Twin brothers Howard (left) and Harvey (right)

It’s Veterans Day, a day to say “Thank You”. Thank you for your service.  Thank you for your willingness to put yourself in harms way to protect the freedoms we now enjoy and to help bring those freedoms to others.  Thank you for serving while the political machine treats you like pawns in a very dirty dangerous game. Thank you to my LBGT  friends who did so while hiding and denying an integral part of their lives. This is a very special Veterans day for you.  Thank you to the families who sat by the phone night after night waiting for contact, for the moms & dads and wives & husbands waiting up at 3 a.m.  for their loved one to get their turn to skype or video chat from their sandy hell hole. Thank you to the chaplains in uniform, who comforted the injured, and wept with the grieving. Thank you to the kids who see the empty chair at the dining room table every night, who have one less person patting them on the back when they hit their first home run, or sing in their first concert. Thank you to the wives and husbands who write letters every day, or cry angry tears every night.

Thank you also, to the men who went to war less willingly.  Who were told “you must leave your family, your business, your home and go do this for your country.”  Thank you for going to places you’d never heard of, during a time when news was hard to come by, and news from family was slow.  Thank you for serving when all you had from your loved ones was a letter from 6 months before, wrinkled, smudged and tattered, but lovingly carried in a pocket like a promise.   Thank you to the loved ones at home who wrote that letter and waited patiently for yours to come back.

Copied at the bottom of this post, is one of those letters that came home.  It was a letter, sent by my Grandpa Harvey to his mom, the day after his twin brother Howard was killed in combat. They served in WWII together, back before the Army came to it’s senses and figured out that siblings shouldn’t be in the same foxhole together. My father has been taking these letters written on crumbling paper and transcribing them to word documents to at least preserve their contents.

When my son (who is named for my Grandpa and my husband’s) asked 2 nights ago if anyone in our family had any stories about WWII, because they are studying it in history, I said “Oh boy do we ever”, and gave him the Cliff notes version of several stories from both Grandpa Harvey and my Grandpop (my mom’s dad).  Neither one were much for regaling us with tales of their service.  Both probably had suffered from what I’m sure would now be called PTSD, due to what had gone on while they were in the European theater.  Both had been very involved in the liberation of concentration camps.  Grandpop lost both his father and baby son at home, while he was away at war. Grandpa Harvey, lost his twin brother right there with him in combat. But they did have a few stories, usually the funny ones, that provided glimpses into what they were like as young men.

Grandpa Harvey never talked about his brother. I knew he had a twin, I knew he was killed in combat, and that was about it. Later after Grandpa died, I knew they served together.  And when my grandmother died 11 years ago, my uncles and dad found the collection of letters she kept that he and his brother had sent home to her and their mother. (included in those were the old USO “letters on a record” that the troops could record and send to family.  Nothing more poignant and tear jerking than hearing a scratchy recording of a young man tell his mom “not to worry, I’ll be fine” when you know that within the year, all would not be fine.  And there is nothing sweeter than knowing that due to the hard work of my husband and his friend- a sound engineer- we have digitally preserved those words, and the sweet sweet sounds of my grandpa, great uncle and their army buddy singing “When you wore a tulip, and I wore a big red rose” to their pretty girls back home. )

Back to the letter…. after I gave my son the quick and dirty timeline of his great grandparents stories during WWII, I told him to give his Grampy a call, because he’d know the details better than I. My dad told him the details, gave him some websites where he could see maps and so forth.  After he hung up, Dad called me back and told me about the letters he’d been transcribing.  He asked if he should send one to my son.  I told him that would be great, T would love it.  I had no idea that this letter is the one he would choose to send.  I think it perfectly illustrates, in very simple words,  the sacrifice that veterans, of any war, in any country, have made.  My 11/11/11 wish at 11:11 today  is that no brother, son, friend needs to ever send one of these letters again, and no mother ever needs to know my great grandmother’s pain she must have felt when reading it.  Yes, it’s unrealistic, but a wish is a wish.

This letter was published in the local paper at the time of Howard’s death.

From the Times Gazette.
Staff Sergeant Harvey Whitmore’s Letter to his mother Mrs. Grace Whitmore 246 East Ninth Street is being published because many have asked if the twins were together at the time of Howard’ death. This is Harvey’s letter written on April 15, 1945 the day after Howard as killed.

