#cordage

Plastic bag is not as much a danger to bring in the house as plant material, so I spun this up while watching Project Hail Mary, which made me cry an unfair number of times. I cut this plastic probably three to five years ago, because I was getting tired of the plastic bags piling up.

I've tried several times in my adult life so far to figure out how to upcycle plastic bags, so one of my first projects was learning how to compress them so they take up less space.

My next project was to learn how to cut bags into a (usually solid) strip. It turns out, I could've cut my strips juuusssttt a liiitttttttllleee wider lol. I managed to hold onto my latest iteration of cutting plastic bags into strips. It consists of, minimum, dozens of yards of plastic bag strips.

I still have a cat litter bucket (or maybe two...?) carefully packed to the max with plastic bags. Plus an entire drawer here at the house, so I should probably get those compressed. You have to fold the bags up, anyway, to cut them into a strip.

Things that are so cool about dogbane (citations needed, grain of salt): it is indigenous to North America. Indigenous Americans have used it for millennia to make all sorts of stuff- cordage, nets for hunting, shoes, baskets, etc. It (allegedly) does not need to be retted (!!!) just dried. Dogbane fibers have a smaller diameter than other line fibers like flax meaning fabric made from dogbane might be nice n soft.

All of this to say: I bought some dogbane fiber. Now you may be saying "Avery what are you doing?? You don't know how to spin! You don't have any spinning equipment" and I say to you "yeah oops"

But look how pretty it is!!

I have been using a splicing technique I learned from a video by Donna Cossette (Paiute) for the Nevada arts council to make cordage just with my hands and a bit of spit.

I made just about twelve feet of spliced cord. My hand cramped so badly. Either I am doing this wrong, or this is not a bulk technique.

Also, since it's toxic, I did it outside and my cat was yelling at me the whole time.

Found some fallen poplar limbs and thought they'd be good for cordage so I'm doing this for the first time!