sew sew art

The Liebster Award

2012-02-26T09:56:00.002-05:00

I was just awarded the Liebster award by Kit Lang. Kit is one of those individuals who throws caution to the wind and jumps into a project with both feet and a LOT of humor. I find I leave "You are a HOOT!" as a comment about every other time. She is SO funny and has a wonderful sense of adventure. I am shamelessly copying her blurb about the award since it sounded so wonderful:

“Liebster” is a German word meaning dearest, beloved or favorite, and the Liebster Award is given by bloggers to other bloggers - intended to showcase exceptional up-and-coming blogs with 200 or fewer followers. There is no evaluation committee or formal award process for the Liebster; but it's lovelier because it's recognition from a peer.

The rules for the Liebster Award are:

Show thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them.
Reveal your top five picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
Post the award on your blog.
Bask in the love from some of the most supportive people on the internet—other writers and artists.
And best of all – have fun and spread the karma.

So in the spirit of giving, I am nominating these two blogs:

Quilt Idea Dea was the second Dutch quilt artist I "met". I have been following her blog along with Suus for about a year and a half. I enjoy reading her journal of experiences while she travels the happy road of artistic expression.
Marjolijn Quilts is my last choice. Although I am relatively new to her blog, I see her going to workshops and classes and perfecting her art. She has had some great posts about thread sketching and quilting, especially her tree branches.

Done

2012-02-25T10:23:00.000-05:00

Well, the BIG SHIBORI project of 2012 is finished. Boy, did I learn a lot from my mistakes so I'm here to share my angst so you can take a lesson.

Did I mention I used felt (above) on top of the Styrofoam? I used 505 basting spray to adhere the felt to the Styrofoam. I started in the center and smoothed it down with my hands, getting all the ripples and looseness out. The I used the spray adhesive again to attach and smooth the shibori piece down securing it with pins to the side edge of the Styrofoam.

I took the painted lath and cut one end on a 45 degree angle.

Drying on my table

I drilled three holes in the lath on the ends and in the center to ease the dry wall screw through the wood and easily into the Styrofoam. Any force might tear up the Styrofoam and lessen the grip. I then applied construction adhesive made especially for use with Styrofoam to help adhere the strips to the sides along with the screws.

I used the bottom screw - 2" long. The wide sharp threads on the screws helped grip the foam.
Mistakes made were using lath JUST big enough without any wiggle room. One corner had to be butted instead of beveled. The bevels didn't meet like the would if I had constructed the frame first and then seated it around the piece. I was left with poorly made corners. I used black "Gorilla" tape to mask the joints which were VERY evident. It might not look perfect but it was a massive improvement and not that visible from a distance. The gaps WERE very visible when looking head on.

The other big lesson was that I painted the outside and edges of the wood but not the inside of the wood. I just didn't think it would show. Think again. I had to carefully go back and touch up the exposed inner edges with paint. On the first side, I used blue painters tape but THAT was mistake #3. It was pulling the fabric away as I tried to remove it. For the other 3 sides I used freezer paper folded in half, waxed side out and slid it between the fabric and frame while I applied the paint.

Here is the finished piece with Meagan by the table. We had to attach eyes and wire to a wooden strip I will apply to the back for hanging. The show opens March 2 from 5-8pm. Meagan and I will be there for pictures. I'll post them.

Our hanger
And a bonus picture of my backyard. Sunrise over the church. The plastic on the ground will be a garden my neighbor is planting to grow food for our town food pantry. I just donated the garden plot.

Lessons learned

2012-02-24T05:46:00.000-05:00

Now I'm glad I am blogging about this because one obstacle became another and now I have an even better way to display this piece. You never know when your solutions might help someone else.
OK, I cut the huge piece (4' X 8') of Styrofoam to 47" X 47". I WAS going to cut it 44 X 44 and wrap the fabric to the back but then I thought of this:
Why not cut it 47" square - just one inch smaller than the piece of fabric and just do a 1/2" wrap. THEN I can add 1.5" wide lath along the sides to #1. hide the cut edge of the fabric, #2 give the appearance of a frame and #3. Have that 1/4" reveal from the front visually STOP the eye from falling off the frame.
Pictures:

This is the Styrofoam cut to 47" X 47"

These are 5 very straight and flat ratty and filthy old lath strips 48" long

Blurry but you get the idea. Glue the strips onto the sides of the stretched and finished piece

This will be the reveal from the front (look at the dirt that fell off the grimy wood - yuck!

Lighted sanded fronts, backs and sides. I will hit the edges to remove those tiny "hairs" with a sanding block. I will also paint the outside and edges with flat black acrylic paint to give it a finished appearance. On the back of the Styrofoam I will glue a strip of lath with eyes and a wire to hang the piece - tomorrow...

