Connecting the dots...

...a letter from Erik

Click on photo to enlarge - © 2007 jim otterstrom

We got a very nice letter the other day from our young friend, Erik, who lives along Lytle Creek in the San Gabriel Mountains, about 65 miles from here.

Erik and his mother, along with his older sister & brother, have come to see our Native Plant Garden during the Big Bear Xeriscape Tour for the past couple of years, and the kids really love the gardens & the chickens.

This past July they stayed here most of the afternoon picking our brains and endearing themselves to us.

So it was great to hear from Erik, and today I'm mailing off replies to him from Peggy & I, including one of our pine-needle basketry starter kits, and 2 more for his brother & sister.

The kits include a coil of hemp twine, a large-eyed craft needle, a pine-needle guide (3/8"plastic tubing), a chunk of beeswax to wax the twine, a small bundle of pine needles (they have plenty of pine-needles in their neck o' the woods too), and complete instructions on making a small basket/bowl.

One of the most enjoyable things about Earth Home Garden, for Peggy and I, is watching how much fun kids have exploring the gardens and interacting with the chickens.

It's a regular occurrence for kids to come by and ask if they can go in and see the chickens and collect the eggs for us. They're also very interested in the hand pumps on the rainbarrels, the pedal-stone, the solar waterfall/pond, the hand plow, my big eco-friendly ant farm, and all the other wildlife that visits our place.

But it's especially rewarding for us when city kids, who've never had much exposure to country life, or nature, find some joy & magic in our little patch of Mother Earth.

Erik, however, is not a city kid. He's one of the more fortunate ones who lives in the rural foothills beyond the outskirts of town. His entire family has a budding interest in learning about sustainability, about living within nature, instead of upon her, and we admire their thoughtfulness and good energy.

~Pine Needle Basketry Class~

Click on photo to enlarge - © 2007 jim otterstrom

Peggy and I taught a Pine Needle Basketry Class for The Big Bear Sierra Club group at the local U.S. Forest Service Discovery Center last night.

Twenty some folks gave it their best shot and I think about a third of them actually got the hang of it and will finish their baskets.

Everyone seemed to be having a good time and we enjoyed ourselves too.

We've taught the craft to several friends, on a one to one basis, but teaching over 20 people at once is a whole new experience.

Peggy and I were both so busy helping people with their projects that we didn't have time to take pictures, so the one above will have to do.

Now that most of my obligations are out of the way for awhile maybe I can get around to catching up with my backlog of posts before I jump into the mountain of yardwork and gardening I also need to catch up on.

Petroglyph Bowl

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The bowl was made about 5 years ago and combines a gourd with pine-needle basketry.

There's a remote early-man site in the Mojave Desert about 35 miles from here with ancient petroglyphs adorning the rock walls of a short narrow canyon. We spent a lot of time there when the kids were younger and I took close-up photos of most of the symbols.

I copied the petroglyph designs as closely as possible onto the gourd with a large red indelible marker and then colored the rest of the gourd blue, also with indelible marker. Then I hand-rubbed the bowl to wear away some of the indelible ink which gave the bowl a sort of weathered batik-like patina. After the pine-needles were stitched on, the entire bowl was finished with a coat of beeswax.

For the baskets & bowls I usually stay with earthy tones, but I had some turquoise colored hemp twine and wanted to experiment with color. I like the way it came out and I may make a couple more Petroglyph Bowls in different colors, but the above photo doesn't really do this one justice (see the photo I added below).

The Petroglyph Bowl was given to our friend Bob Varga in appreciation for the 30,000 pound boulder birdbath he brought us.

And with this more current work I think I'll bring my little art retrospective to a close, I want to go out and play. But it's been fun going through this old stuff and sharing it with you.

If I ever get a slide scanner for the computer you guys are in real trouble, I've got about 2,000 old slides from my photography days packed away in closets.

Have a good Sunday everybody...

Same Bowl, Another View...

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Here's the above bowl in a little better light where you can actually see what the finish is like.

The Basket Case...

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Today is house cleaning day, we moved all the furniture, took the rugs outside for a beating, mopped the floor, brought everything back in, and then sat down for lunch, a beer and a break. During our break I was sitting on the floor adding some wood to the stove when Peggy came over and sat, kind of Yoga style in my lap to snuggle for a minute, when shortly she started chuckling, and pointed to Neo staring at us from behind me, cozily perched in one of our pine-needle bowls while Steely Dan played softly from the iPod. Funny how our pets pick up our vibes and want in on the action, often stealing the show.

Thanks Neo!

I was comfy there by the fire with Peg before she made me get up and grab the camera so I could take a picture of you...

This post reminds me that I'm supposed to be continuing our basketry project and sharing some techniques.

O.K., O.K., I'll get back to that real soon.

But right now I have to get back to work, Peggy is cracking the whip today, and so far I've been a good boy, but you know what they say, "you're only as good as your last deed", or something like that?

De-Capping The Needles

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De-capping is the most time-consuming step in preparing the needles, and for the batch I soaked, will probably take well over an hour.

In the top photo above, I'm simply pulling the caps off with my thumbnail, which is how I prefer to do it, but I do end up with black pitch under my nail that is difficult to remove, and, if I do too many needles at one time, the tip of my thumb gets a bit tender.

Peggy has a different technique, she scrapes the caps off with the dull edge of a butter knife (middle picture), which works fine too, and I think I read somewhere that there is also a tool made for de-capping now. Whatever method you come up with is fine as long as the needles remain attatched at the ends.

