Another Year of Clovis

Clovis is six years old today.  How time flies.  I remember when he first arrived and was this tiny.

Now, he's six.  I have been planning to make Clovis t-shirts for a while now, but it seems fitting that the plan was finally realized on the eve of his birthday.  Here is a little bit about the process of screen printing the t-shirts.  I was led into the world of printmaking by a great teacher and friend, Caitlin.  We worked at AS220's print shop, the organization that was featured in a travel article about Providence in today's New York Times!

First, I started with the design.  This was an iterative process over many weeks.  Once the design was complete, I printed it onto acetate sheets.  At the print shop, the acetate templates were photo-exposed onto an emulsion that had been spread across a screen and dried.

The light-exposed emulsion hardens and the areas where the black template prevents light exposure remains soft and gets washed away, creating a sort of stencil.

Each shirt is placed on the table according to guide marks, the screen is folded down and the ink is hand-pressed through the screen using a squeegee.  Each impression is unique.  Learning the right pressure and angle for ink delivery is all a part of the art.

The shirts are then dried on racks.

Prior to printing the shirts, we did a number of test prints on various colored paper.  I love these, too!

And here is the final product, some beautiful Clovis prints and t-shirts, just in time for his birthday!

Growing in the Garden

One of the great things about Providence and my Armory Park neighborhood is the sense of community.  One way this manifests is in a series of community gardens.  I am so lucky to have a plot and make things grow.

Here's a long shot of the garden from earlier this spring.

A garden plot neighbor graciously allowed me to plant butter beans in an unused corner of their plot.  There are also thyme and sunflowers.

The garlic earlier in June and a box planted with herbs: basil, marjoram, thyme and wormwood.  What can I do with wormwood?  You can see a little tomato plant beside the box.

This is how the tomatoes and the ripe garlic looked a few days ago.

Long shot with stop sign.

Ripe garlic with the riot of the herb bed behind it.

The tomatoes are surrounded by marigolds and borage.

I also just harvested the garlic I planted last fall!

These Siberian irises are a part of my patch.  They had a lovely bloom this June.

And these are some pictures of flowers from around the neighborhood.

And here's Clovis taking a nice stretch after reading Absalom, Absalom! all morning.