This Labor Day we piled into the car, along with our friend Bryan (check out his beautiful new photoblog, by the way) and went down to Sarah’s hometown of Canby to check out one of the cooler annual events in this area–the Swan Island Dahlia Festival. (Locals: Even though the festival is technically over, you can still visit the flowers for a few more weeks–actually, it’s kind of more fun when it’s not the official festival. If you go, the Canby Burgerville is one of the best. Just sayin’…) It’s simply acres and acres of dahlias of all sizes, shapes and colors–it’s a real visual treat.

If we had been smart, we would have grabbed the handy sheet they had available and made a note of the really fabulous ones, since we’re definitely going to plant a few at our new house (more on that in a future post). But, we didn’t do that until we were leaving–whoops.

Our favorites are the reds–red translates in dahlias in more wonderful shades than any other flower. This one is a fabulous medium-size dahlia that has flowers that are almost spherical, and the individual petals are shaped like cones that collect water. How cool is that?

We also saw lots of happy bees. Not all bees are happy, you know. Bryan totally geeked out, which happens when you put a former environmental educator in a field of flowers. We’re pretty sure that Bryan was as excited about the bugs as the flowers…

Bryan is totally taking bug pictures in this photo.

Have you ever seen a dahlia that looks like this? We sure hadn’t. It looks almost like a sea creature, a starfish maybe…

How bad-ass is this two-tone dahlia? It’s bright red on top, pale yellow on the underside. Wow.

So this one’s called “Rip City.” It’s red and black. Yep…

We had a great time–even though we had some nasty food at a place that used to have pretty good pie and decent hash browns… We also tried to go to the cool architectural salvage place in Aurora (it was closed) and had a great time at St. Josef’s Winery (the winery is right behind Sarah’s mom’s house). You can see more of our photos of our day in this Flickr photoset.

But since we’re talking about gardening, we thought this would be the perfect time to mention that Sarah’s mom has started a nifty new gardening blog! She’s done all the work on it herself, and is still learning how to work with WordPress, but it’s looking good. Check it out if you’re a plant geek.

~S & J

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Even if you don't live in the Portland area, you should be reading Bolt's blog--it's full of awesome stuff and pretty pictures of fabric.

So, we’ve been very naughty bloggers lately. Basically all summer long. We haven’t really had a post of any substance in over a month–isn’t that terrible. We have lots of good reasons, basically that this summer has been very hectic and extremely stressful. We’re hoping that things will calm down over the next couple of months, and that we’ll resume our regularly-scheduled programming here at Sewer-Sewist. We so enjoy writing this blog and connecting with all of you.

Anyway, we wanted to let you locals know about an awesome sale that our favorite fabric store, Bolt on NE Alberta Street, is having this weekend. All fabric is 20% off all weekend long! And Gina, Bolt’s fabulous owners, only carries top-notch, beautiful fabrics, so you’re bound to find something that’s just what you “need.” We love that Bolt doesn’t just carry quilting cottons, but also has a huge variety of stuff that’s great for garments, decorating, etc. Plus, the quilting cottons that are at Bolt are all ones that work for a whole lot of other things, which is great for us, since we make mostly clothes and accessories. We don’t really need to go on and on about the awesomeness or local fabric shop, but we sure do love it! So, if you’re local, and looking to treat yourself to some wonderful fabric, head on down there this weekend. Oh, and if you’re not local, you’re not totally out of luck, because they recently launched a very cool blog about the shop and neighborhood.

~S & J

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Josh's locked up type for his baseball project.

Josh operating the press.

Locked up type from Josh's project.

The first color on Josh's postcards--check out the names, they're awesome.

Both colors printed on fawn-colored paper.

And another--you can really see how the type cascades across the paper.

Detail of this beautiful type called Prisma.

Josh should probably write about this some more, but he radically changed the nature of his project over the four days. He started out trying to create a linoleum cut print about the demise of the economy of Dayton, Ohio, but he found that it was making him stressed out and frustrated. He then switched to this baseball-themed project and it really took off. I think that really speaks to the importance of thinking about how the subject will make you feel while your working on your creation, doesn’t it?

~Sarah

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Inked rollers...

Inked rollers & locked up type.

Hot pink ink. (Not ours.)

Hot pink draw down. (Not ours--but a fabulous color!)

Green ink--this is a gorgeous transparent green that another student mixed. It's lovely seeing something so vibrant also be translucent.

Green ink draw down.

