Backstrap Weaving

Well, hello…….. Here we are well into 2026 and yes, I’m still here. And here is a long overdue blog post. Typing at this laptop keyboard was not doing my shoulder any good while I was still unable to rotate my wrist into a full palm-down position. As a result, I am still stuck with a frozen right shoulder and a wrist that turns most of the way but which I fear will probably never recover its full range of motion.

So I’ll attempt to fill you in with just a little of what has been happening starting with way back last year when I joined a group called the Fiber Artists Network up on the mid-north coast of NSW. What a group! Such an incredible collection of talented women who use a mind-boggling array of techniques to create their textile art works. I wasn’t sure how exactly my work fit with this group but I enjoyed every opportunity to get together with them and soak up inspiration. And here I am now moved to my home in the Blue Mountains where I can only continue to see their work from afar.

Another new member to that group, Dale, immediately after joining, invited a group of us to her home for a day of natural dyeing. Everyone was there to do some botanical printing except me. I’d brought my own pot, which I’d lugged all the way over from Bolivia, and was planning to dye some of the wool I’d bought from my teachers in the Bolivian highlands on my final visit (sniff!) in 2025.

I took along the dried cochineal bugs that I’d got in the market in Santa Cruz (and before you ask, I did declare it when I arrived in Australia. I had hardly even begun explaining when the bored officials waved me through). This caused much excitement in the group and although the focus remained on botanical dyeing, I ended up with quite a mix of fabric and thread in my dyepot alongside my wool skeins.

Dale provided a nice variety of plant material from her own garden for the botanical printing.

This included leaves from what is commonly known as the Silver Dollar gum tree which produce a gorgeous burnt orange color. You’d never imagine by just looking at the silvery leaves. She gave me some to take home. I posted messages in the local Facebook groups hunting for more and a lady drove over one day with a small bucketful for me.

I was happy about the rosy red color we were getting from the cochineal after all the trouble I’d had in Bolivia with the very hard tap water there when I was trying to dye silk.

Later at home, I dyed another skein and shifted it to a bright red by adding lemon juice.

Next came the Silver Dollar leaves. I added to the supply by buying a few sticks of it from the local florist. The pretty rounded silver leaves are frequent additions to flower arrangements here particularly those that contain a lot of native varieties.

I was thrilled with the results but did have to ask myself if I was ever going to weave with so much orange yarn. A quick glance back at some of my past work reminded me that I have included this color much more than I had imagined.

Next on my list was leaves from the peppercorn tree. It’s a native of South America but was a popular shade tree at one stage used in rural areas of NSW. We had one in our school yard when I was a kid and we certainly enjoyed the cool of its shade and the aroma of his peppercorns on sweltering summer days. I hit the local Facebook notice boards again and was told of a tree offering its weeping leafy branches to passing strollers on one of the main streets of a neighboring town. Off I went. The search became a big part of the whole adventure. While gathering leaves, a silver-haired gent whose long beard was tied in a pony-tail told me that he too had had a peppercorn tree in the schoolyard. He and his mates would use the leaves to soothe the sting after a caning! Maybe the boys at my school had done so too but kept it a secret from the cane-wielding nuns.

Known as “molle” (which is part of its botanical name) by my weaving teachers in highland Bolivia, it gives a rich gold color. I was only using alum pre-mordant. I believe that my teacher Maxima and her group also use chrome during the process and achieve a much richer gold.

I had my friends in the local craft group collecting both red and yellow onion skins for me and was surprised at how much richer the color from the yellow skins was. I had been expecting the opposite. I didn’t use the alum mordant with the onion skins having read that it wasn’t necessary. However, the color was a bit uneven…but in a good way!

After connecting with a keen natural dyer up in northern Queensland on Facebook, I then tried mango leaves. They gave a beautiful buttery yellow in very little time. A second skein left in longer was more golden. I got a nice green by adding a touch of copper sulfate and some other tones using water and a bit of white vinegar in which rusty nails had been soaking for two weeks out in the sun.

Other non-weaving activities involved updating, adding final touches to and improving some of my woven jewelry pieces.

All the dyeing paraphernalia had been put away and I spent my time refurbishing and creating pendants and wrist cuffs between walking around the deliciously cool nearby pocket of littoral rainforest and visiting the beach in the evening to watch the paragliders take off in the evening breezes.

Lying crumpled up within one of the boxes of jewelry findings was a small strip of silk that I’d woven. It was the piece on which I’d been sampling the figure of a weaver at her loom to be included in a larger project. I was able to cut off the final version and turn it into a pendant. I couldn’t believe that I just happened to have the little hand charm to add to the bottom.

I spent a couple of very peaceful weeks there at Shelly Beach keeping Catherine’s beautiful garden watered. It gave me a chance to see just how independent I could be hand-wise and if I was indeed ready to make the bigger move away from my brother’s home to my real home in Katoomba. Spoiler alert: I’m there now….but more about that and my return to the loom in my next blog post.

And then came Christmas. A dear friend bought me a (quite expensive!) ticket to a wreath-making afternoon. I must admit that I was reluctant to go. Anyone who is a regular reader of my blog will know that I don’t do Christmas. But hey, this was my first one back in Australia. Let’s make it a memorable one in that I actually participate!

I did feel extremely handicapped. I didn’t have enough grip strength to handle the secateurs on the thicker branches and I struggled to work the florist wire and weave the stems in and out of the frame. But I gave it my best shot..I finished mine ages before anyone else in my group who spent so much more time selecting and planning. This wasn’t their first time and I should have probably slowed down and put a bit more thought into it. I was just a bit frustrated and disappointed with my hand and shoulder’s performance and wanted to get it all over with.

There was weaving involved and so I guess this does deserve a place on this blog….

There was a Christmas party with the Fibre Artists Network group out in the beautiful lush Bellingen countryside. We played Secret Santa, or Kris Kringle, as they say here in Australia, and were charged with making a brooch for one of the other members.

Here they all are after being randomly distributed and unwrapped…..

I can see more natural dyeing coming up hopefully with my own handspun especially now that I have borrowed this book to peruse….

And here I’ll end this post. There’s so much more to tell as a whole new chapter has begun and is well under way but here’s a look at the beginning of that new chapter which marks the end of this long, long roller coaster of a journey from the other side of the world.

The most I’ll tell you for now is that I am very happy!!

I happily put on my badge for the group photos knowing that the time has indeed come to exhale and live in the Present and if that’s the impression I gave the person who stitched my badge, I am thrilled. Time to stop holding my breath and worrying about my future here in Australia. Time to stop feeling sad and doubtful about having left Bolivia.

Until next time….(.there will be weaving to show!)