My process

2012-02-23T10:07:00.001-05:00

I'm not sure if anyone cares about this process, aggravating as it is to me, but I find blogging about it cathartic. I am trying to get this shibori piece mounted and ready for hanging at Waterfall Arts. This is the piece Meagan, the young woman I am "mentoring", and I made for the H2O show. It is our interpretation of water. After more shibori dyeing than I even wanted to do, I now have the gradation of values that I wanted. The piece is sewn and ready to hang.
So what's the big deal? I cut the wood for the frame but I needed to bevel the insides and my bandsaw blade broke. It is too cold to fiddle with it in my unheated wood shop so I tried my big bench mounted belt sander. The sanding belt broke. It is definitely too cold to fiddle with that too. I felt the universe was pushing in another direction. So I decided to mount the fabric on 1.5" Styrofoam insulation board.

It is light weight, relatively easy to cut and easy to push pins into, to attach the fabric. This is step one.
I have ironed and hung the fabric on the straight of grain even though it will be displayed on the bias (diamond shaped).

Today I will cut the Styrofoam to the correct size and possibly do the attaching. Check back tomorrow...

Art was the Connection

2012-02-22T05:55:00.000-05:00

In November 2010, I stumbled on to a blog created by a woman from the Netherlands. She was doing a snow dye workshop and I had just done some snow dyeing with friends. I left her a comment telling her so. A few weeks later, I had done shibori dyeing and low and behold, this woman was doing shibori dyeing at the same time. I left her another comment. This woman was Suus. I started reading her blog entries and through her found many other fiber artists from the Netherlands. I have the power of the internet to thank for bringing us together. This was the beginning of a long and ever expanding connection I have made with many wonderful and warm women from the Netherlands. Many of their blogs are listed on my blog list.
During my second blog anniversary, I received an email from Suus, telling me how generous I was and that she wanted to send me some of her wonderful snow dyes. I said yes, if we could trade. She agreed. I have just received her snow dyes, THREE of them, along with a wonderful artist post card with burnt organza and Tyvek. (above)

Although I was a dental hygienist for 37 years, I also have a bachelors and masters degree in Environmental Science and Policy. I wrote my masters thesis on sustainable communities and part of that was in depth research on what community was and how it was created. At the time, 1997, computers and the internet were still in their infancy especially when compared with today's social media, YouTube and apps. One form of community creation that was mentioned in the literature was the internet. Back then I didn't really see it but I am now part of a large community of quilt and fiber artists, many of whom I "met" on the internet.
I have started to study Dutch and one artist "friend" Nienke, gives me a dutch word a day. It is these kindnesses and thoughtful blog comments from others that make my life so enjoyable. I don't know when I will get to the Netherlands but I WILL go there as soon as I am able and I so look forward to meeting these wonderful generous women. Life is GOOD. Thank you my friends.

Tray Dyeing Tutorial

2012-02-17T16:00:00.002-05:00

There are so many ways to color fibers. Using the tray dyeing method is definitely one of my favorites. It is called tray dyeing because many people do it in a tray. I am not a fat quarter dyer. I like to dye at least a full width half yard of fabric so I transferred the IDEA of tray dyeing onto a flat surface. When I dye really large pieces (over a yard) I use 1" Styrofoam insulation board which is cut into 2' X 4' sections. I covere my table or Styrofoam board with a plastic bin bag so I can easily move and carry them. For this tutorial I used full half yards and left them on the bin bag to batch. Here's how I did it.

First I scoured the fabric in hot water and Synthropol to remove any finishes. Then I soaked the fabric in soda ash solution. I usually use an electric spinner to spin and recapture most of the soda ash solution but with this technique I wanted the fabric a bit wetter so I squeezes the pieces of cloth out by hand. I laid the fabric out on the table on the bin bag which is opened full length.

As you can see I added one skein of #3 and #10 crochet thread and a skein of this odd unbleached weird thread a friend gave me as part of a challenge. It was kind of water resistant and dyed badly. Next I gathered up the fabric into channels. This helps the dye stay in lines and gives the fabric the striped appearance. I squirted the first color along the folds.

This was purple

This was olive

After I felt I had enough dye on the fabric, I dropped the skeins of yarn onto the fabric and pressed it down to saturate it in dye. This turned out to be not such a great idea. I should of had the thread under the fabric which is the way I usually do it. I also pressed the fabric down flat so my finished pieces were not as linear or striped as I would have hoped.

The red I added to the blue to make purple came out in globs making these red specks. This was an old purple. Live and learn. The old fuchsia was so clotted that I threw it away and made fresh dye after this.

Here are some more process pictures.

When I was done with one piece I folded the bin bag over the fabric and folded the open ends up to lessen dripping.

I took another bin bag to hold the individual pieces and put them on the floor until I was ready to batch them.

When I had all four pieces dyed and wrapped I folded up the outer bag. It was starting to leak so I added a second outside bag then folded them up.