Back of my type project.

This is an ink-stained table in the print studio.

~Sarah

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Josh's intro type-setting project. The stag is actually an impala--like would be used in an old Chevy ad.

Times 12 type--this is from my project this spring. I have quite a bit of type set from that project that I still need to print. I plan on finishing that up in the next few weeks.

More type from my spring project--the script is Raleigh 30, which is a beautiful italic type. It's very difficult to set because you have to use "wedgie things" to make sure everything's straight.

Ornaments. It boggles my mind how many unusual ones there are.

88 - Spartan Bold Condensed 72. I love this type so much it kind of makes me hyperventilate. This is a piece of a block from my spring project still needing to be printed.

California job case. This is where type is stored. I believe this one was for Bank Gothic.

This is from my summer project--it's part of the lyrics from a favorite song of mine, "Portland, Oregon" sung by Loretta Lynn and Jack White.

Brackets--you just can't reproduce this with a computer.

Punctuation. Did you know that printers invented punctuation?

One of my favorite types, Ad Sense.

I also experimented with the “Chroma” setting on my camera. I love how it makes the images look like they were taken with a lomographic camera. Type is perfect for photographing on this setting.

The two blocks of type from my spring project still needing to be printed. I am really proud of the type-setting on these.

The song lyrics for my summer project.

I’m going to keep my camera with me all weekend long, so I’ll have more photos of type and projects to share…

~Sarah

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Today’s our 4th wedding anniversary. Last year, we celebrated by screenprinting weird T-shirts, Josh creating a bizarre–yet appropriate–fake commemorative poster for the Moon Family Band and by making new outdoor lights for our patio.

This year, we’re taking a four-day letterpress and mail art class together, this Thursday through Sunday. It should be loads of fun–and what a treat to get to spend four full days just making stuff and learning together! Undoubtedly, Josh will make something crazy and Sarah will shoot for something entirely overly ambitious. Should be a great time.

Cheer, everyone!

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Susan‘s sweet little girl, Pearl, turned one about two weeks ago, and since she’s just about the coolest kiddo ever, we had to make her something special. She’s growing like a little wild weed, so we thought that a year of unique hand screenprinted T-shirts would be just the ticket. Josh and I each designed two. Check them out below.

This T-shirt is Pearl's size right now, and my original design. Since it fits currently, I anticipate that it'll have maybe a month of use before she's bursting out of it. It's the Steel Bridge, which is my favorite bridge in Portland. I designed the artwork and screened it in a metallic pewter color. I'm planning on turning this design into a letterpress piece as well.

This is one of the shirts Josh made. It's a monkey/gorilla stencil from the Stencil 101 book, and Josh made it glow-in-the-dark. To work with glowin-in-the-dark screenprinting inks, you have to first put on a base of opaque white--we learned that the hard way. Once the white is dry, you overprint the white with the glow-in-the-dark ink. Everything's better when it glows, right?

This is my other contribution. If I timed it correctly, it should fit Pearl right around fall--the start of the next Portland Trail Blazers season. It's the phenomenal Brandon Roy, guard for the Portland Trail Blazers, All-Star, All-NBA 2nd Team Member and all-around fabulous player and person. Pearl has a Brandon Roy jersey that she wears on game days--which coordinates with her Trail Blazers socks. I'm thinking that at the rate she's growing, her jersey may not fit her all season, but the T-shirt can hopefully fill in the wardrobe gaps next season. I neglected to take a picture, but the back of the shirt has an appliqued Blazers logo on it. I owe Pearl a pair of Trail Blazers pants to go with it, but I want to wait until fall to make them, so I can get a better idea of the sizing. This is my original design, and actually part of my letterpress project. It's neat seeing the image in two different mediums.

Josh's second contribution was the biggest hit of all of the T-shirts--"I brake for hummus." Pearl's favorite food is hummus, so Josh made the largest T-shirt a snazzy gold printed shirt proclaiming her loyalty to garbanzos, tahini and garlic. 'Nuff said.

Happy first birthday, Pearl! Can’t wait to make you four more next year!

~Sarah

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Have you seen Interweave‘s awesome special magazine, Stitch? We loved it when the first issue was released–it’s defintiely a magazine for folks who love to sew and create. Well, the second issue of Stitch features a lovely article by the marvelous Susan Beal, and she interviewed Sarah for her article “Print Me,” which is about how to customize your sewing with DIY screen-printed fabrics. And, also flattering, little ol’ Sewer-Sewist was listed as resource for those aspiring to screen print at home.