Dear Mom

I know by the time you get this you will have received the telegram about Howard. It all happened so quickly that I just can’t realize that it’s true. I want you to know mom I got to him as soon as I could which was about a half hour after it happened. The Medics had already done what they could for him but I guess it was of no use.

I don’t know whether he told you we were in combat or not. At least he didn’t want to for fear you’d worry about us. When the truth is known things hadn’t been to rough up ‘till a few days ago and since then it’s been just a little unpleasant. Yesterday afternoon we were tied down by a lot of artillery fire and there wasn’t a lot we could do about it. Howard had moved on ahead and was setting up his guns when a shell hit above them and got him and wounding four of his men. I still don’t know why they went ahead unless it’s because they were the only ones with guts enough to move. Anyway Mom that’s how it happened and I’m glad I was near him at the time. I know that’s the way he would want it.

I didn’t feel too well last night or today. I think I’ll get to go back a couple of days for a little rest and I’m going to try to find out about sending him home. From what I can find out it may be quite a while before I can do that but I’ll get it done anyway.

I know how you must feel Mom because I feel pretty bad about it to. Somehow I feel he’s right here with me and that’s the way I’ll always feel too. I Have no doubt that we’ll meet again sometime face to face and stay together always.

Now Mom please don’t worry and I’ll do my best to find out what I can. Don’t feel to bad because I’m sure he’ll be well taken care of. I’ll write again real soon Mom. Be Good And God Bless You

Your loving Son, Harvey.

My great uncle, SSGT Howard Whitmore is buried in the Netherlands American Cemetery, in Margraten, Netherlands. His body lies in rest among the thousands of other soldiers that never came home. His brother, my grandfather, Harvey Whitmore died in 1985.  I miss him very much and wish my son could have met him.  They have the same eyes, and the same sense of goofy humor.

Hand dyed velvet shibori "fuschia on fire"

Ombre dyed "bubble stretch silk" scarf

Salt Lake Sunset bubble silk scarf

hand dyed rainbow shibori socks for wee little feet

you get this…

silk/rayon velvet dyed, discharged, overdyed, forgotten & found again

velvet shibori scarf dyed, discharged, overdyed

In a rush to get *something* done, anything really, I grabbed a handful of scarves I had dyed with liquid fiber reactives. The one above I believe was cranberry & turquoise. The one below was all cranberry.  I had limited time & apparently limited focus. At first i couldn’t figure out why my discharge bath wasn’t heating up. (I had unplugged my hotplate set up).  Then even when hot enough it didn’t seem to be working. So I started gradually (i thought) increasing the strength. Till i realized I had just doubled the amount of thiox, unintentionally, and WHAM- then it worked. Quickly stripping way more than intended.

I was completely devastated since it was yet another “failure” in a long list of things that hadn’t been going well. And i just *didn’t have the time* to do it all over again.

I peeked under the folds and realized it also hadn’t been compacted as much as I thought either. So resists weren’t tight.

*sigh*

So, I grabbed some dye paste I had left from another project from right before, literally slapped it on the poles, stuck them in buckets, and forgot about them, OUTSIDE, where it’s about 45 at night for 2 days.

Imagine my surprise when I went out to take the garbage out, and there are my little buckets, with the neglected poles. I picked the leaves off, started rinsing, pulled it off the pole and was shocked at the results. Colors I wouldn’t have ever really thought to put together had I “planned” it all out. The pinkish one below I was less impressed with, but the sister to these two is in my closet. mine mine mine.

Dyed velvet, discharged, over dyed on pole.

Now my goal is to try to in some way replicate these mistakes.

(Apologies for the crappy, unedited iphone pics. Sometimes, it’s just not worth it to drag out the big camera)

How about we stop legislating nonsense? 

I’m not even sure where to start, but a well meaning law has gone so far off the deep end, that it will literally force makers of natural toys, children’s products, kids clothing, anything that could be *perceived* by the CPSC as geared to kids (even if it’s not), to go out of business.  In addition to requiring not only not allowing component testing to stand in for item testing, they are requiring it on EVERYTHING.  Every color, every size, everything.  I’ve seen costs for this range from 180 per item to 300 per item.  In some cases there will be SEVERAL tests required.  Make hand dyed baby onesies?  The fabric needs to be tested for lead, as do the dyes, the snaps and the thread.  All independantly.  EVERY COLOR.

