skunk out in the yard, and said he was going to have to set the trap. Then, a little while later, he walked  down the driveway, in the dark,  with a can of poison spray to squirt in the dirt bees' nest, which they've dug in the ditch next to our mail box. There was the skunk again, its white striped tail flailing around in the dark, in the enlarged bee hole. It was burrrowing deep in to eat dirt bee larvae (yuck) never mind the stings. Dirt bees are mean. Maybe they were asleep. In the morning we could find no bees. Now my husband thinks the skunk is all right.

My excellent husband is also a mushroom hunter, and  found a large clump of wild Hen-of-the-Woods (maitake) mushrooms. Roasting them in the oven fills our kitchen with an intense aroma, which I imagine  is like the smell of burning peat underground in the Great Dismal swamp fire, yet strangely appetizing.

As it grows, this huge mushroom incorporates leafs, twigs, bits of sand, and wood loam, that have to be removed. Our appetite for these mushrooms seems to have become a craving. We both stand near the oven, waiting impatiently for them to be done.

Wild and bitter grapes are all seed, a little pulp, in sour dusky blue skins, but I can't resist eating them, at least a few. I feel like a child again, wild in the woods.

                   new colors for wristwarmers, less the smoky pink silk

                               

Chimney Smoke

 

 

There's a whiff of it in the air, and it's not a forest fire!  The sugar maples are about to turn that crazy orange they do.  Our first load of picture-book firewood arrived today.  Call it scarf weaving weather,  and I've started adding a little alpaca-silk blend yarn to the mix, for coziness. I'm still in the lost-in-the-woods mode, in soft smoky colors and Rosepath,  and I like it like that.

Old Summer

Fresh camera, new cotton towels from Sofia Arnold,  Flying Duck Chinese Kite, paper flower weaving, and a new We're Not Out of the Woods Yet  rosepath scarf.  Mr. Pike, puffing smoke from his bee-smoker to sedate the swarming bees,  has harvested honey from all the bee boxes.  A cricket chirps in my work room--good luck!  Summer's almost done.

good weaving days

I walked up to the quarry this Sunday afternoon, in a perfect breeze, a perfect light.  I wanted to take a picture of the ferns that grow across from the quarry, and there they were, in softly filtered sunlight. Some butterflies were dead along side the road.  I've woven two new plain scarves, in linen and combinations of silk, alpaca, and cotton, but mostly unbleached linen. One is ferny,  greens and browns. The other is dark teal blue, browns and charcoal gray,  lakey.

Deer Season, Deja Vu

Deer season ahead.  The deer are running now, sometimes in front of your car headlights.  Driving at dusk is a fraught experience, 45 mph seems too fast.  Not much has changed in my neighbor Falk's yard since last year, except he's not there.  His old blue truck is parked behind the sheds.

I wove 3 more pillows of rag, linen, and Rosepath,  and will weave some more.  I'm waiting for new yarn to arrive, silk and alpaca cones in choice colors, only 2 back-ordered! My plan is to make wristwarmers and scarves with similar designs to these pillows.  I'm also planning for Sno-Crush, first all textile show, here, Nov 20 - Dec 31.

uphill

The wild clematis is a little garland of puffs along the hill road. The woods on the side hill of the valley is not so leafy now, but the Witch Hazel is in bloom with its small yellow starry flowers.
I wish my weaving could merge into the rough fissured bark of the century (at least) white pine. I don't try to copy what I see. It's usually after I've woven something, that I see what I have been looking at.

Late Bus

Dusk happens suddenly these days. I walk up the hill after the late school bus comes through Avalanche. The woods is settling down, a few birds call, a cardinal chip-chip-chips. Two deer run across the road in front of me, their white tails flagging. There is a bow hunter in the woods.

My bench cushions are woven and shipped now.  Still some pillows to make and  sew together tomorrow.  But now, there are a few of my Hen-of-the-Woods mushrooms leftover, and some red wine, suppertime.

Hen of the Woods

All weaving came to a standstill.  My husband brought home many bags of clusters of Hen of the Woods, or, Maitakes, that he collected  in the woods.  The mushroom clusters grow at the base of oak trees in the fall. (Similar mushrooms growing on different tree species should be avoided).  They  are very flavorful, and taste like tender meat on chicken wings. They have a firm texture, a little chewy.

They pull apart easily before they are cooked.  I've been sauteeing them , or roasting with olive oil,  garlic and rosemary, salt and pepper.

Often the mushrooms are huge, and may weigh up to 40 pounds.  Enough to last the whole winter, until the morels come up in the spring.  They freeze well, so I've been putting them away, and sampling, sampling, sampling.

up north

Along the trail to the falls, birch, scraffiti, no mosquitoes.  The Kawishiwi Falls flow north, all the way  to Hudson Bay. I'd like to go there, to the far north.