Who’d have thought it?

I have been dyeing for a long time – but I’ve never had an experience like this before.

Have a look at this lot.

Would you believe me if I told you they all came out of the same dye bath? [Apart from the colour catcher - that got washed with them all.

It is a bit misleading because the pieces with the distinctive mottling were ones I showed you after the last dyeing session. The cotton lawn at the bottom, the felt [top right] and the silk rods were white when they went in. The dye was a mixture of buttercup yellow, magenta and turquoise which was supposed to come out a golden brown – as it did on the felt and silk noil at the top. 

So why are the rest of them green? [They are greener than they look in the photo.] I realise I must have been a bit heavy handed with the turquoise but I didn’t know that mixed dyes can affect different fabrics in different ways.

My first reaction when they came out of the dye bath was ‘yuck’ but they are beginning to grow on me. And the silk rods are a wonderful bronze colour.

Following my whinge yesterday about not feeling creative I tackled one possible cause – I tidied up. And I do feel better having done it. Perhaps I’m turning into my mother in my old age? No – I don’t use milk jugs. And I know what colour my hair is.

So I went round in circles.

I know it looks like a mat. [Perhaps I am turning into my mother – although it was my mother-in-law who had mats on her mats. I kid you not.]

It is a sample for Dyehard Surfacing’s battingless quilt challenge. Three layers of sheers,  fixed to the bed of the sewing machine with a drawing pin held by some masking tape, so that the fabric rotated. I cut away some of the layers and then used the drawing pin and tape to hold it to my rather grubby window. [Definitely NOT turning into my mother!]

It was inspired by these.  The purple just happened.

 

 

 

 

This is another sort-of-appliqué C&G sample – inlay. It is painted pelmet Vilene, with the leaf shapes cut out and transposed, then machined.

Could be a technique for tiles.

Busy doing nothing …

or not achieving very much, which comes to the same thing.

I mentioned here that I had tried to rust some washers for a postcard swap [as you do] and been disappointed with the result.

I have to apologise to Chemtek Instarust because when we came back from holiday this is what they looked like.  Rustier.

The background, subsequently cut up for the postcards, is my favourite -  layers of paper ephemera pasted down [in this case to paper not fabric.] Then it  was brushed with gesso or emulsion paint, whichever came to hand, rubbed with oil pastels and Markel, painted with burnt umber watercolour, sprayed with Moonshadow mists – I was after a distressed look …

I decided I wanted some fabric layers on the cards. I have rather too much of some very boring calico which for some reason, long forgotten, I dyed brown in the washing machine. [I just did a colour association exercise from Dunnewold, Benn and Morgan’s ‘Finding Your Own Visual Language’, and almost all the words I came up with were negative. Starting with mud and going downhill from there. My subconscious is telling me I really don’t like brown.]

But I digress. I decided would try discharging the boring brown to see if that made it a bit less boring. And then I decide I would sort-of shibori it with buttons and elastic bands – proving that there is a use for boring buttons and the elastic bands from packs of spring onions.

Here it is pre-bleaching.

 

 

 

 

And this is the result. I found it hard to judge the effect of the bleach, so it is a bit overdone – but definitely less boring.

Unfortunately it is quite the wrong shade of rust for the – er- rust.

So I turned to the trusty scrap bag – or in my case, large size plastic box. The biggest size you can get without wheels. [I keep those for the wool stash.]

As I am a sad person I have my scraps sorted by colour in bags in the box. Why is it, that when I don’t like brown and I love purple, I have far more brown scraps than purple?

Unfortunately I neglected to photograph the fabric I chose before I ripped it up – but this is the left overs. It is a piece of poly satin, sunprinted with fig leaves.   Suitably grungy and the right colour.

I stitched that down to the postcard bases, and added small, well frayed left overs from the  backing of this. And a bit of lace and ribbon which they seemed to need. I [blush, blush] glued the washers down – and decided it was time to find some threads to stitch over them. And came to a halt because I only had a little bit of the best one – a variegated  floss from Anchor. So that is all on hold until I can go shopping tomorrow. although if I can get perle in the same shade it will be perle not floss.

These cards are supposed to be in the US before the end of the month – apologies, Surfacers, I think they are going to be late …

I can’t show you a photo until the cards have arrived at their destinations, so instead  here is today’s purple flower – which I think is a self-heal, photographed at the Red House Museum on Tuesday. Lovely delicate shades merging into each other.

Purple is definitely nicer than brown.

It's been quite a productive day ...

not least because I woke at 5 a.m. and left Wensleydale to doze while I got the day started.

No new stamp, but I did revisit an old one.

The February challenge on Dyehards Surfacing is a painted quilt - painted after quilting. So this rather messy object was stamped and brushed with glitter after I had free motioned it. I have some heavy silver braid, which I think probably came from Glitterati, so I hope to couch that on tomorrow.

My inspiration came from snow - and tiles. Now there's a surprise. I have discovered from reading Hans van Lemmen's book on 'Medieval Tiles' that some of the earliest have relief patterns on them - which prompted the idea of couching.

I also discovered that the Winchester tiles are relatively simple. compared with those in other places. I don't suppose I would have embarked on all this stamp making if they had looked like this.

I have also finished the embroidery on the Stitched Textile design group challenge, now known as 'There's one in every crowd'. Perhaps more than finished - I am swithering about the beading and may take it off.
I like the wrong side nearly as much as the right side - or would have done if I hadn't been lazy about starting and finishing off my threads.

Unfortunately it has told me it wants to be a cushion, and I have no suitable fabric, so there will have to be a stash enhancement exhibition to get some, and a cushion pad. Of course pink and purple won't go with the decor in any of our rooms ...