I took an "art" towel and put my heated rice bags on top to meet the proper temperature during the critical first hour. I used a second towel to keep the heat in.

I put these under my parents bed because their apartment is very warm and my house is cold. I wanted the "package" to stay flat. Under the bed was the safest, warmest place to batch for 24 hours.
The next afternoon I took the package out and lifted each piece of wrapped fabric out of the towels.

I washed each piece of fabric in ice cold water and left them to soak in ice water until I was ready to wash them.

I put the thread into a separate container of ice water to make it easier to transfer them into my lingerie bag for the wash and dry.

I put them in a quick hot wash for 30 minutes with Synthropol and 2 Color Catchers. If you don't have Synthropol. Use a soap without bleach or optical brighteners.

I dried the thread skeins in the lingerie bag. When the fabric is dried, I spray with water and steam press. Here are the fabrics whole and with a close up picture.

This piece was red, purple and intense blue

This is intense blue and olive and green

This is navy, turquoise and olive

And my Fave, purple and olive

This is the thread just out of the dryer not yet dry. I open the skeins and hang them to dry. Tomorrow I will re-twist them back into skeins and store them for future projects.

This is an old piece a few years old. Wouldn't this make a wonderful sunset?

And this was dyed especially for sky. I folded fabric in half before gathering to get a perfect "reflection" of sky on water (not shown) and I used it in a quilt of a Vernal pond.

I hope this gives you ideas of how to create some wonderfully stripped fabric. If you can just gather and not press the ridges down, you're outcome will be better. Using the Styrofoam boards helps too.

I hope you have a wonderful time experimenting with tray dyeing.

Testing done / Making plans

2012-02-16T08:23:00.000-05:00

I'm glad I tested the dyes to verify their strength. Here is the swatch.
Before

After

From this test I can see I have at LEAST 3 good primaries: The larger Intense Blue, both Sun Yellow and Golden Yellow, Fuchsia and Turquoise. The black is weak but I have a bit of "new" black from the shiori dyeing bottles which I didn't test since they are rather new. I will think up some color combinations and do at least 4 tray dyes and document it. They will be finished batching tomorrow. I usually post at 5am but tomorrow I will have to wash, dry and iron the batched fabric after I get home about 10am. See you then...

America's Test Kitchen

2012-02-15T12:21:00.004-05:00

subtitled: Testing in Beth's "wet studio"

I was preparing to do the tray dyeing tutorial and I had this box of dissolved dyes from I can't actually remember when so I decided to do a "test batch". I lined up all the bottles and a piece of pre-treated fabric. I wrote the name of the color on the fabric with a permanent marker

Can you tell I love crows and ravens?

Then I opened the cap and tipped the bottle onto my gloved finger tip.

OK. So I wasn't very neat. Then I covered the piece of fabric in the plastic bag and topped it with a heated rice bag. Did I mention I love my rice bags. Think I'll add that Tutorial to the top of the home page too.

Results tomorrow, then I can get on with the tray dyeing.

Just a quick note

2012-02-14T10:53:00.001-05:00

I wanted to let you know the Book Cover tutorial is now easily located on this own page/tab at the top of the homepage.
My wonderful brother ERIC is visiting this week to help my parents celebrate their 69th wedding anniversary. It is always a treat to have him in the house. He works for U.S.Customs and Border Patrol as a writer. He is VERY talented. More later...

Book cover - a great gift

2012-02-13T06:02:00.002-05:00

Friday Meagan came over and we cut the stretcher frame for our "water" piece. The show opens in March. We also just found out or mentor/student relationship involves giving a presentation at a middle or high school or a public venue like a library. That should be fun. Anyway, cutting the frame took about 5 minutes and I am still shibori dyeing, and have been all week, trying to get just the right look for the bottom most 3 squares. I think I have finally got it. Meagan and I watched a show on DMTV about sketching. It was about still lifes. I've set one up and will continue to work on my skills. Then we still had time so I thought we might do a small piece of "stitch and flip" sewing like the QAYG quilt (see tutorial tab above). I bought a new reference book and thought why not make a book cover. Of course I decided this half way through so the photos are kind of funny and many were an after thought.

How to make the best book cover EVER

I started with an odd bit of polyester (cheap) felt around the size of a book cover. Then I used the QAYG assembly technique for covering the felt with fabric scraps. You can also use the top tabs on my homepage to locate this tutorial. I did not take a picture of the finished piece before cutting so I patched together this picture

Then I used the book itself to mark the COVER to the correct size. This should be done on the wrong (felt) side not the right side like in this picture. Ask me how I know...

After the felt is covered with cloth bits, it is time quilt. You can quilt in channels, echo quilting or free motion quilting but the cover will look better if quilted so do something. I decided to free motion with Madeirs metallic threads.
In the process

I use the cut off the fingers from rubber washing up gloves for traction on the fabric. I have tried everything. I have a drawer full of every kind of glove out there. I tried rubber jar opens - not bad. These fingers don't get in my way at all and I still have my thumb and first finger naked to pinch or grab. Works for me!!

