On the 12th I taught basic dyeing and discharging classes with a few gals from the Raintree quilt guild. Here are some of their stunning results with discharging.
Catching Up
February 23, 2011 by 10 Comments
On Friday, February 11th, after 3 attempts to go, I finally made it to Form, Not Function at the Carnegie in New Albany, IN. A friend and I first visited Jane Dunnewold’s wonderful exhibit, Etudes: A Daily Practice on display in Louisville, KY at the Hite Art Institute. We enjoyed that very much, then went to New Albany to find the Mexican restaurant, which had moved, before we went to Form Not Function. I love Jane’s work. It was an awesome day and I really should do that more often. It just reminded me that I don’t get out enough!
Back to life at home….my husband and I went out to eat at an awesome Mexican restaurant the next night in Marion. Can you tell I like Mexican? Here’s what I got…Don Sol’s Fajitas.
The salsa was excellent and there was enough food to take home for lunch on Sunday! The restaurant is Don Sol’s in Marion, IL. If you are in the area try it!
Last week I painted dryer sheets.
This week I ironed them.
This week I painted sky fabrics.
And dyed all of these things.
Cotton and rayon circular scarves, jumbo cotton rick rack and a bunch of onesies. Walmart now sells organic cotton onesies made by Faded Glory. They are so nice and soft.
Well, that’s my week so far. I have more to do before the Bloomington, IN quilt show next week.
Curry
December 25, 2010 by 1 Comment
I love curry powder…actually I love lemon curry powder the best. It has a little lighter taste than regular curry. I buy it at the Green Earth health food store when I get to Edwardsville. I don’t know where else to buy it, but you can get it in the bulk section there. I don’t use it in a lot of things, but when I want it, I like having it on hand. I was filling a small spice jar with it the other day and decided the color was so yummy I had to take a photo.
Now, compare that with this piece of cloth dyed with Curry dye. Are they close to the same color? It’s yummy too. There is also Amethyst on this cloth. I bought the Curry dye powder this year and now it’s at the top of my favorite list.
I am going to have to do something awesome with this piece of cotton. As for the lemon curry powder (the stuff you can eat), try it in your chicken salad the next time you make it, along with dried cranberries or fresh grapes and slivered almonds. It makes a delicious salad.
Week In Review
August 12, 2010 by 5 Comments
It’s been a strange week. I slightly twisted my ankle last Saturday, but no pain and swelling showed up til Sunday afternoon. And it swelled up really good by Monday. I hobbled around the house determined not to let time be a’ wastin’…
I kept ice on it a lot, but also spent time at my sewing machine. I had printed a huge piece of cloth a while back and decided to make these…those of you who read my blog will recognize the cloth…I love these…
Since I sold my first set of screen printed throw pillows last Saturday, I am now highly motivated to keep going, so I sewed up a few more covers, after cutting lots of fabric for the backs.
It’s too hot to be outside printing since we don’t seem to be able to move past 100 plus degree days. But I have lots of indoor work to be done as long as I can keep supplied with everything I need. In my “weakened state” I made a request on Facebook to see if anyone was going to Walmart. Could they check on zippers for me please? One of my friends did go there but they didn’t have any of the polyester zippers I needed for my bags. So I placed an order with Brewer which I needed to do anyway, but wasn’t ready to do it this early. I ordered a bunch of zippers, but they only had one box of the Cloister Brown and I needed many. Sigh. But the three zippers I got are enough to hold me at this moment. I am making bags which are liners for a basket purse. My friend Kay is a basketweaver and we are teaming up on this project. I think the liners might help her sell the baskets better. She did sell a purse and liner last Saturday. Woohoo! She has two big shows next month, so I gotta get busy.
And then there’s my own work…I am giving thought to creating hand dyed cotton napkins with matching table runners. This is for the Select Collection event to be held in November. The theme is home and wearables. I dyed some shibori designs on fat quarters. Table napkins, anyone?
Kay likes them and thinks they would be great as napkins. What do you think?
Progress!
July 28, 2010 by Leave a Comment
Working out in the patio yesterday, I dyed 10 of these…Sweet little onesies for sweet little babies.
Between Monday and Tuesday, I finished 8 new silk scarves and have 3 more waiting to finish. I need some time to decide how to finish them. I want to do more wax designs. There is only one in this group using my new “BIG sponge” stamp. I love the BIG sponge.
