yesterday i received a phone call from a friend, jody horwitz, who is a knitter. she asked if she could swing by my house and drop off something, i said sure, thinking it might be something for hannah, who worked for jody last winter at the yarn shop. well.

she gave me these beautiful mittens that were from a kit that leena sells. leena dyes her own wool from her flock with natural (cochineal and mushrooms in this case) dyes. this is fiberwork i could never do--oh, i could dye the yarns and raise the sheep, but never ever could i knit something like this. i was stunned, and so very pleased. and my hands will be warm and happy this winter.

a feather from a mourning dove, i think. on top of the cover of a rock book.

front cover and pages of rock book.

the rock books are coming along. all the pages for two are made, but not finished (!) and the third is in process. i have used badger paper and black walnut dye and daylily and mica as well as abaca and a variety of others that i harvested from my freezer and my yard. this has been a productive papermaking september and october for me.

and i have news this week which i will share later on. right now, it's sunday evening. i must prepare for work (lessons!) and for being away a night.

a little bit of abaca shifu, colored with pigment from carriage house. i made this paper 25 or so years ago, fully intending to use it right away for shifu. it's aged well. me, too!

the legs of a papermaker after an hour's work. pulp. water. happy. the sun helped dry me out. a sunny but quite cool day. winter's coming on.