Finished quilting

Since I failed to document this in pictures, I went back and "posed" some pictures. DO NOT get these pictures confused with making the black lining. I used black because it was easy to see the marks.
So now, on your finished COVER, you will mark the size of your book like this:

Lay your book on the COVER which is wrong side up and mark around the top, right side and bottom.

Then carefully stand the book up without moving it and mark the center section. This is important. Then lay the book on the other side and finish marking the COVER which is WRONG side up

It will look like this (above) with the marks on the wrong side of the COVER

Below are the marks on a piece of black so you can see them more easily

Also in this picture is a "Sewline" chalk marker from Japan. Expensive, yes, but so worth the money. The chalk which is actually some sort of ceramic I think also comes in colors. I have found this chalk pencil invaluable and well worth the high price. The marks are easily erased when you are done.

Now here is the part that makes this the BEST BOOK COVER EVER

Place the COVER facing up on your table. Take a piece of fabric for the lining on top and cut it the same height but about 5" wider. A good gauge is the width of the spine plus 4". In the picture below I am pretending this is one piece of fabric even though it is cut in three sections. The height is the same and it is about 5" wider than the cover.

Then cut the single piece of liner (black in the picture) into 3 sections. Take the right and left sections and make a small hem on one side. These hems will run along the spine. This will be clear in the photo below. Lay the hemmed side on the COVER right sides together (cover facing up and hemmed sides face down on the cover like this:

Now this can be the tricky part. Take the third piece of fabric with 4 raw edges and lay it over the center of the book. It goes on top of the side sections.

Pin enough so this all stays together while you sew it. Sew all around all four sides - YES, all FOUR sides.

As you approach the corners stop about 2 stitches short and rotate 45 degrees and sew the corners on an angle. Remember I chalked the outline on the wrong side but the photo is a good one to see the angled stitch

Sewn all the way around all 4 sides and if I'd marked the felt side this would be more centered.

Clip to about a scant 1/4"

Now comes the turning which will be easier to understand through photos.

With the lining facing up, lift the center section.

Reach inside the piece and grab the side seam. My hand is grabbing the right side seam. Turn the piece inside out. See below

You can easily see the right and left flaps into which you will slide the front and back book covers. Next poke out the corner (do not use pointy scissors-smile) and roll the edges and press (iron).

This book cover fits the book so tightly that I open the book all the way with the two covers touching each other to slip inside the cover.

I think (my opinion) that this is the best book cover ever for these reasons.

the inside of the cover is covered with cloth.

center opening of cover does not expose the wrong side of the cover and

cover fits the book perfectly snug

Please try at least ONE and then you will be hooked. This is the best book cover EVER and your friends and family will be amazed at your cleverness and artistic abilities (applause, applause) and everyone will be clamoring for you to make them their own cover. These make great journals for gifts.

Thank you my friends / Dank je mijn vrienden

2012-02-12T09:38:00.001-05:00

This was a wonderful week of celebrating with "old" friends and making a few new ones. This week has invigorated me and I have lots of ideas for new things. I mentioned a few Friday. Monday I am posting a book cover tutorial because I just happened to be making one (more about this Monday) and I thought why not !
I also have another idea that I will throw out. I don't know if it is possible but thought why not ask if anyone is interested. Curious???
See you Monday

The last winners and belated photos

2012-02-11T05:13:00.000-05:00

Today's winners are Nienke for the silk charmeuse or the surprise and the second winner of the two pieces of dyed cotton goes to Dotti.

There was so much interest in my dyed sport bras, I will post a picture later today (when the sun comes up). It's too dark to take pictures now (5am) so I'll add them to this post in about 3 hours so check back later.

Nienke, let me know if you want the silk or a surprise and include your email address. Both you and Dotti can email me using the email option under my profile.

Thank you to all my blogger readers for making this week mooi and so much fun for me. Next week I will have another tutorial for you to see.

Here are a few of my sports bras. I buy the 2 white, one pink 3/pack and I over-dye the pink one also.

The two on the bottom I did with the FIVE who started the FIRE blog. They were done with ice dyeing in the summer at Kathy Molatch's studio. What a fun day. I don't remember how I did the pink and blue ones but the blues/greens is a tray dye which I will do a tutorial on next week. It is a fabulous way to dye anything and it is especially effective because I can so easily add scrim, thread, burlap and even sports bras.

Hello my friends and the friday give away / Hallo mijn vrienden

2012-02-10T05:12:00.001-05:00

Today's random winner was Marjolijn. You can email me with your address and I will mail out the silk. Today is also silk but if you would prefer a surprise rather the silk, You can choose the silk charmeuse below OR a surprise package of quilting things. There will also be a second number for the green fabric I forgot from Wednesday.