If you can’t prove testing, and can’t provide certification, you are not in compliance.  You can be fined HUNDREDS of thousands, and face jail time.  

After Feb 9th, 2009, all these items you have made over the years, will suddenly be considered hazardous waste and can NOT be sold (accross state lines- apparently you can still sell in state only, and only if you state is not as rigorous as the Fed laws.

In addition, there are parts to this law that include apparel manufacturers.  “i’m not a manufacturer, I’m a dye artist, weaver, sewer, etc”  you say. Nope- if you make it and sell it, you are a manufacturer. You will be required to label even more stringently.  In addition, I believe- but am not positive because the whole thing is so damn confusing, submit products for testing for flammability, though it’s possible they will all just have to be labeled as flammable if you don’t. 

And apparently “labels” are not permanent enough to the cpsc, it is sounding more and more like it will have to be a permanent part of the product, not removable.  Yes that will look nice on that silk scarf.  “FLAMMABLE!”  No kidding.  So don’t butt your ciggy out on it! Or dangle it over an open flame. 

I urge anyone, or at least the 3 of you who read this to look into how this affects your business and art. 

Some interesting articles can be found here:

http://www.fashion-incubator.com/archive/new-product-safety-regulations-that-affect-all-manufacturers/

http://www.fashion-incubator.com/archive/cpsia-requirements/

http://www.fashion-incubator.com/archive/cpsia-and-small-manufacturers/

http://mothering.com/sections/action_alerts/toy-safety-legislation.html

Take a look, read up, contact your legislators, nearly all these links lead to more links.  And some sample letters if you know how to write one yourself.

I’m all for regulation and protecting kids.  I’m a mama, I know.  But I’m going to kick and scream about this one. 

more later…

One of the Best Fairs Ever!

Peace to you and yours.

on my mind:

The Election

The Economy (and it’s effect on those of us selling “luxury” or “non-essential” items.)

Trying to build up stock for my Etsy shop, a few shows, and the holiday season in general.

Trying to find an artistic path instead of what lately seems like aimless wandering. (Today I’ll discharge silk, tomorrow I’ll slap wax around, the next day- painting, after that more shibori, what do i want to do, dye scarves forever?- or create my own fabrics to be used in other work, or maybe I’ll continue my fascination with Rozome, etc etc lather rinse repeat)

yada yada yada

More later.

and as testament to my apparent need for better focus, the first time I posted this I spent a half hour trying to find it…. only to find out that I accidentally wrote this as a page instead of a post…..

 If your message doesn’t pop up right away, please don’t get offended it just means something in the message triggered the little internet elves to hold onto it for me to take a look at first.   I’ll post it as soon as I look at it.

thanks

HA. Just kidding. Obviously. This would be the doofus cat that still calls my house home. SOMEDAY his real mama will come to reclaim him (hint-hint christine…). He just likes to wait until I’m slaying trolls in the Etsy fora to take advantage of the most expensive fabric in the house. (Don’t worry- this gets washed on hot about a dozen times during dyeing.)

Here- thanks to my hubs, is my “discharging” get up. Sometimes you just gotta take the color OUT of something, and that throws off some really nasty fumes. I do it outside (hence the outdoor shot) with my hot plate and a “table” made of sawhorses and buckets and so on. Not something you want to dress up for. Generally- this would be done in one of the many multicolored (aka dyesplashed) shirts and crocs. and grubby pants or pjs. But we just amae back from a day out with the kids- so I threw the garb on for the modeling session in front of the hydrangea. FYI: That hydrangea is FULL of bumblebees…..

Scary eh? Maybe sometime I’ll actually do some REAL workspace pics. After I clean up my workspace.

Anyhoo- that’s me. Last time I was out doing this- in my driveway- every dog walker and kid walker happened to decide to go for a stroll by my house that day. Trust me- It wasn’t pretty and I secured my place as the nuttiest on the block.

Now that we’ve looked at that- let’s look at the cute…

Yes- that’s the asshat cat from above, looking cute so that I still feed him every day. There are two others in the house- but they are a little more camera shy.

