25 April, 2003

Fish print tee shirts!

Well, it has come to my understanding that fish print tee shirts are a hot item in Antarctica. It seems you can't leave the continent until you've made at least one, so I made four. I'll give them away as gifts and remembrances of my trip.

First, you have to locate a dead fish that didn't quite take to indoor seawater aquarium life. Those things do happen. Then, you freeze the fish to keep it from decaying. When you are ready to have your fish print party, you take the fish out of the freezer and thaw them in warm water. Next, you choose a fish that suits your fancy and trace the fish on a piece of foam. After that, you cut out the tracing and lay your fish inside of it. You need to fan out the fins with pins so you get as much of the fish on the print as possible. Now, you choose a fabric paint color and paint your fish. Lay your tee shirt over the paint and Voila! You have a fish print tee shirt!

It seems everyone in town signs up to join the party. There has to be a sign up list so the party givers will know how many tee shirts to bring. I've heard these parties can go into the wee hours of the night, but we finished at a conservative 9 PM.

Yes, Palmer Station is like a small town and so we call it such. The lower buildings at the station are called downtown and when you are at an up-the-hill building you will say, "I'm going into town."? It's like a family here. Everyone is very close and gets along.

1 Here Brett is thawing out the fish in warm water.

2 After the fish are thawed, Brett lays them out for someone to pick it out of the line up.

3 Barbara and Ken are shaking the fabric paint up and mixing it well for us to use.

4 Here I am tracing the fish around the foam.

5 My new fish print tee shirt!

4 Here we are tracing our fish around the foam and cutting out our patterns.