flotsam & jetsam...

okay, that term is more correctly used to describe floating or washed up wreckage from ships, but it has evolved to mean bits and pieces in general, so i think it works quite well in describing my ocean stitchings these days. just wanted to share some recent pieces i have been working on, a few things inspired by the shore. above is no.4 in the shore fragments series, a corner of sunflower star (did you know they can have up to 24 arms?) spread across the sand, with a mussel shell and other bits, including some strips of real cedar. there is a lot of texture in this piece, helped by some of the hand dyed fabrics (not by me) that is hard to appreciate in a photo.



i did use a bit of my purple cabbage dyed linen for the sea urchin shell above. while eventually most shells bleach white, many times i have wandered along the shore and found small pieces of purple shell dashed amongst the rocks. finding an urchin shell in one piece is hard along these stormy shore, but a real treasure when you do. anyway, i thought this purple linen was a good fit for the purple of the shells, layered with white and purple stitching.

did you know urchins and seastars are in the same family (echinoderms, along with sand dollars and others), and all have five-part symmetry? you can see that symmetry in the stitching on the urchin, and more clearly in the five arms of the ochre stars below. i have made quite a few purple ochre stars but i thought it was about time i made some orange ones. i also added more detail stitching on these ones. i think maybe people recognize them in this colour more clearly, although purple ones are by far the most common along the inside waters of vancouver island. i like them either way, and the orange ones remind me of the exposed west coast.



while i am always stitching away, i haven't added anything new to the shop just yet. we may have a postal strike in canada starting tonight, so i'm a little on the fence about what to do. i think for now i will keep the shop open, and if anyone would like to order anything, i can hold the order until the strike is over, or put items on reserve. i feel that using a courier service would increase the cost quite a bit, so i will hold off on that option unless some asks specifically. if you are in a canada and have an online shop of your own, what are you doing?

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things i like today:
• in anticipation of a sunny weekend, i'm drooling over these homemade fudge popsicles
• eva's indoor indigo vat has me plotting my own
• bryant austin's ocean photography has me speechless.
• and this sea lion pic just makes me chuckle every time.