Upcoming Workshops

I've got a full line up of workshops this spring and summer. 

A little something for everyone. 

Feel free to email me with any questions about any of them.

44clovers@gmail.com

You can also check out my new website at 

44clovers.com

I've been running a series of natural dye workshops in conjuction with Portfiber 

all this spring. 

I have 3 classes left;

Natural Dyeing Basics

1 day; Sunday May 18, 2014

11am-3pm

$75

Feel free to bring fiber/ fabric in 4oz lots for dyeing. 

Whatever you like from wool, silk, angora, camel, etc. 

You can also purchase fiber from a wide variety at Portfiber the day of. 

You'll learn mordant basics and shortcuts, over dying, heating requirements, and much more. 

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Natural Dyeing for Sewists

2 Days; Sunday June 1st, 2014 11am-3pm at Portfiber

Thursday June 5th 6:15pm-8pm at Z Fabrics.

$105 for both workshops and all materials included

You'll learn so many skills in these two days;

natural dyeing on fabric

shibori methods

hemming techniques

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Natural Dyeing for Needle Felters

2 Days; Saturday June 14th 1pm-4pm at Portfiber

Saturday June 21st 1pm-4pm

$140 for both workshops and all materials included

We'll be working with raw Irish Texel fleece I brought back from Ireland:)

Bring along picture of your favrorite songbirds if you'd like. 

I'll also have pictures from magazines and books. 

We'll work on those tiny beautiful details that make songbirds so remarkable. 

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AT THIS YEARS MAINE FIBER FROLIC

The fiber frolic is a 2 day wonder of fibery delights ranging from animals, demonstrations, beautiful hand made goods, fiber materials and equipment. 

It's one of my favroite weekend of the whole years. 

This is the first year I'll be teaching at the Frolic and I'm SO EXCITED. 

Under the Rainbow in the Dye Pot

Saturday June 7th, 2014

9:30am-12:30pm

USing just 3 dye pots, I'll show you how to use natural dye pigment powders to dye dye each color of the rainbow. Then using a special technique, we'll make a self striping rainbow yarn. You can then use both dyed batches of yarn to incorporate into any of your fiber projects, rugs, weaving, knitting, crochet, or fulling

workshop fee: $75

materials fee: $15

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Lichen Magic

Saturday June 7th, 2014 

1:30pm-4pm

We'll talk about properly collecting within a context, indentification of lichens, and their fascinating properties. I'll also show you to test and prepare lichens for dyeing in order to extract their exciting colors which range from golds, orange, red, purple, and blues. We will also be dyeing up samples from my lichen fermentation jars. 

Workshop fee- $65

Materials fee- $10

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Foraging for Color

Sunday June 8th

10am-2:30pm with lunch break

Every plant  holds pigment inside. It's through experimenting that we find out what colors our neighboring plant life hold. We will discuss foraging with an ecological context, identify, and test what we collect for color using non-toxic mordants on silk fabrics and wool yarn samples. 

Workshop fee: $75

Materials fee: $10

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PEAKS ISLAND FIBER ARTS CAMP

 Peaks Island Fiber Arts Camp was founded by Laura Glendening and Susan Hanley in 2004 - now in it’s eleventh year of sharing a unique blend of arts, crafts & outdoor fun on Peaks Island. Our camps offer a summer time balance of learning skills, exploring & creating, and time for hanging out with new friends in a kind and cooperative environment. This year Susan will be taking the summer off and fellow Islander and textile artist Rachel Bingham Kessler will be filling in. We are happy to offer individual and group lessons too, please contact us for information.

To reserve a place in a camp, send in the following info; Your child's name
Age
Parents' name
Address
Phone number
Email
Which week you'd like to attend

Each camp enrolls just 8-12 campers, so please, To register and hold your spot, mail in your non-refundable deposit of $100 payment to:
Peaks Island FIber Camp
Laura Glendening
17 Sterling St
Peaks Island, Maine 04108
207-766-5705, lrglendening@gmail.com

Early Summer Days

Whittling, creature making and mud oven granola baking!

Spend the early days of summer relaxing with new friends and a project or two. We’ll whittle a walking stick and knitting needles - visit beaches and share stories. We’ll make a piece of fabric from which little animals & creatures will grow. And we’ll heat up the mud oven and bake delicious homemade granola!

