"The Goods"

Look at how we unceremoniously haul thousands of dollars in handwoven garments in trash bags...

I went to Medford for the seamstress swap that gave me my first batch of blue ruanas on the afternoon before I left for the show in Bend.

The rest of that afternoon was spent on the floor of the bathroom with sudden and severe food poisoning. After nine hours of painful purging and frightening fever, it rapidly ended, just in time for me to go to bed and wake up to pack the van. Whew! That was a close call!

And see? These are gorgeous garments that wear just like they're supposed to. No sign of the tension issues that caused me so much trouble in weaving them.

The one in that photo is probably the one that I'll keep for myself. The blue areas are a deep cobalt.

Did y'all know that I keep one garment from each batch of cloth for myself? I know that I won't be doing this forever, and I'd like to have some memorabilia from my younger years as a production weaver. And I write off the inventory loss as "marketing" because I will need to have some of these garments on hand to rephotograph every time I shoot a new set of photos for jurying.

Eventually, I plan to do color-specific shoots with blue shot next to Crater Lake, red shot with Autumn leaves, grey in front of a sandstone cliff, etc. I may even enlist compelling models and hire a real photographer. Eventually. But until then, I just keep one of each garment color in my closet.