The bottom photo is of de-capped needles that are ready for use.

The pine-needles we use fall from the Jeffrey and Ponderosa Pines in and around our yard and we get far more needles per year than we could ever use. Pines can have have needles in clusters of 2, 3, or 5, but Jeffrey & Ponderosa Pines are both 3-needle pines. The length of our needles varies from around 6 inches to well over 10 inches, but I think most of them average about 9 inches. I don't see why you couldn't use shorter needles, the project would just take a little longer, I suppose pine needles in clusters of 2 or 5 needles would be fine too.

I'll get to the actual stitching of the coils later on, I have a stack of needles to de-cap, a walk to take with Dallas, and some chores to do.

Pine Needle 'Caps'

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The next step is to de-cap the pine-needles, which is simply the process of removing the sticky sheaths where the needles were attatched to a branch. For some baskets, needles with their caps left intact are used as an element in the design, but for the bowl I'm working on they will all be removed.

Fresh Out Of The Pot

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After half an hour in the hot water the pine-needles are removed and placed on a towel where excess water can be soaked up. I use tongs for this step to avoid burning my fingers.

In the background you can see the early stage of the bowl I'll be working on once the needles are prepared.

Pine Needles Soaking

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In order for pine-needles to be pliable enough to work into coils for baskets they must be soaked in hot water. Bring a pot of water to a boil, turn off the burner, add the pine-needles and allow to sit for a half an hour.

More later...

Winter Solstice...

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Peggy and I will be celebrating the Winter Solstice on December 21st, and, whatever your beliefs or religious persuasions might be, we hope you all find Peace, Joy and Comfort during this holiday season.

With Love,

Peggy & Jim

Peggy & Corrina

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We don't usually name our hens but Corrina here has a very adventurous spirit and likes to be around people so we made an exception. Corrina jumps the chicken yard fence every day to scratch & peck her way around the native plant garden looking for seeds, greens & bugs. Here she watches Peggy collect pine needles for some winter basketry to see if any bugs turn up. When she's in the chicken yard and a person approaches, Corrina will jump up on the fence to greet you and, when she's out, she'll walk right up to Dallas looking him in the eye, and Dallas seems perfectly content to leave her be. She's been doing this for weeks now.

Nourishment!!!

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There is an update on our son Jimmy's condition below but, for the moment here, I'd like to give thanks for the abundance of Nature, and the nourishment provided for body, mind and spirit through even the worst of times, if we'll simply respond to these gifts with thoughtfulness, care and a small measure of rewarding effort.

Above is a photo of this morning's harvest from our garden and I was really in need of the calmness that descended upon me as I harvested this healthful home-grown food today.

All of us at Earth Home Garden (Jimmy & Lindsay will be staying with Peggy & I during his recovery) will need much nourishment in the days, weeks and months to come, and the importance of a garden in our lives is today freshly illuminated.

UPDATE ON JIMMY:

Dear friends & family-

Jimmy had surgery to repair his broken jaw last Tuesday afternoon and the surgeons said the jaw is now in perfect alignment again.

Yesterday they replaced his trachea tube with a smaller one that has a valve on it so Jimmy was able to speak for the first time since the accident, and he had quite a bit to say.

Two physical therapists also came in yesterday and got him up on his feet for a few minutes, but it was all he could do to get to the door of his room and back to bed again.

Jimmy also has been able to start drinking some liquids through a straw which he says is a great improvement over being fed solely through the tube in his nose.

His vision hasn't improved so he still can't see anything but vague shapes.

The doctors say that his CAT Scans and MRIs show no evidence of brain injury that would cause blindness and they are still hopeful that his vision will improve, but they don't know how much, or how long it might take.

His trachea tube may be completely removed in a few days and it's possible he will be released from the hospital some time next week.

He is making good progress now and we are just so thankful that he's alive.

Peggy and I want to thank all of you for your support & concern, and kind offers of help, during this very difficult time and we apologize for not being able to respond to each of your messages personally.

Love,

Jim & Peggy

Fresh Snow Peas

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Fresh Snow Peas from the garden today for a cool afternoon salad.

The Xeriscape Garden Tour was quite a success this past Saturday with 250 to 300 visitors despite the threat of thunderstorms (we were so busy I forgot to take pictures).

Our friend, Orchid Black of The Theodore Payne Foundation, sold about 50 Big Bear Native Plants on our deck bringing in $425 for Hunter's Nursery which sells native plants grown out from seed collected locally the previous season.

My leg is much improved at this point so I'm planning on resuming my 4/5 mile morning walks very soon.

Maybe things are getting back on track for me to post regularly again, I certainly hope so!

Fresh Picked Greens

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Peggy collecting greens for a lunch salad in her recently completed pine-needle bowl.

The Goods!

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Fresh picked greens and a few thinned young radishes.

First Rhubarb Of The Year!

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Peggy is harvesting the first young rhubarb shoots of the season and I can smell the pie already.
The bed just to her left was planted in two varieties of beets about a week ago and we're expecting to see sprouts there soon.

Bowl Waxing Day!

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The beeswax is melted in a sort of double boiler arrangement.
Wax is highly flammable never melt directly in a pan on the stove.
The next few pictures show the continuing steps to finishing a pine-needle bowl with beeswax.

Icing The Cake!

Peggy waxing the inside of her bowl with melted wax from the coffee can.

Inside & Out

Now brushing melted beeswax on the outside.

In The Oven 175 degrees F

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Bowl just placed in the oven.