I am over the moon. I have just found translate.goggle.com and I can now translate all the blogs I follow which are in Dutch only without a translate button. Most are in English and I find myself more embarrassed daily by all the followers who speak or write so nicely in English while I am ignorant of Dutch. I do speak German like a 2 year old but I lived there for over a year and it was enough to get by in the shops. I am hoping Dutch will be as easy as German was. This is my new goal!

I just deleted this huge blog post about a piece I made. Instead I'd like to talk about the future. In the coming weeks I will be creating a tutorial on what I refer to as "tray dyeing". I was just reading Joke's blog about snow dyeing and she was comparing her work to work by another person (I think. I am relying on translate). That made me remember that I wanted to do a post on tray dyeing. When I dye fabric, I throw in all sorts of things like thread, scrim, burlap and sports bras - yes, sport bras. I have quite a wonderful collection of them. That is another subject for another day. So the tray dyeing blog is coming soon. Very easy and not too messy.

I also want to tell you about a HUGE surprise on the Fire blog. We are having a guest blogger who just wrote a new book which is not even out yet. She will be blogging about a unique technique from her book and we will be giving away a copy of her book. My news is that I will also give away a copy of her book on my blog. I think this will be a do-not-miss event.

Today's give away is a really beautiful piece of silk charmeuse. Please leave a comment and thanks so much for helping me celebrate belatedly, my second anniversary. I dyed this in acid dyes in the microwave oven in 5 minutes. I LOVE acid dyes AND my "dye only" microwave oven. Maybe that is another tutorial blog post??

And also this green fabric that I forgot to put on the Wednesday blog. I don't know where my mind is. I will pick a second name for the green fabrics today. Although this looks like Mondays fabrics, they are different (and still sitting here!).

Dyeing thread and Thursdays give away

2012-02-09T06:56:00.001-05:00

I'm so glad I told you how I randomly pick people from the bowl because Dea won again. I decided to choose another number since she won yesterday too. Gill was the second name picked. I emailed Gil who had a choice of fabric or threads (not shown) and threads were chosen so Dea will get the book and Gill threads. The winner of today's silk will be picked tomorrow. Please leave a comment. More silk for Fridays give away too.

I received an email from one of the author/bloggers from And then we set it on fire who asked some interesting questions. One was where did I get the thread that I used for dyeing. I bought it at Walmart. Walmart is not my store of choice but they do have a few weird items that I have found handy.
This thread is for crocheting dollies and bedspreads - not my thing. It is called Aunt Lydia's crochet cotton. It is mercerized - a BIG bonus because mercerized cotton REALLY takes color well. The Walmart link is to the cotton thread. First of all the cotton thread comes in a few different sizes. I use #3 which a thicker pearl cotton weight.

The thread on the left is #10 and the right is #3. The thinner thread is relatively easy to get through the eye of a needle and the #3 pearl cotton is a bit more of a chore. They each make a statement on fabric. This is how I make my skeins.
I found this HUGE skein of cotton on sale somewhere for about $9.00 so I grabbed it. I usually buy skeins about the size of an orange. They are easier to handle.

I cut a piece of foam board from the Dollar store 18" long. As you can see, mine has seen better days.

Next I put the big ball in a container. With the smaller balls, I can drop them in a cardboard box which I keep at my feet. This big ball needed a heavier container. I might use a heavy plastic bin. Today I made do with this arrangement.

I pulled out some thread and lined up the end of the thread with the end of the foam board leaving a tail about 4" long.

Then I wrapped the thread around and around the foam board 20 times giving me 20 yards.

This is the end of the wrapping. I cut another tail the same length so I could tie them off.

I slid one end under the threads

and tied a knot.

Next I slip the thread off the foam board.

Now I needed help with the pictures since I had to use 2 hands. I slipped my fingers into the end loops and started to twist my fingers in opposite directions.

I continued to twist until it was tight on my finger tips.

Then I carefully slipped one end off one finger and pushed it into the loop from the other finger.

Then guided the skein into a twist using the lower hand.

I can work up these white cotton skeins at night while watching TV and I keep them in bags in my dyeing cabinet so that I don't forget to add them when dyeing.

You can really see the difference in the sizes of the #3 on right and the #10 on the left.

This thread is so yummy when dyed you can easily get addicted.

Don't forget to leave a comment for the silk below

Plus I popped another small piece of green haboti into the pile to go with these two.

My randon selector and Wednesday's give aways

2012-02-08T04:36:00.000-05:00

Tuesday's Winner is Dea. Email me using my email address in my profile with your address.

