THE GOOD MOTHER CLOAK (2024) is woven from cordage made from dried plant material from my garden, my old laundry baskets (deconstructed), and birds’ nests. The vertical weave is made from the fibers of my deconstructed laundry baskets, which I harvested both for the raw material & for the memory of years of duty and care trapped within the fibers. The horizontal weave—what holds the cloak together—is primarily plant material grown over two summers in my garden, which I twisted into cordage (handmade rope) as a daily practice over many months, then wove into the cloak. The birds’ nests were all found on the ground throughout several years of daily walking or given to me as gifts. As my garden merged with my deconstructed laundry baskets to become The Good Mother Cloak, I was thinking about the complicated and varying expectations surrounding what it means to be a “good” mother or what it means to just be a “good” human, and about what it might look like to move through the world offering visible care & safety. I was thinking about nurturing, about how nature nurtures & releases, and about the urgency of our own human tending and nurturing in times of societal and environmental turmoil. I was thinking about duty, instinct & sacrifice, and the urge to protect all that can’t be protected. I was thinking about painstaking care for loved ones, of tending to love and loss, of the never-ending & essential work, and of the eventual need to let go. This cloak is wearable.