So ever since I saw those beautiful little woven baskets from natural fibers, I couldn't stop thinking about them. My longing to make one superceeded all of my other needs, and I became determined to go out, find some stuff to make baskets from, and figure out how to make a pretty one!
Now, I've made baskets from newspapers, cloth, and pine needles before, so I know some basics, but I never made any from grasses, twine or wood, and the reason why I didn't, is because it seemed like a lot of work! I've seen one video on it, and a woman was describing this weeks long process of foraging, peeling, drying, then soaking the material, and I didn't even have space to do all these things.
However, now I found out you could make baskets from ivy twine, and not just that, you could make baskets from dandelion stems! I'm mad I didn't know about that one before. I figured that baskets, in the end, can be made from pretty much anything that is bendy or cord-like.
I have to admit I wasn't feeling very patient when I made this determination; I wanted baskets, now. So I came out one sunny afternoon feeling that stubbornness will make up for my lack of research; I would go out and drag back whatever material I could possibly bend. And then I would not go thru the hassle of peeling, drying, soaking or whatever it was it needed to prepare, no, I was gonna come home and make baskets immediately. What's the worst that can happen? My basket falls apart? It doesn't matter; I'm after the experience and finding out.
So walking by the riverbank, the first thing I found was thickly growing red water-spurts from some tree. I don't know what kind of tree it is, maybe it's just a big bush, but I noticed the branches were very bendy, and there were so many I wouldn't make any ecological impact if I took some, so I grabbed a handful! Then, I stumbled upon big goldenrod stems, and goldenrod is a medicinal plant, I've known about it for a while, and I was surprised to find just how fibrous and woody the stems are, and how bendy! Wow, I thought, this is even better than those tree spurts, I'm gonna collect even more of this. So I did. Here's my collection at that point:
Then, I went to the place I knew grew ivy, and I got me some of that too. I couldn't get a lot, and it's pretty gnarly, but, I figured I'll cover some stuff I know for certain can be made into baskets.
At the very end, I managed to find a meadow with some dandelions, and collected that too. These, I would have to dry, they're obviously not going to bend while raw, but hey, if it's possible to use them, I want to.
I did have to carry all of this in my hands thru the city, and at first I thought I would be self conscious about people staring at me, but then I forgot that I'm carrying all that stuff, because there were various cats outside, and I was busy trying to get the cats to allow me to pet them (I did get one, it was great.) People were staring at me with some degree of approval; I looked like I knew what I was doing, carrying all those raw materials around. Hehe.
So I get home, and the first material I wanna try is those red branches, I thought it was a good first-time thing to start with, and only then I tried to remember how to actually weave, and realized you need stronger pieces for the spine, and thinner ones for weaving around them. Oops. I was only collecting the strongest spurts. Ah well, I thought, still feeling nothing bad can happen even if I just do it with what I got. And this is what we ended up with:
At every point of this I'm telling myself, okay, but this is still 100% usable, I know it looks bad, but that basket could hold tomatoes like nobody's business if I finish it. It's strong, it's reliable, so what if it looks messed up? Produce wouldn't fall out! This is a good, practical, start to a basket!
And then, I ran out of red branches! So I figure, okay, let's just take the goldenrod stems then, they're the same color, it wouldn't be super noticeable. So I do, and discover immediately why people are not weaving with the goldenrod stems; they break. Yes, they're bendy, but if you try to bend it on an angle, it's immediately breaking. After trying and failing to add 3 different pieces, I had to give it a rest, and face that I would not be having a basket at the end of the day.
I did, however, gain a lot of experience! Lot of my curiosity answered. I'm thinking now, that drying and soaking all this stuff probably adds to the bending properties, and would allow me to manipulate the material more easily, and that's why people are going thru the hassle. It also made it clear that it would be  easier to make baskets using one stronger material as a spine part, and another, more cord-like, as the material to weave around it.
I'm not terribly disappointed, this is how learning works. I'm aware that in order to make any kind of pretty basket, I would be first doing 3-5 very ugly and misshapen ones, but as you can still use those for a purpose, I would be creating practical items! I'm still tempted to go out and gather more of these red branches just to finish the messed up basket I've started, because I don't want to throw it away, it's my first and I love it.
I'm still drying the dandelions and the ivy, so eventually I will be attempting baskets out of these too, will keep you posted! Once I know how to make a simple one, I can try for the more complex ones. I also am waiting to make a few big ones that I can use, before making the small adorable ones!
