Where: Robertson Branch Library (1719 S. Robertson Boulevard)

When: Monday, Feb 23rd, 6 pm

Join Waldorf Handwork Educator Brie Wakeland Muszynski for a hands-on workshop on how to sustainably create beautiful, naturally dyed fabric using various local plant species. In this workshop, participants will utilize black walnut and toyon plant material to dye a napkin/bandana to take home.

I've had all the ingredients for this for about a month now. I will post here once I get around to actually making it. Has anyone else made soap? How did it go?

Actually, I made about three dozen with a new mold I just got today.

I save all my cleanly split walnut shells to make tiny boxes, but sometimes only one half survives. After collecting a bag of them, I used them to recycle my spent candles.

This is a test. I read that fermenting lichen in ammonia for about six months creates a natural fabric dye that doesn't require a mordant.

This is actually test 2, since I tried to precipitate the dye out of test 2 and ended up making poison piss instead.

Colours range from yellow to red to purple depending on the process and type of lichen. I don't know lichens, so I just threw whatever in there and hoped for the best. You can see the ammonia turned very dark, so I think it worked.

TBD if it actually dyes, I'm waiting till it's warm enough to open a door before I start boiling ammonia in my kitchen.

I've been using sushi rollers the transport my brushes since art school and finally decided to make my own brush-roll-up.

Wet felting is the process of using soap, hot water and mechanical agitation to coax wool fibres to knit together. I dyed some burlap and cheesecloth to work into the fibres as well, 'cause I love texture.

Here's a pic of the inside — all criticism for brush care can go to my twelve year old niece.

I'm good at a lot of things. Sewing isn't one of them.

This started when I got a pattern to use up the box of felt from my failed wet felting experiments. Since I already mastered The Dryer Ball, my hubris led me to believe I was ready for multi-cellular organisms.

And I was. He's my handsome fox man.

I go through a ton of envelopes every spring when I pack my seeds for annual plant exchanges and the seed library at the book library, so I learned how to make my own.

This is one of a few styles I use.

If you garden or can fit a pot of soil in your living space, remember to check your local libraries for seeds, lots of them host a free exchange.

Or, this could be a use for all that paper we made last month. Because everybody made paper with me, right? https://lemmy.today/post/44387660?scrollToComments=true

I searched for a good plant-based alternative, finding this article among the few without strong politics mixed in: https://www.offthegridnews.com/current-events/top-headlines/tallow-beeswax-and-other-wonders-making-candle-wax-at-home/

Yes, that site posts pseudoscience and leans toward conspiracy theories, but the unfortunate fact is the venn diagram for homesteaders, survivalists and libertarians is nearly a circle. I'll take the know-how and leave the rest.

The plant info is further down in the Off the Grid article, for our vegan/vegetarian pals, since the Food Republic article rides hard on the meat train.

If you have better sources or first-hand knowledge, please share!

I met a group of artists this week who are honing in on their weakest skills in order to force each other to work on them, no matter how painful it is.

It's easy to work on the things you're good at, and much easier to give up and forget when you don't succeed on the first try.

So, what do you suck at? Is there a reason? Would you ever try to improve?

Most are from lake pigments, with a few earth pigments in the mix.

From the top left, reading right:

Top row: Red roses, iron oxide, greens from florist waste, cranberries

Middle row: Red roses (again,) red cabbage, kyanite, lemons

Botton row: Spinach and corriander, just spinach, beets, agate grindings (from my rock tumbler)

These are just the ones I managed to get potted and dried, I have a whole box of mixed paints waiting on another order of watercolour pots.

They all look a bit different in consistency in part because I've tried a few different formulas of watercolour mix, and because they're made from different things. Cranberries and red cabbage always end up a bit "sticky."

My latest formula for watercolours is:

• 300g Gum Arabic Solution (gum arabic powder and water)
• 280g Glycerine
• 20g Clear honey
• 20 Drops clove oil (antibacterial - paints will mold)

I mix into pigment at a 1:1 ratio by weight.

I'm not a shill and this isn't an advertisement.

I was put off by the fact that you have to make an account on Ravelry to see anything, which is why it took me so long to start using it.