June 23-27, 8:30-2:30. Ages 7-12 $285

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Fabric Collage

Create a beautiful light & colorful collage. Using Matisse’s cut outs as inspiration campers will create their own colors, shapes, and patterns with silk cloth. We’ll experiment with designs and lay-outs. When all the pieces of the collage are ready they will be held together, not by sewing, but by felting.

June 30-July 3, 8:30-2:30 ages 8-14 $235
Four Day Camp

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Still Life and Lunch

Fruit salad, bread, blueberry hand pies, pizza and more. We’ll spend the first part of each day drawing & painting the day’s ingredients. Then we’ll work together to prepare the recipe of the day. Finally we’ll enjoy the good food we’ve made. On Friday we’ll sew together a book using our drawings and paintings, recipes may be included too.

July 21st-July 25th 8:30-2:30 ages 6-14, $285

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Bugs Tracks and Crafts

Follow the paths of snails, bumbles, and hermit crabs while we explore the beach, garden, and forest for these tiny creatures. We’ll inspect their track habitats, and nests. Then using various textile textures, techniques, and our imagination, we’ll create unique keepsakes capturing the nature of these tiny creatures.

August 18-22nd, ages 6-12, $285

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NEW ENGLAND FIBER ARTS RETREAT

an all inclusive fiber arts retreat where you will be fed so well, make wonderful new friends

go on farm and studio field trips and take some amazing classes with some of Maine's most talented fiber artists. 

Another favorite time of year for me! 

This will be my 5th year teaching at Medomak and we've all been working hard to being new classes to the table. 

I am only 1 of 4 other instructors. All of us veterans by now. 

Bill Huntington

Bristol Ivy

Casey Ryder

Dana Fadel

Here's a short list of some of our exciting offerings through out the whole week. taught by me, 

felted soaps * inkle weaving * rigid heddle space weaving * felted landscapes * weaving on a 4-harness loom * tapestry weaving * tunisian crochet * knitting outside the box * finishing techniques * windrow cowl * beginning lace * knitting in the round * intarsia & duplicate stitch * to build a hat * stranded/ fair isle knitting * diagonal knitting/ felted bag * coils and core spinning * drop spindle spinning * carding to spin * botanical embroidery * embroidery 101 * shibori & bundles * rainbows in our dye pots * foraging for color

Holy Moly! That is a lot of classes!!

for more information contact our Director, Casey Ryder: casey@medomakcamp.com

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I am so blessed to have the oppertunity to work with all these wonderful fiber folks who are also dear friends. 

When I'm not knitting, spinning, and dyeing, I'm drawing up new class ideas and refining seasoned ones. 

I will also be adding a few plant dye workshops that will be happening here at my home on Peaks this summer, so keep a look out. 

If you have questions about any of these happenings or would like me to come teach in your area, I'd love to hear from you. 

44clovers@gmail.com

ox, Rachel

These late September happenings

We welcomed a few new critters to our family. These two lovely girls have lived on the next street over for the last 5 years. Their prior owners are moving off the island soon and wanted to have the girls stay on. Jubal and I were more than happy as Jubal, especially has been wanting chickens for a very long time. Now we've got 'em. I don't actually remember what kind they said they were, but the brown one here pecking out of my hand is Tulip. The speckled one is Olive. Tulip, I believe was laying a few eggs when they first arrived. Not sure why they aren't laying any more but we think it's due to age? They are 5-6 years old now. This spring we hope to get some chicks to integrate in. 

Elsa joined us in late July and is such a sweetheart. She's 12 and has no teeth. She seems happy as a calm though and really loved her belly rubbed and brushed. We have to keep up the brushings everyday or she'll get all matted. She's such a love though. 

As Jubal and I both work from home, we try to get out whenever we can for a walk. But we both get so absorbed with our work it's so easy to forget to stop and take a break. Every time we do though, it always feels so good. This is a lovely spot. Kind of secluded from the beaten path. 

Just a few scenes from around Peaks...

I love this time of year because I'm more apt to work outside then in the summer. In the summer I can easily become a grumpy wilted sweaty weed. Not too enjoyable to be around. But when the weather gets cool, I suddenly become inspired and hopeful for all that can be accomplished around the yard. 