Stitch is on newsstands now–it’s a great magazine and Susan’s article is wonderful, featuring loads of interesting and inspiring folks who are screen printing at home.

~Josh & Sarah

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Some of last year's bounty. Those beans were so, so, so good--an heirloom mix of bush beans that were almost leggy enough to be pole beans. Very sweet and crisp.

We’ve still been sick around here. Between the two of us, there hasn’t been a single healthy day in all of March. Pretty crummy, huh? We’ve been keeping thoughts of warmer weather and less sickness alive in our hearts, though, by dreaming about this year’s vegetable garden.

We plant an organic vegetable garden every year. In fact, we have gardened together since 2001, when we had a plot in one of the original Victory Gardens in the middle of Rock Creek Park in the Glover Park neighborhood of Washington, DC. That year, we had put our names on a waiting list for a garden plot in the community garden near us, knowing that it usually took several years to get a plot. However, right at the beginning of the season, someone was unable to care for their plot anymore (there were a number of people who’d had their plots since they were originally developed in the 1940s), and the garden coordinator went down the waiting list, and we were the first people who answered the phone. And that’s how we wound up with a primo piece of D.C. real estate–a large garden plot right across the street from our apartment building, for the very small price of $40 a year. Our plot was pretty overgrown, and we didn’t have garden tools per se, so we spent a lot of time on manual labor churning up the soil and preparing it for planting. We walked all over the city in search of vegetable plants and seeds and, not having access to a car, carried some pretty wacky things on the subway and bus. That summer was incredibly hot, and our garden flourished. Quickly, vegetables started producing. Soon, we were feasting on fresh lettuce, peas and all sorts of other goodies. And just as quickly, wildlife began having our way with our bounty. Oh yes, Rock Creek Park is home to a lot of urban wildlife–coyotes (we would hear them howl from our apartment), turtle, foxes, rabbits and deer. Those damn deer. They would crawl under our fence, leap over it and just push through it. No matter what we did, the deer would get in and eat our vegetables. Despite that trauma, it was one of the best summers ever–and we spent hours every night outside in our garden. We’d often take our dinner out to our garden and sit in lawn chairs, enjoying the opportunity to have a piece of the country right in the middle of the city. Friends would stop by our plot and say hi. We made friends with the older folks who’d gardened there for decades, many of whom were also seed savers who shared seeds and knowledge with us. It was a special place. After 9/11, the garden was one of the first places we visited, and when we left D.C. later that year, the garden was the last place we said good-bye to.

We’ve pretty much gardened together ever since.

In Santa Fe, it was tough. Our beloved herbs would bolt and turn bitter. Lettuce was a waste of time–not enough water. The soil was so alkaline that tomatoes whithered and didn’t really fruit. And, apparently, even chile peppers hated the pine needles that fell all over our yard.

Back here in Oregon, gardening is a dream. The soil is rich, and most things thrive. Peppers don’t produce like they did in D.C., but those that do are sweet and beautiful. Herbs thrive, and many of the annual varieties actually last through the winter. In 2007, we had an amazing bounty. It was hot and dry and our tomatoes went crazy–and we had lots of fabulous heirloom varieties that went nuts. We’ve had great luck with beans–especially the varieties we planted last year. Just a few plants kept producing beans all season. We also plant loads of herbs like oregano (homegrown oregano tastes so much better than the store-bought) and basil (can you ever have enough fresh basil?).

This year, we’re going to plan our garden a bit better. We need to, believe it or not, plant more summer squash. We love zucchini and other summer squash and have all sorts of creative ways of cooking them and storing them for the future. (Hint: You can grate zucchini and then put it in freezer bags and use it in all sorts of dishes.) We need more peas and beans, because we just love them so much. And Sarah, as usual, can’t get enough different varieties of cucumbers. Also, this year, we want to be more strategic with our herd garden, and expand it to experiment with some different items, more thyme, different sages perhaps and maybe something we’ve never tried before. Also, we’ve not been so great with planting some of the other things we love–particularly brussels sprouts. Mmmm… Brussels spouts. If you don’t love them, you’re missing out. Sometime we’ll post our favorite brussels sprouts recipe here. Try it and you’ll love this much-maligned and oft-misunderstood vegetable.

