Red Solo Cup Dyeing.......in Yogurt Cups

They said it wouldn't rain, by mid-afternoon we'd had an inch.

I wanted the warm temps on my driveway to batch the dyes.  The rain cooled it a bit and disappeared the sun, but I don't think it really mattered.  To keep the rain from diluting the dye, I covered the cups with the plastic bag I used on the table.

The technique is from Nina Marie Sayer and can be found at:

Red Solo Cup Dyeing

Nina Marie explains the process in easy to understand terms.  All you need is about an hour.  That will allow you time to prepare the area, mix your dyes, create your dye pots, set it to batch and clean up.  One hour, that's all.

As the process went along, I kept thinking, I need to take photos.

Did I?  Nope.

But I did get the best part, the finished pieces!

My only complaint is the light colors.  I soaked the unbleached ecology  cloth in soda for 2 hours.  And I also used soda and salt in the dye mix.    So I may try again this week and use more dye in the pot.  I didn't measure, but I did use more than a teaspoon in each cup.  Hmmmm.......

..........and as an added bonus, I found a clump of these threads in the bottom of the washing machine!

Dyeing Workshop With Wendy Starnes

Yesterday I was in an all day workshop with Wendy, a local (Alexandria, LA) fiber artist.  I have know her for a number of years.  She has had a lot of her work published and hanging in shows like The International Quilt Festival in Houston.

I am familiar with most of the techniques she was working with, but I love the opportunities these workshops present so I always try to take advantage of them.

Working with Procion MX Fiber Reactive Dye Powders, we did a rainbow dye of fat eights using fushia, yellow and turquoise.  The red and oranges are still batching on my carport.

The blue and purples are currently in the second wash in my fancy washing machine.  I am so glad I didn't get the front loader, using the front loader would not have allowed me to work with the dyed fabrics like I do.  I would have to hand wash them.

Think about that when you are buying that new washer!

We also did a gradation dye in an indigo blue.   Some of those got washed in this blue batch.  Actually I am thing all got into the blue wash.  We will see.

I will post photos when they all get washed and dried.....and ironed!

All of this was on PFD fabric.  She let us work on a piece of silk scarf.   I poured a lot of colors on mine, some others were conservative and did blues or reds or greens.

I have always had a problem getting dark colors.  So this was  my objective in this workshop.  So far this look like my colors will be intense.  This is that silk scarf.  i am ordering some velvet scarves for Xmas presents.

Mordant work and a Little Dye Work

I am preparing some fabric with a mordant in order to do some ecobundling.  This time I am doing a strong mordant of soy milk.  I  have read that it is a good protein source to open cotton fibers.  So I had to go to the grocery store anyway (and I forgot dog yogurt so I will have to go again anyway) and I bought soy milk.

Remember my find from the Purple Cow that included the fish duvet?

I dis-assembled the duvet cover and separated the back side into strips about 18 inches wide.  I put a one strip into the soy milk bath.






I took another strip and did a shibori wrap.


 I soak my fabric in plain water but mix my dye with some soda ash.



Mental note:  buy more soda ash..........



Now I am washing it out in my super heated hot water.  This is what I bought the machine for!






 



Of course, I didn't wear gloves...........

Let's try the Dyeing To Be Loved Post Again

Let's try this one more time.  I am still doing something so wrong that I am not figuring out how to  get the Chrome engine up but I am doing something right that I am able to get the Firefox engine and the Mozilla one up just fine.  Go  figure?

I have had a wonderful weekend dyeing.  Last week I purchased a couple of packages of cheesecloth and I already had this wonderful set of Procion Dye Powders and somehow, in my kitchen, they collided and  became beautiful!

I started on Saturday and dyed red, yellow, blue and purple.  i didn't even think about  adding the soda ash and the colors were nice and pale.

While the pieces  were air drying, one of the pieces ended up in a certain little dog's mouth.  I found two strips missing.  After a complete and exhaustive search of the premises, I added peroxide to his  stomach and he threw up the two pieces within minutes.  Crisis averted.  Frank says, maybe I need to get your a clothes line  somewhere.  Ya think?

So today  I dug through my stuff and found a nice huge container of soda ash.  I made dye batches and added about 6 or 7 yards of cheese-y-cloth.  I  also had a few yards of white Kona and set up a  shibori style dye bath and even more wonders came about.