This is my brilliant random selector. I had this brainstorm as I was waking up that if I gave each comment a number that corresponded to the order in which the comment was left, then I could simply put numbers on slips of paper and pick a number (or 2) and the corresponding commenter would be the winner. This way there are no favorites, it doesn't matter in which order you left your comment and it would be truly random.
It worked. I wrote the numbers on slips, stirred them with my college pliers (left over from 37 years in dentistry), and plucked the two Monday winners from the bowl.

Yes, there are 11 slips of paper and only 8 comments that you see. But wait... Look at Friday's preview and you will find the three people jumped the gun and left their comments on Friday. I did include them and it is totally fair because no one got preferential treatment. All 11 comments went in the "Monday bowl"
So far today (I am writing this blog on Tuesday) I have 4 comments. I have 2 thoughts I wanted to share with you that have nothing to do with art quilting.
The first is my questioning whether people who give away things really give them out randomly or do they look for a friend or a "cute" comment. I wanted to be very fair and thought the random number bowl was a great idea.
The second thing I wanted to discuss was "advertising" this give away on my 2 favorite yahoo groups. I would have tons of comments from people who wanted the prizes. But then I thought, #1, what are my motives. I kind of like the way my blog works now where people who like to see what I am doing read it and tell their friends and #2, why create a huge pool of comments which will lessen the chance of people who actually do read my blog from winning. So I didn't blanket the internet with ads for my give away.
I have come to "know" so many of you readers and commenters and think of you as friends in a way - my internet art friends. You are the people I want to celebrate my anniversary with. As you might have noticed , I have quite a few "friends" from The Netherlands. Who knows. I might make a trip one day and go on a blog tour of The Netherlands.

Don't forget to leave a comment today whether you have won or not this week. Keep entering all week.
I'll be back tomorrow with something related to art quilts....

Using hand dyed thread (neatly)and Tuesday's give away

2012-02-07T04:52:00.003-05:00

Mondays winners are Ineke: book and Kit: fabric. Email me using the email option on my "Profile" page with your addresses. And enter again today!!

I watch DMTV featuring Linda and Laura Kemshall. In one of the episodes, Laura had a demonstration on making skeins of embroidery thread and dyeing it to suit. Now whenever I dye something I make sure I include some thread and usually scrim (cheesecloth) and burlap too.
The big question comes into play when I think of using this skein of thread. How do you use the skein without getting it all knotted up? This is what Laura shared:

Take the looped ends of the skein

and pull one loop from the other.

Un-twist (open up) the skein

At the knot that ties the ends together

Re-tie the knot making it very tight

The new tighter knot is on the left of the original knot.

Then you cut the circle of dyed thread just below the knot leaving an 18" "pony tail" of thread. This is the perfect length for sewing as well.

Tease out one thread

Then when finished with the skein, fold in half and tie a loose overhand knot for storage

I keep all my threads in a double sided box that my friend Rosalita found at a yard sale.

Definitely DON'T forget to leave a comment for the 10 free skeins of my hand dyed thread. They are real beauties.

Meagan on Monday and the great anniversary give away day one.

2012-02-06T05:44:00.000-05:00

Monday Some of you may recognize this book as the technique of the month from the And then we set it on fire blog. I think this would be great for someone living in a country where this book is NOT available. If you cannot get this book in your country, please leave a comment in the comment box on Monday. I will ship to any country.

If you CAN get this book where you live, please leave a comment and you may win this hand dyed fabric. They are full half yards (folded in half). The fabric on the right is 40"X18"

Now about Meagan.

I wrote a bit about her in this blog and how we met. We have been meeting at least once a week and working on a collaborative piece for an exhibit at Waterfall Arts the end of February. The theme for all the participants is Water (actually H20). If I am not mistaken, there are all sorts of artists participating in collaboration with young people who are assigned to them. I think this includes visual, and performance arts as well. At any rate, Meagan and I decided to do a large piece of shibori dyed cotton which we are calling, "Coastal Pollution". We tried a technique which didn't get us the result we were looking for so we thought of shibori which is very watery looking. This was our operating sketch.

We tried 2 blues and black but again did get the look we wanted so we stuck with one blue (navy) and black and did achieve the desired results.

This is the pole wrapped shibori with dye and covered with a plastic bag. This was a very quick 30 minute dye with heated rice bags.

This is the pole with fabric at both ends and the rice bags on top then covered with a towel below

And below soaking in ice water after wash out. I will wash all the pieces together when we are done.

Friday we got together and laid out our squares on the floor which I trimmed to 12.5" squares with a template. Then I stitched them togther. I cut backing and batting but I am unsure if I will stretch this as a whole piece of stretch each component onto the frame. This week I buy the lumber to make the stretcher which will be 45" X 45" but hung on point.

This is how far we have come with the piece hanging over the edges f my portable design wall.

Seeing it on the wall, I think I need to make another black piece for the bottom. The folds were not on the bias and the marks look very out of place. Oh well, I still have 3 weeks...