But it really is the best archive of patterns and advice for literally everyone. It's community-driven with I don't even know how many folks sharing patterns for free, with whole active forums to ask any question, and ways to organize favorites.

I know I sound like a shill. I just fucking love ravelry.

I recently posted in !cool_rocks@lemmy.today about the lapis lazuli a rockhounding buddy sent me.

But I wanted to destroy it.

My goal was to create the original ultramarine pigment of renaissance artists. After a few failed tries manually, I ordered a rock tumbler and — since lapis lazuli is SUPER hard and I didn't want to have to separate grit from pigment, I got steel paint mixing balls to grind it down. That way I can separate any steel bits at the end with a magnet.

After a week, the pieces look like this. It's so pretty I'm keeping these to polish and turn into, I donno, a necklace or witchcraft or something, while I let the balls work on the rest of the bits.

Once it's finished and filtered, I'll share the depressingly small amount of pigment I get out of this weeks-long process.

I built one of these for art supplies — literally out of an old school locker. Anything can be a free library of you fill it with free stuff.

I make avocado dyes and pigments all the time. In fact, dying and pigments are the main reasons I eat so many vibrant fruits and vegetables. I get a lot of fibre.

I keep a jar of water, avocado skins and pits on my kitchen counter that I add too whenever I have one. I keep ot slightly alkaline with baking soda, which seems to deter bacteria growth.

Different kinds of fabrics take to the dye in different ways, with cotton being my favorite so far. Plant based fibres seem to do better with a urea treatment before dyeing, and you can get some very deep, dark purple/grays with iron mordant (I keep steel wool soaking in salt water.)

The fact that loofah aka luffa is actually a vegetable is always the biggest shock to people when you tell them they can grow their own luffa sponges; the fact that they grow on land, not in the water.

I know what I'm filling my garden with this year.

I haven't tried this one yet, but I have a batch sitting in wait and my own DIY, definitely don't try this at home electrolysis set up (a stripped phone charger and a plug-in adapter.)

Since battery acid became a bitch to get at hardware stores in my province, I'm excited to give this one a go since it only uses acetic acid, hydrogen peroxide, and copper.

Maybe it's your best features, your worst ones, or a mix of both. It might not even be human — a marmot or and angry ball of scribbles is completely valid. How would you draw yourself?

A great instructable because you don't need a whole shop to do it, just a few office supplies.

I'm going to try this one today.

Basic hand-weaving or lap weaving is a lot like making spicier friendship bracelets. If you use tiny strings and add beads, it's pretty much beading, too.

Weaving is one of those skills with a thousand uses if you're very into DIY. Learn to weave and you can mend clothes, make rugs, baskets and hammocks, and even build fences.

Finally.

It only took weeks of letting copper sit in a vinegar sauna (but no touching!) and a day of double-boiling off the liquid to get... about 5g of pigment. Nevermind the toxic fumes and toxic everything else and the fact that Verdigris is super aggro to other colours.

Worth it. I feel like a renaissance artist, minus the radiation and lead poisoning. My sinuses feel weird.

What it looked like in the jar before I scraped it out:

For fun, art, and acitivism.

Written instructions:

1. Crumble three handfuls of moss and 3 cups of likewarm water into a blender.

2. Add 2 Tbsp of water retention gardening gel and half a cup of buttermilk. Blend.

3. Transfer to a bucket. Paint onto rough concrete or wood with a paintbrush.

4. Mist with water weekly.

Festival du Voyageur is a cold, snowy, musical, drunken-sledding prairie tradition I'm so so fortunate to have joined for a few sporadic years.

If it's cold and snowy where you are, you can make ice sculptures, too. A video link on the page shows you how.

You can even go the easy route, like I did this year, and use silicone moulds to make ice-ornaments and hang them outside. Use food coloring for extra fun.

As long as it wasn't done with a pen, pencil, marker or anything you would buy in a store, you can post it here. It doesn't even have to last very long.

Some ideas:

• Charred wood
• Scraped against a surface with a rock
• Mud on anything
• Stomped into snow
• Glue and sand on paper

Psychologists have used this question to gage openmindedness and creativity in children.

What can you do with a paperclip?