Dyes to Die For

LOL.  Several years ago I stood in front of that traditional quilt guild and announced that I was dyeing again.  There was silence from the group and I though, look at these old quilters, they would never dye a piece of fabric! 

I even held up several wonderful dyed pieces and discussed the merits of each one. 

Still not a word from any of them.

I made several joke-y quips about dyeing and how easy it was.  How the colors just  danced before your eyes, and how happy I was to be doing it.

The looks on their faces became more and more distraught.  I thought, look at these people, they just can't be happy with anything other than their traditional quilts and Aunt Grace fabrics. 

Someone from the middle of the group cautiously asked what i had left and I explained that this was the end of my fabric for this round.  And that this was over.

More silence.

Then someone from the back of the room, tentatively and quietly asked....... you mean your fabric?  You are talking about dyeing fabric?  They were much relieved.

And now I am dyeing again.

Here is the run of 8 blue gradations.  We made a cup of dye.  Poured half into the bag with the fat eighth, then added water back  up to  a cup.  We did this 7 times, diluting the original dye by half each time. 

We talked about me wanting to work on intensity?  Well, the first three dye bags are nearly as dark as the one before.

So I did get intensity but not a lot o differences in values.

But I did get some nice patterning. I purposely did not smoosh them a lot

Which backfired on me with the rainbow dyes........