Here is my shibori wrap on a PVC pipe.


 And below are the four dye cups from today's batch with the soda ash.

Here are the results from the first  day, no soda ash.  very light colors but you can definitely see the  red, blue, yellow and that weird red/pink color  on the end. 

Here is the set that McGee took a chunk out of.  See the chunk missing?

Shibori Light!  Nice sky for sure!

And seeing the shibori  with the red right now, I immediately thought  of a sunset on the water!  Maybe a sailboat in there, or an eagle!



Here is part of the second soda ash batch.  Nice, you can really see the colors. Look at those yellows!  Oh my!

 These are some interesting pieces that spent some time in two  different dye baths at one time.  They  "hung" out  over both.  That read on the left is really red and grey or  green maybe.

And to top it all off, one of the pillowcases from Habitat that got a  bit of a shibori  treatment.  Not sure if this is the way it will look or if it gets over-dyed somehow. 

We shall see!

Green to Dye For

I am posting this on Creations by Nina Marie, go by there and enjoy what others are doing!
http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.com/2013/03/studio-pegboard-for-off-wall-friday.html

A couple of months ago, I purchased a bolt of white, or what I thought was plain white muslin fabric, from Mia's.  It was cheap enough and had been washed due to a leak in her front window that occurred during a hurricane.  When I used a piece of it, I realized it has some sort of a pattern on the front, and had actually been wrapped inside out back on the bolt.

I kinda forgot about it, and tore a strip off to do the green thing with yesterday.  So soaking in the pot, scrunched up was this piece of what I thought was plain white muslin.

Swirled mess

To dye this I wanted to try do do snow dyeing, but of course, we have no snow.  I used ice cubes instead.  I scrunched the fabric up with my fingers and place it into the pot.  I wanted a small pot to contain the fabric, since it was just a small piece.  And I tossed in a number of ice cubes and sprinkled my powdered dyes on top of the cubes.

The Procion Dyes I used were blue, yellow and red.  I put the blue on first, then the yellow and added the red as an afterthought.  What exactly I was thinking escapes me now, but red was added.    I then put the pot outside on top of the recycle bin to keep it away from basset noses.

About an hour later, Frank brings the pot in to me and is swirling the melted ice water around. After berating him for moving MY STUFF, I put it carefully back on the recycle bin and left it out there overnight in the rain storm.  A really bad rain storm.  It was under the car port so it shouldn't have gotten any wetter than it already was.

Wet is always much darker than dry

At some point, I did think about having all those dyes swirled together like that, but was unable to affect anything at that moment, so I ignored the thought.

When I poured the dye water out this morning, I thought I had a nondescript green mess.  But when I laid it out on the trees to dry, I noticed the red parts, and decided it might have been a good idea to have that in there.

When it dried, and for some reason the dogs didn't bother this at all (I am totally amazed at that!), it looked very very interesting!

The front of the fabric had these stupid flowers on it, the ones I had forgotten all about.  But the back......oh my.......the back was incredible!






I saw leaves all over the back, in real leaf shapes, like a dense jungle of bushes and trees 




Large leaves and small leaves.......LEAVES!













I think I am seeing my green piece for the Fiber Group, baby!  You bet!

Dyeing To Get In

LOL.  Remember that old cemetery joke, they had to put a fence up around the cemetery because people were dying to get in!  LOL

I got another of the Taking Names sets done.  This one is Mint Green with scrappy.  I used a lot of blue and green pieces and just love it.  It is not one I would have chosen but it is looking fabulous.

We are not heading for the Red Stick today, too much to do.  I hope to get a look at some backings for the two baby quilts.

I really need to complete the quilting on the Southwest quilt that is on the frame and get some other stuff going.  Like the baby quilts.  I want to do Baptist Fans on the Baby Steps quilt.   And straight yet wavy lines on the Baby Bricks quilt.

I have some dyeing going on.  I am trying to get a nice green for my Fiber Group.  But I am not sure how it is working.  I am only rinsing once so the effect should be darker than if I totally washed the dye out of everything.  It will be a small piece and not washed or put into a larger quilt so it should be OK.


Not so appetizing, huh?  We shall see.  Oh, yes, it is drying high on the top of my nandinas because of the Idiot Child Who Eats Fabric.  Need I say more?