In which I discover the joys of basket weaving

 When I was visiting my folks in late May, I begged my mom to teach me that most cryptic and unknowable arts: basket weaving. I made quite a big deal about it, how I was lacking in my training in the handy crafts because this one art had never been passed down to me, etc. She pointed out that, while she gave us kids plenty of opportunity to learn other crafts, "Sometimes I had to have something I could do without you kids around." Basket weaving, it would seem, was one of the private joys that my mother had kept for herself. Fair enough. But we gaggle of giggling goslings were all grown up now and here I was, back at the nest, demanding to be taught how to weave my own! She rolled her eyes, said it was simple enough to learn, and eventually went to the basement to retrieve a book on the subject.

As I paged through, I began to realize just how many of the baskets of my childhood were, indeed, made by my mother. They had always just been there, but I had never thought about how they came to be. My "foster mother," as I call Ginnie, with whom I lived while working in the U.P., was also a prolific weaver - most recently in the pine needle end of the basketry spectrum - and had many of her various baskets hanging up to be accessed when just-such-a-basket was needed to carry just-such-an-item. My real mom's baskets were perhaps more utilitarian in a way, all pressed into near-constant service as containers for such exotic items as microphones and audio cables, or garlic cloves. In other words: their creation, out of sight and never really brought up to my child's hearing, went unnoticed, though their presence was all around, holding things for me every day.

After settling on a rough idea of what I could make that would be practical, easy to finish in the time I had, and small enough to transport on the train ride home, Mom went to the basement again and this time came up with a whole bag of supplies. She began introducing me to reed, round reed, cane, and other would-be basket spokes and weavers that had been waiting quietly below me for most of my childhood. Purchased at an estate sale long ago, my mom claimed that she had never had to buy any further supply as it all goes quite a long way. She determined to start me on my project, a little tea strainer, that very day. Or should I say night. The time being already past 8 p.m., when all sewing should cease lest mistakes be made. Evidently my mom truly thought that this was easy doings. Getting the little vessel started proved beyond me, however. Perhaps because of the hour, perhaps because of the holds-a-shot-glass-snugly size of what I was making. Mom ended up getting it started and "upsetting" it for me. She then set me to twining, which I found a much more pleasant (and rapid) endeavor. A few days later, under my mother's watchful eye, I attached a rim and handle and finished the little basket off. My first project: a success!

Back in California, it was only a matter of time before visions of basketry began to swirl in my head once more. Mom had stumbled on a woman who makes very nice and unique basket-weaving kits for reasonable prices and I found myself poring over her website, looking at every project and daydreaming about which I would prefer to purchase for my next project. I stumbled down rabbit holes of basket weaving supply websites, not even quite certain what I was looking at nor how much I would require, with Mom's story of the lifelong supply from the estate sale echoing in my mind. In the end, I realized that the best thing would be to do what I knew how to do best: to order as many books as I could find from the library on basket weaving, and I did just that.

A week later I received a call from the library. "You've got some books to pick up here, and today at least ten different books on basketry showed up, so please come down..." I was there the very next day, and left with my arms so full that the books crash-landed into the back seat of my car when I got the door open for them. Once home, I lined them all up in front of the fireplace and waited for the weekend. On a hot Saturday, I sat in Jack's chair (which I tend to do when he's not around even though I generally don't find his chair comfortable, a kind of "missing you" action, I think) and paged through every single volume. Some had more pictures, some had more illustrations, some had more words. Some were tutorials, others general skills manuals, and still others were inventories of baskets of the world. At least two had patterns from woven footwear. After an hour or two, I couldn't bear it any longer. I had to make a basket! But with what?

And that's when my thoughts turned to the birch bark we had stowed upstairs. When Jack and I had visited Michigan in the fall of 2019, we had harvested some loose bark pieces from downed birch trees while out on a hike with my family. We brought it back home with us and I contrived to make some sort of basket with it. Initially, I had looked at basic folded birch bark basket designs. Then, quite by accident, I had become obsessed with Yakut Birch Bark Dishes (as seen here: Life in Yakutia: Yakut Birch Bark Dishes). While these were awesome, they were also daunting. So I never did anything with it and there the bark sat. Now I brought it downstairs, casting aside this notion of replicating the Yakut dishes (especially once I actually looked closely and realized I didn't have enough clean pieces of a size to even attempt that style of container), and letting the bark speak to me about what and how it could be.

My first discovery was that the bark could be peeled apart in layers, and that splitting it roughly halfway would provide me with a lovely, two-toned piece. Most were white on one side and peach on the other, but one particular piece proved a lovely mauve when split apart. The inner-most pieces had a dark brownish-grey on one side and the peach or white on the other. My pieces were full of splits, so I got out a scissors and used these to begin cutting roughly equal strips out of the pieces. I discovered throughout the working of the material that all but one of my pieces were somewhat supple and oily, peeling apart with relative ease. The last piece was dry, brittle - and soaking did not improve it. I recalled a book on Native American crafts that my nephew had which stated that the bark of "most" downed birch trees still contained enough oil to be workable. Evidently this was what that difference looked like.

Within a couple hours, my listening and guiding the birch bark resulted in a most excellent basket, and to my mother's credit, it was actually quite easy! It just took a little time and fiddling. Here's a closer look at the results:

I used a different color for each of the three weavers: the standard peach, the interior dark brown, and that unique mauve one on top.

To finish off the top, I used some braided cord I had lying around from an old project, two thinned (and thin) strips of the peach-colored bark, and waxed linen thread.

You can see that I eye-balled the cutting on my strips especially well when looking at the spokes of my basket here. The whole thing is a bit more reminiscent of a rhombus than a square, but not too badly.

And here's another shot from directly above so you can see the interior. I just love the richness of those dark browns. The one spoke that its above the rim is the one I used to tuck the ends of the rim under. I decided that was the best and easiest way to keep everything in line, and I liked that it gave the basket a little bit of a tag, if you will.

 I have every intention of ordering a kit to work on at some point. I'm debating right now if it's best to wait until I've made more headway on certain lingering knitting projects, or if I should just go for it right now, like I did with the spontaneous use of nearly all my birch bark supply with this delightful little project - all while my knitting sat on the arm of Jack's chair right next to me! I would very much like to weave a basket for my tail rack on my bicycle - ideally something with a lid - but I feel it would be prudent to get a bit more practice in before I try to make something more complicated and which I would likely have to order some supplies for. It's delightful to discover a new craft! The idea that I can make a durable container of any size or shape to suit my needs gives me such a thrill! Hopefully you feel inspired to discover something new-to-you as well. :)

Until next time!