When gathering sage, be sure to honor the plant with a prayer of thanks, and an offering of tobacco. Collect the sage in cotton, linen, or wool - no synthetic fabric or plastic. Be sure that you've first purified the fabric, and any tools used in collecting or bundling the sage.When you bring the sage home, cut the branches to 7 inches in length. Bunch them up to about 1 ½ inch thickness in your hand.
Cut some cotton embroidery floss in a length of about 3 feet. (Cotton crotchet thread works, also.)
Lay the branches of sage on a smudged piece of clean cotton, all facing the same direction. Roll the bundle in the fabric to help compress the shape to a tighter cylinder. (do not make so tight that air cannot circulate to the center.)
Now open the end of the tube of fabric on the branch end of the bundle...and keeping hold of the bundle, wrap cotton thread several times around the branches, (making sure to leave a tail for tying later). Now, you can remove the fabric while you finish criss-crossing the thread over the rest of the bundle.
Wrap the thread around the length of the bundle in wider swaths...and when you get the the leafy end, crisscross back to the branch end the same way.
When you get back to the branch end, wrap the thread around the branches several more times. and then tie the two tail ends together, cutting off any trail of thread left.
Trim off any wayward branches that stick out from the bottom and the sides.
Hang bundle up to dry.
12 comments:
Wow, I did everything but wrap :) Your image reminds me of skeleton leaves under a microscope. Your image is like magic :)
wow thank you. i've been tweaking it..the colours are right, in my mind but i was worried that the shape of the leaves wouldn't be recognizable...that maybe i'd made them too pebbly. ..? and in turn, made the image too busy to be comfortable to view...
Aside from their fragrance what I like about sage leaves is their texture.
I switched this out for a simpler line. The more I looked at the other one...the less "fresh" it seemed.
cat
The other day I was flipping through IF blog sites and I did see yours. At the time I was just looking and I did see your other piece. So have to tell you I like this one better. The colors in this one do look fresh and I love the design of the leaves. You have a fresh look in your style.
This sage you pick is it wild or something you grow?
such a nice post...great topic
Simple, lovely and elegant!! Great illo!
A new image :) I liked the other, like I said it had 'magic', but agree this one is 'fresher'! The pale green fresh leaves create this :)
I can smell that sage just looking at it. It isn't often that a blog is as pleasant to look at, as it is to read.
You have accomplished both. Very Nice. - BurntOrange.
I find myself visiting my own blog every hour just to read what visitors have to say!
And then I head straight over to Illustrated Friday to see the beautiful illustrations other folks are posting...but also to read what folks are saying.
Thank you, everyone, for your kind comments about the sage.
cat
oh, i love your work...and i love the color of the leave, the very special green :D
i love the tender green of fresh sage... and the smell and taste of it in chickenlivers... :)
very nice illustration!
What is Smudge? It sounds dirty.
Post a Comment