See you tomorrow for the Tuesday Big Giveaway. Don't forget to leave your comments.

5 Day Giveaway (Preview)

2012-02-03T05:47:00.001-05:00

To celebrate my second year blogging, I decided to give away a treat every day for five days. This will start Monday. I want every one to see what is up for grabs and give you a chance to alert all your best friends so they can throw their comment in the ring. So here are treats.

Monday we start with a book. Some of you may recognize this book as the technique of the month from the And then we set it on fire blog. I think this would be great for someone living in a country where this book is NOT available. If you cannot get this book in your country, please leave a comment in the comment box on Monday. I will ship to any country.

Tuesday I am giving away 10 skeins of hand dyed embroidery (pearl cotton) threads some are #8 and one is #3. Not being a thread person I'm not sure what that stands for but #8 is finer. The purple on the right is #3.. There is subtle variations in the colors and some are two colors blended. Anyone can leave a comment. The more the merrier. Each skein is approximately 10 yards long. On Tuesday I will also include a brief tutorial on how to handle, use and neatly store a 10 yard long skein of thread. Yes, there is a skill to it!

Wednesday is another (and last) book day. This is a wonderful book which covers many techniques. It is called "The Quilting Arts Book" and it can be seen using the link. On this site you can "seeing inside" and learn about all the wonderful techniques covered. One of the first articles features Linda and Laura Kemshall, my personal heroes. Laura demonstrated how to use and care for skeins of hand dyed thread (Tuesday's tutorial) on her show, DMTV. If you can't get this book in your country, leave that info in the comment box

Thursday we start with the fabric. I have a 36" X 45" piece of chartreuse shibori dyed silk haboti. You can use this in a quilt or use it whole as a scarf after hemming. It is accompanied by a 15" X 20" piece of hand dye painted silk. I think it is heavy weight silk haboti. It co-ordinates nicely with the shibori piece and they will go together to anyone picked who leaves a comment.

Friday will feature a 34" X 45" piece of silk Charmeuse. For you who may not know, silk charmeuse is satin on one side and crepe on the other. Although the colors are identical on both sides the appearance is quite different. This is the entire piece.

Above is the crepe side and the figures are crisp and very sharply defined.

Above is the same section on the satin side and it appears much softer.

Well, I hope I have whetted your appetite for a fun week of giveaways. I will also be including some posts to amuse and hopefully inform you while you are leaving comments. Each day I will announce the winner from the previous day's giveaway. See you Monday!

p.s. I am adding some hand dyed fabric to the "Book" days for those who CAN get the books so check the blog on Monday and Wednesday for additional goodies.

A Needed Accessory

2012-02-01T12:21:00.002-05:00

RICE BAGS. Yes, these come in so handy for batching MX dyes in cold weather. They are also dead easy to make. I cut a piece of plain muslin 13" long (47mm) from a bolt. This strip I cut along the fold giving me 2 pieces 13 X 22.

I folded it along the 22" side making a square about 13 X 12. I marked three lines dividing the fabric into four sections with the fold at the bottom.

I stitched along the sides and lines giving me four long pockets with the openings at the top. I used a funnel and cup and poured dry rice into each pocket filling them about 3/4 full and pinned them shut.

I sewed them closed and now I have 2 rice bags to keep my fabric warm while batching. Just pop the bags into the microwave for 3 minutes on high and they will stay warm for quite a while. While batching I cover the fabric and bags with a towel to keep the heat inside.

If you would like to, you can make some rice bags 6" X 22" and wrap them around your neck or use these bags to warm your feet. They deliver moist heat. You can make them in pretty fabric and give them as gifts too.

How easy is this?

2012-01-31T09:15:00.000-05:00

I decided to write a brief post about why deconstructed screen printing is easy and FAST to do and how it can be done any time of the year. Here is goes:

The screens are easy to store out of the way. I store mine upright and slide them anywhere I can find room. This is in my kitchen also known as my wet studio. See the screens?
Setting up screens takes almost no room and is not messy. I can do this on a table top with plastic the a drop cloth.

The wet screens can be stacked with spacer until dry in a small space. In this picture I hadn't put the spacers in yet. My spacers are saved jar lids.

The screens dry over night (usually) and can be kept in their dry state until ready to use for months. Go ahead and store them upright when dry til you have time to use them.
They are self perpetuating which means they keep themselves going. This is what I mean by that.
I make 3 quarts (3000ml) of print paste - fast and easy. This will probably last a year.
I take a small plastic dish with a lid and mix 1/2 cup (250ml) print paste with 1 teaspoon of MX dye powder. I do the primary colors and black. That's just 4 small dishes in the refrigerator. This too will last a long time. I will use it before it goes bad - months.
Once I "deconstruct" the screens, I will have 6 empty screens that I have washed. They dry quickly - the screen in minutes and the frames can be wiped dry. I can start over again before the work area has been cleaned up by using the left over dye paste to "re-set" the screens for another day. The dye paste also can be stored for months.
The batched cloth can be kept warm even in winter with rice bags. These are cloth bags filled with rice which can be heated in the microwave oven and laid on the fabric. Cover with a towel.
MOST of the batching occurs in the first hour between the temps of 70-110 degrees Fahrenheit I am guessing that is 20-30 Celsius.
The fabric can be folded in plastic and put on a tray and stored out of the way until batching is complete - about 24 hours.