“Yes Way!”  I say.

I did, and I have proof, that indeed, I spent the afternoon rocking out with Gaelic Storm’s new album, in my basement, mixing and concocting, and soaking and rinsing.

Behold, the wrinkled, not quite ready for primetime, but sort of pretty nonetheless, batch of scarves I did today.

Here a SimpleViewer Flash gallery should be displayed. Click here to open the post in your browser to see the gallery.

They may not be colors for everyone, but I am finding, as I usually do at this time of year, a yearning for the colors of autumn.

Subdued, warm, looking like the sound of crunching leaves, but light enough to still feel like summer heat.

They should be up in the shop by tomorrow.

(and for anyone keeping count, which is probably only me…. that was a seven week hiatus from dyeing things.  Let’s not let that happen again, shall we?)

So instead I write a letter to you. Somewhere in a foreverland of snowcapped mountains and rolling hills and Scottish moors and happy dogs, I imagine you sitting down to read this. Taking a break from some intricate puzzle you’ve been building, popping into the office for a bit, leaning against the doorway.  In my head you are on a coffee break, and I guess you kind of are on a break from the meds and the radiation and the fatigue and difficulty breathing and the vision problems and the searching for words and the frustration in not finding them. A break from the cancer. Yes you are on a break.

Put down the hammer, pour yourself a glass of Laphroaig (the 15 year of course) and relax.

Hey Nick,

Back to work tomorrow and word of your leaving us will surely be starting to spread. I’m sure the guys at the site first, and then moving outward like ripples on a lake. The calls will come in and grown up tough guys will be reduced to quivering puddles again. They will be examining their own mortality. Which in a few cases, could be a good thing. But I digress.

I’m not sure I want to be there, my friend. Unless you’d like to pull in to the office driveway and stand silently, smooshing your nose and face onto my window, waiting for me to turn around and then fall off my chair in shock, like you did last summer. Or the day you came in and taped the computer mouse to the desk. You can come do that again. I promise I won’t yell. Well not much anyways. Maybe just a little, until you break out into rolling laughter. And we follow suit.  Doubled over, gut splitting, tears flowing laughter. Maybe you could do a little peanut butter on the steering wheel once more, that one was good too.

Or you could bring one of your gorgeous dogs in again. Max was it? You the proud doggy papa. Trying to convince me I needed to bring a Golden home to my family. I was convinced, you know. But the better half wasn’t so much.

You could come in and tell me about Utah, and the mountains. I’ve finally seen them, and you were right. There’s nothing like them. But you could tell me about them again, and I’d listen. Eagerly clinging to every word, we’d listen.  And show me the pictures, again.  Please.

How we are supposed to do this? This moving on, this one day at a time. We need to keep the forward momentum, but we don’t want to leave you behind.  Faith has brought me from here to Utah and back again, allowing us to leave there feeling you were at peace now. I’m digging my nails in and not letting go.  This faith is an elusive thing.  I held onto it for the last  6 months, and I promise to keep holding on , but it’s hard and a bumpy ride.

Throw us a bone, let us know that it’s all okay.  Nothing hokey, no rainbows and God light, but a good old fashioned prank.  Glue the shot glass to the table, or the phone to it’s cradle, or 12 sugars in someone’s coffee.

Then laugh so we can hear you. So we can nod and smile and bust a gut ourselves and say “It’s okay. He’s on his break.”

[imagebrowser id=5]

Many thanks to the Nicoll family for use of these wonderful photos. He was a true friend to many and is deeply missed.

and this is what he made:

When asked what it is….

“It’s a pooping sheep.”  he says.

You just can’t make this stuff up.

And indie…dear sweet kitty indie…

couldn’t
get
enough

Wouldn’t leave them alone. As soon as I got him off the tale, back up he jumps. WORSE than the computer obsession.

So – when he wasn’t looking- I moved them to the kitchen window. He found them.

I finally had to put the out on the ledge on the porch so he can’t get to them.

He then proceeds to cry at the door, (much like he did when I had the lemon grass plant out there before I planted it) and run out every time someone opened the door to go out.

He cries, he rams his head, he scratches at the door.

