boxes, batts, and paper

I've decided that when it comes to finishing my work, I should just never stop. I get more done that way. For example, since Sunday afternoon, I've been working tirelessly on preparing for SAFF and the Kentuck festival, and all my hard work really is yielding satisfying results. On Sunday, I finally got around to printing my fleece treats box lids. These cute little kraft boxes will be home to four ounces of yummy (and very different) fibers. I"m still looking forward to making paste paper dividers and a liner that identifies each fibers and provides space for note-taking before I begin packaging the fleece. Nevertheless, now that the labels are all printed, much of my work is done.

After my box-printing success, I decided to card some more arts and crafts batts. My pink BFL and silk from last week's dye session had finally dried, and so they became my next carding victims. My pile of finished batts is getting larger every day. Since last week I've done two "all the real girls" batts, with indigo dyed rambouillet, cochineal noily silk, strips of 1980s silk dress, and black alpaca, three of "first blush", with cochineal BFL and silk, a bit of purple-green BFL, and black alpaca, one "cosmos" with indigo BFL, black alpaca, noily silk dyed with wiltons, and other random scraps of wool, and a bright little batt I haven't yet named. I plan on doing one more "all the real girls" and "first blush", and I'm assembling supplies for "Paris Hilton sex tape." Hopefully that batch will be ready by next week! As always, I'm sorely tempted to just spin every single one of these batts myself, but I am strong! Now that I've gotten comfortable with my louet carder, every one of these girls are headed to SAFF, whether I like or not.

And as if I hadn't managed to get enough work done, between yesterday and today, I've made 40 sheets of lovely cover weight paper from cotton, linen, and silk. Here they are, drying in spurs. I'm planning on printing a couple of designs with wood type and linocuts on these pretty sheets. And then they'll become journals for Kentuck and SAFF. Tomorrow I'll be playing with paper some more and mordanting fiber. Go Heidi, go!