This here bald spot is our goldenrod patch that we pulled out in an effort to create more yardage. It may be surprising as you know how much I love goldenrod for dyes. It can create THEE BEST YELLOW EVER!! And has been proven by historians as one of the best light fast and wash fast yellow plant dyes. So, back to my plot, it's ok because there is just copious amounts of goldenrod EVERY WHERE. And my latest plan for this little spot involves lots and lots of foxgloves. My sister gave me some apricot foxglove seeds so those will be involved for sure. The quince bunch to the left will also be removed shortly. I should really post more pictures regarding the progress of it all. 

Speaking of progress, our gardenshed----> painting studio is still underway. We're pretty hopeful I'll be in there painting by the winter. Also, this week begins the painting of our home exterior. It's been 10-20 years since the metal siding was painted and is a faded white/ grey/ green(?). But soon, it will be a soft peach pink with butter yellow trim. 

Someone really gets a lot out of my knitting marathons. 

I've been foraging for mushrooms a bit on the island and have made some interesting discoveries. I found a mass of this white fungi in out upper forest hill. It looks a bit like a club foot mushroom but white. It's very spongy and watery on the inside. 

This one I found near an oak and where hen of the woods was growing earlier until we plucked that up. It was so tasty!! But this one, I'm not too sure. It may be honey mushroom.....? I've prepared them both for the dehydrator and are stored for later dyes this fall or winter. Will report back later with results. 

While teaching natural dyeing at the Squam Artworkshops this past September, I too came away with a huge amount of samples. As always when I'm dyeing, I alway have new discoveries that I think are very important to record. The bag to the right will be made into samples to fit into my hoop for use in further workshops and demonstrations. I really enjoy this process. With the remaining samples I think I'll knit a little something for that twinkle in our eye;)The blanket in the background is the ten stitch blanket. A really easy and pleasing blanket to knit. This was also knit with my first set of samples when I first was teaching myself to use natural dyes back in 2008. I knit, dyes, and spun them as samples for the shop I was working for at the time. They then hung in the shop window for about 2 years to test the light fast-ness. We could see a difference in change. The shop owner decided she didn't want to use them anymore and offered them back to me so this was my creation. It lives on the back of our sofa now. Actually, when Jubal and I went on our first date I had the beginnings of it with me. I showed it to him when he asked me what I liked to do for fun. He didn't look bored when I told him how much I liked to knit and work with fiber. A few weeks after I moved into to his house a little over a year ago, I completed it. I love this blanket.

In late September I held a natural dye workshop here at our house which was a blast and I'll be running a few more this fall and over the winter so keep your eye out if your interested. With the left over dye baths I kept through in more and more fiber. I was able to go 3 more rounds often letting the fiber soak overnight in the baths. I just love all of those colors! 

Especially the indigo.. this indigo bath I realized I could dye with it when it was cold. I checked the color first seeing that it still looked grass yellow green and then I did my dips with out heating it up. The color was just stunning. And dyeing with fiber like this is really enjoyable to spin because a lovely heather variegation happens.


One of my favorite mushrooming spots is on my sisters land in Bowdoin. With this last haul, my two little helpers and I spotted some fascinating that I haven't seen before. My littlest nephew is really good at spotting the tiniest mushrooms shouting out "EEE-CHAL! Is this a good un?!"  

These mushrooms have a beautiful faint lavender hue and turn a solid ocher in spots. I have a feeling they could be related to the red gilled mushrooms. As they are near where I saw them last and look like they have a similar structure.   

There's something magical that happens when you give two lively boys a snack.... The air becomes soft and all you hear is little lips smacking:) 

I'm beginning a new series of embroidery involving botanicals. This here is an indigo plant. I really enjoyed working the french knots for the tiny little blossoms but I really need to polish my lettering as I can't even read when I stitched. Practice makes perfect. 

Birch and Maple fingerless mitts. Spun from madder and fustic dyed over handspun camel and silk. Soon to be in my Etsy Shop:: 44 Clovers.

I finished these Squam Lake fingerless mitts this week as well. My own garden grown indigo dyed over hand spun Maine raised pygora goat. I bought the fiber from Jenny Smith who raises numerous fiber animals and lives in western Maine. She is often at the Maine Fiber Frolic with her wonderful assortment of fuzzy things to tempt you. LOVE THIS FIBER!!

Gosh, so that's what I've been up to. In a nutshell. Stay tuned for more projects, workshop offerings here on Peaks and at portfiber and textile gatherings. I'm in the process of putting together a textile night for islanders. If your interested in joining, send me a message. 

Also, what are you working on these days? Post a link in the comments. 

oxox, r.