These are the definites on our gardening list:

• Tomatoes (heirloom, of course–we’ve got lots of faves; would love to hear about your favorite varieties)
• Cherry tomatoes (these are for Sarah and the dog–they grow them in pots and sit out in the patio and ear them together)
• Peppers, sweet and hot (cayennes are very versatile and Josh likes to have a couple jalepenos, too)
• Summer squash
• Cucumbers, slicing and pickling; we’ll be trying some Armenian cukes again this year–we grew them several years back and they were super
• Lettuces; Josh doesn’t eat salad, but Sarah’s a fan of sweet baby lettuces
• Chard; Josh is learning to love sweet rainbow chard
• Beans; we prefer the three-color heirloom varieties we’ve planted the last few year
• Peas
• Brussels Sprouts (they’re good, really)
• Basil
• Oregano
• Sage
• Thyme
• Chives

Things we won’t be growing:

• Beets (we both hate them)
• Onions (we love them and really love the young, green Walla Wallas, but we’ve not had great luck with them in the past)
• Cabbage; it’s so cheap here, it seems silly to use the space
• Winter squash; no fun
• Corn; no fun/you need loads of space

There are loads of other things that we’d love to grow, but space is limited, since much of our yard is–unfortunately–taken up by plantings (not our choice), but this year we’re going to try and squeeze some veggies in around the ornamentals. We’re pretty jealous of the 1,100 square feet of organic kitchen garden, including room for berries, that Michelle Obama has had put in at the White House. (And what a great thing for her to be doing as a model for the rest of the country–food gardening seems to be something that people have gotten away from, and it’s so great for folks, young and old, to be involved in where their food comes from.)

Are you planting a garden this year? Any favorites that you think we should consider?

Happy gardening all! If we keep dreaming of warm, sweet tomatoes and fresh, crunchy green beans, and the accompanying sunshine, we’ll just will this cold weather and all the icky sick germs far away!

~Sarah & Josh

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Our plants are really not prepared for this type of thing.

Portland’s was under siege–by snow–for the better part of two weeks. We, like everyone else in Stumptown, didn’t adapt too well to our forced solitary confinement. But, it did give us a chance to take a few fun snow pictures–including those of the projects we (read: Sarah) made for people for Christmas. While we showed y’all these in our first Video Threads episode, we thought you’d want to see a few pictures–plus, you just gotta check out all the snow.

First up in our snow fashion shoot, the Amy Butler Downtown Purse. Ah, yes… Getting a little tired of making this one, but it’s always so well-received and doesn’t take a lot of effort… This is in one of the newish Denyse Schmidt cotton canvas fabric from FreeSpirit.

This will be the last one of these bags for awhile. As cute as it is, there are only so many one person can make...

The button on this was leftover from the last knitting project Sarah did before tendinitis ended her knitting for once and for all.

Next, the “I’ll have one of everything…” bag from Anna Maria Horner’s new book, “Seams to Me.” This is made in various quilting weight cottons in peach, green and pink tones.

It's kind of a pain in the butt to find that many fabrics that coordinate. How on Earth do quilters do it?

The handles are braided using 12 strips of different town fabrics, which creates a really fun and funky sort of look. It really keeps this back from looking too “quilty.” If that makes sense. (Probably not, huh?)

These rag rug looking braided handles are so awesome! They really make the bag look unique.

And another one from Anna Maria’s book, this one the “Cup Half Full” apron. This is pretty darn cute in two fabrics from Heather Bailey, and an orange checked print for the bias border.

Everyone needs a fancy hostess apron to wear in a snowstorm, right?

This color combo is really bright and fun--almost Christmas-y, but not quite.

Sarah’s mom, who usually scores in the homemade gift department was the lucky recipient of a violet iPod Nano, and most everyone else got silly gifts/books… Despite the snowfall, this Christmas was far less stressful than last because we weren’t under the gun to get things made. Production sewing can be nerve-racking.

Our view for days and days and days...

Our poor house started to look like it was going to get buried under all the white stuff.

Thankfully, the Snowpocalypse is over and we were able to successfully leave our house in our own vehicle for the first time in a VERY long time yesterday. (We had to borrow Sarah’s mom’s SUV to go to the Christmas Day Blazers game–which was, uh, “rad.”)

In completely unrelated news, we’ve added a Facebook/Blog Networks widget to our sidebar. If you’re on Facebook, you can join our network by following the sidebar link and see who else is reading Sewer-Sewist. It’s kind of cool, actually.

Happy holidays, everyone!

~Josh & Sarah

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