He paces, and jumps on the couch, then on the shelf where the keys are just to get a glimpse of his beloved flowers.

Pace cry jump pace cry jump.

I’m trying to nap, until I hear a distinctly different cry and see this:

pacing, pacing, (and meowing)

and of course the obligatory cat butt picture…

Eventually, after about 3 minutes of frantic pacing and a final gaze out the window at his beloved flowers, he jumped down with more of a splat than feline grace, but he’s fine. I think if he hadn’t been so scared- he would have tried to go through the screen to get them.

(thanks to the hubs for his catching the action)

This shy beauty was found among a bed of irises along my driveway. Some of which had been transplanted 2 seasons before from my backyard. I’ve never seen her before, but she is stunning, and the nicest surprise.

It is also amazing what has grown from a handful of seeds, haphazardly tossed in the side yard 2 seasons ago.

Funny how big this guy grew, happy as a clam in this crappy, unamended, compacted soil, from questionable seed, and the pots I purchased from the garden center 2 years ago- died the first year.

What’s nice is this one has a bunch of friends in this bed. Maybe it’ll take over the whole side.

And lastly

This lilac hasn’t bloomed like this in the almost 3 years we’ve been here. It smells DIVINE.

Well my friends, clearly there hasn’t been much dyeing going on. Lately I’ve been reveling in the color in my yard. That’s where I plan to stay as long as it’s sunny out.

This, my friends, was what I woke up to this morning. Boatloads of views and about 15 new hearts on my shop. Never does that happen, as I’m a small fish in the BIG ETSY ocean. But alas, apparently the treasury I was in was on the front page overnight. And this was the lucky listing.

This gorgeous Treasury was curated by juliegarland . She was kind enough to send me a screenshot of the front page that someone took for her.

I’m just a wee bit excited. Just a bit. And please be sure to check out her shop as well.

In response to Shiborigirl‘s challenge to try to figure out or replicate this pattern, I decided to start simple.

Rows spaced half an inch apart, half inch stitches, off set each row by half an inch. I knew looking at the original fabric this wouldn’t get the same pattern- but it could be a jumping off point. About 3/4 of the way down the fabric- trying to sketch the stitch lines and lining up quilting rulers to make sure the off set was correct (and frequently winding up with wonky lines) it occurred to me that drawing an actual grid would have been a helluva lot easier.

So would have been doing this without trying to watch Deadliest Catch at the same time.

Anyhoo, onward we go.

Started with this (stitched ever so carefully on the bus yesterday)

Pulled the strings tight.
Then immersion dyed in dark green mx dye bath, probably swishing too much,

and got this

Clearly, not what it was supposed to be.

Things I know:

I need better thread. I’ve been using nylon coats and clark thread for the silk tying. But it is not thick enough for using with this fabric I don’t think. Or maybe I just need something less slippery. I had a hard time tying the threads tight enough to get clear resist. In digging through a box of samples that I’d done, I realized I had tried this technique a few years ago- before I really started getting into dyeing. I had used a heavier weight “thread of unknown origin” that had been in my grandmothers stash of sewing/craft supplies. It was the perfect weight for that- there were threads still in there, and I remember the cone it was on. I also remember chucking it when the basement flooded 2 years ago.

I think I over swished (agitated) in the dye bath.

Not entirely sure that original fabric did get immersed. Not even sure it was mokume.

So I will think about this some more and try again on the weekend, after I get the veggies in the garden.

And I will chuck that green dye stock, it seems shot anyways, and it’s a really icky color.

I usually throw down cross stitch in disgust, toss knitting across the room and commit similar semi violent actions again innocent crafting projects.

Which is why I’m surprise I actually stuck with this one, to the distress of my shoulder, neck and eyes (from stitching white on white and then picking out the dyed stitches.)

Here it is- my first foray in to both Mokume AND using lanaset dyes. Not too shabby for a first shot.

Photos of completely unpicked scarf to come. I suspect I’ll be  pulling stitches out on the train for the next few days.

I was tempted to ignore the Google Alert I got on  “teegee” since usually, it’s just referring to an indie gamer somewhere. 

But today I looked,  and this scarf is featured

in an article, (a brief one) about Batik. 

Thanks to the folks at  Threadbanger for the plug!