New Piece (Again!)

I am still waiting for my new chirimen order to come in, which should be either this Tuesday or Wednesday.  When it gets here, I can finally finish up that phoenix kanzashi that is enormous.   But in the mean time I have been playing with new fabrics I got recently! My favorite has been this rusty, deep red with stripes of golden yellow through it.  It has made for some great momiji kanzashi! As yous can see, the colors blend together to give it that great dyed effect you so often see on silk kanzashi.  The greens are tea green and yellow green. 


I did attempt to use the gold mizuhiki that I purchased to make the centers.  Bad idea.  Not only did it not hold, it was very messy.  I am still not certain how that traditional spiral is accomplished with mizuhiki, but I am going to keep trying on the side.  Meanwhile I went back to gold memory thread from DMC, which has a copper strand in the center of the wrapped thread to give it hold. 

I also a custom order and sent out some recent bookmark sales! I have been slowly restocking my washi paper here and there, looking for new patterns and cheap deals.  I actually made some decent money this month, though it has all been spent on new fabrics already. 

My workstation is a mess though, and before I start delving into new pieces again, I have some major cleanup work to do.  After I finish this wonderful momiji and phoenix pieces.  Then I am going to do a few barrettes and by then it will be the new year.

In other notes, a Japanese Yuzen (silk dyer) has struck up a friendship with me, to ask for Etsy assistance and to help him learn better English. I have agreed wholeheartedly. He is young, but comes from a family of silk dyers. The panels he creates are stunning works of traditional art. I hope one day to go visit his workshop in Japan to see how he works.  It is serendipitous that he happens to live in my favorite city of Kyoto.