Life At My House
July 27, 2010 by 4 Comments
I’m so bad…I haven’t blogged in forever. I guess I can just take you through what I have been doing the last couple of weeks… in pictures.
I went to Terra Haute to an exhibit that a friend of mine was in. We went to a place she had once gone to school and I saw interesting things to photograph such as this structure.
Interesting glass close to where we parked…
Then made lots of fabric beads and made earrings from them…this pair sold…
I’ve been making liner bags to go in Kay’s basket purses…a little collaborative effort…
I made ciabatta bread for the very first time…it turned out great…I love it…
We went to my family reunion…outdoors at a state park on the hottest day of the year…
That’s my brother…he was not a happy camper…
We left on Friday to go home for the reunion and were having AC problems at the time. Well, it’s Tuesday and we are still waiting for the repair guy. Lucky we are staying cool though.
Back to the “dye studio” and scarves and onesies this week…
Took this while the scarf was drying…
Pole-wrapped and dyed, stamped and a rubbing applied. The rubbing plate design was made on a piece of cardboard with hot glue. Great way to make rubbings.
Working, Working, Working
July 6, 2010 by 8 Comments
Last week I took advantage of the wonderfully mild weather to get out in the patio and work on silk scarves. I screened on most of them. I used deconstructed screen designs, glue designs, and paper resist designs. Some of my breakdown screens didn’t print very long. The new silk screens that Julia and I made worked well, but I see mine are starting to stretch a little. Perhaps that is because I didn’t review Kerr Grabowski’s instructions before we made them! This throw together scarf design turned out to be my favorite. Since I ran out of good breakdown prints, I used other screens and partial designs on it. Another idea has emerged for me to use for future screening. I love the contrast of a large bold design over smaller prints.
The other side of this scarf is a bit different, just because with printing by hand you can get lots of variety. This scarf was printed using all three of the types of printing I mentioned earlier. I’m having a great love affair with chartreuse and turquoise this summer, as well as all the blends in between the two that happen when one does not wash the screens between printing. This scarf is printed on silk charmeuse.
Printing L A R G E
June 30, 2010 by Leave a Comment
I was given some old dyes and some cloth that had been soda soaked by a friend who is downsizing. The hot weather has finally broken here, so yesterday morning I was out in the patio. I wanted to try out the new screens and I needed to get started working on silk scarves. But for yesterday, I got out a piece of cloth from her stash. It is a white on white print and is over 2 yards long. I printed on the back of it. The fabric turned out way too light for my taste, but is still very much useable. I’m not sure if it needed to be soda soaked again or what the reason was. She said it had been soaked last fall…which may be too long ago.
I don’t believe I have printed a piece this large before, but I can see myself doing it again. In the lower right corner is printing from one of the new screens we made. I used a paper resist to make the pattern. The other printing is from a design made with blue gel glue.
Just above that printing is the turquoise from the older dyes she gave me. I used double the dye powder and thought that would compensate for the age, but apparently not as I can see a distinct difference from the newer dyes. The new screens work quite well. Today, I printed on silk scarves and prepared screens for breakdown printing that I will print on other scarves.
One more thing: both of my pieces were rejected for the Working Together show this year….that has not happened before! Oh well…there’ll be another place to enter them.
Sold
May 2, 2010 by Leave a Comment
I also added some small beaded fringe on a couple of corners…a new signature idea. The lady that bought this loved the bead fringe.
Three screens were used to make these designs. One was made with blue glue and two were made with soy wax. Screen designs are easy peasy to make.
My Life in Pictures…
April 9, 2010 by 3 Comments
I’ve been so busy and have not posted for awhile…shame on me! I think I will show you what I have been up to rather than tell you….
Decatur, IL – Tree Huggers Exhibit in front of the Decatur Arts Council–On my way to the quilt show one morning, I shot these pictures.. this was interesting to see!
Back home….loading new stencils from the Crafter’s Workshop in my etsy shop...these are totally fun to pattern cloth with…
Tea dying and color dyeing silk ribbon for a doll show….
…and dyeing doggie hoodies….
…and working on some artistic silk scarves for upcoming art fair…these have been dyed a base color, then stamped with soy wax, then painted with dye paint and are batching…
Silk scarves are my “practice” work…not only do I get to know the different types of silks, but I get to “play” and practice with designs and colors. Still have lots of different things to do and I will show you as I go along while I get ready for the art fair. But…today I think I want to make some paper/cloth…after I go to town and run some errands…later!