This is the most efficient way to "color" fabric. It is all contained in plastic, small and doesn't spill. Low water immersion takes up lots of room with tubs and containers and can spill. It is also heavy to clumsy to move.
The time involved is very small for 1. setting up the screens (day 1), 2. deconstructing the screens, 3.re-setting the screens with more dye. (day 2) , and 4. washing out the fabric. day3. It just keeps on going - self perpetuating. This is why I LOVE it plus I really love the results. Quick and rewarding. Now I am NOT saying everyone "should" do it for these reasons but concerns about time and space really aren't part of the picture.

I hope this is an encouragement. This technique is just too much fun to miss.

Two Announcements

2012-01-30T09:32:00.000-05:00

The small announcement is that I moved my tutorials to separate page/tabs at the top of the homepage. Much easier to find!

The second announcement is that I missed my two year blog anniversary. I will be having belated give-a-ways of books, hand dyed embroidery thread and some of my yummy fabric.
Stay tuned.

The Big Reveal and lessons learned

2012-01-24T16:15:00.001-05:00

Here is the entire piece batched, washed and ironed

Some of these are close-up and some are pictures of two prints. I only made four prints of each screen. Sometimes you can make more but I'd rather have mine rich in color than numerous.

This is a closeup of the drips. The thick drips of dried dye act as a resist but as they break down (deconstruct) they leave a halo or outline of their color. Can you see the navy outlines along the sides of these drips?

On the block below you can see a double image or ghost image. This happened ( many times) because I lifted he screen after the first pull, thought the image too weak so I lowered the screen back into place but it was just enough off to give the double image or ghost look.

On the screens above, you can see the navy color around the drops or circles on both screens

These last two were just fill-ins. I had run out of dye on the screens and just filled in the space with color. If I hadn't, I would have large blocks of white. This way I used some of the left over dye, covered the white and have something I can add more layers to with stamps, more dyeing or fabric paints.

This was a very sad pale square although the drips and dots are kind of cute. A good first layer. The objects on the left are color catchers which grab loose dye molecules in the washing machine to prevent dye back or dye re-depositing on the fabric

Here are some fabulous deconstructed screen prints with those sad white blank spots. See the difference when you fill them in? Also with all the white filled in, 4 prints can read as one long piece of fabric.
.

In addition to filling the white spots or areas of resist with dye I also have been very diligent to at least butt and sometimes overlaps screens slightly so that multiple prints read as one piece of fabric like the results from today.

I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial as much as I did creating it. If you have any questions or need a clearer more precise description, please leave a comment. You can also email me at the email address in my profile.

Cheers.

Deconstruction Part 2

2012-01-24T07:54:00.001-05:00

I started out today with 6 dried screens. I set up 2 tables side by side. The tables are 30" X 6' so the 4' X 8' table hangs one foot off each end and is wider than the two tables together.

Tables stored behind door

Set up with not much moving around room

With print table on top.

With opened bin bags covering table. I found this was the easiest way to fold up the fabric to batch which you will see at the end of the printing session.

Table with pre-treated fabric tightly T-pinned to the table

I was almost out of print paste so I made 2 quarts (2000ml). That's 2 T.Thick SH /1 quart (1000ml) water.

Thick SH in 1 lb. bag with blender

I keep the lid on at all times to keep mold spores out. Print paste lasts a long time (over 6 months) but when it goes bad there is no question. It smells like rotting seaweed. REFRIGERATE IT.

The dark heavy deposits of dye will act as a resist. The lighter and see through area will be where the color melts (deconstructs) easiest and is then deposited on the cloth. As the screen is pulled over and over, more dye dissolves leaving larger areas with dye on the cloth and smaller areas of resist. That is due to the break down of the dried dye and it's deposition on the fabric.

Initial wetting with a thick layer of clear print paste

First few pulls. Lots of white because not much dye has broken down yet. From this picture you can really start to understand how the thickest dye that hasn't dissolved (deconstructed) yet acts as a resist.

After 4 pulls (prints)
One of the cool things that I experiemented with was to make 4 prints, then turn the screen up-side-down and print again over the four prints. If you look at the fabric with 2 prints above, that would mean I would turn the screen so that the red part of the screen was now on top and the blue on the bottom. This was my attempt to get rid of all the white.

These are the four blocks above with one print and one reverse print. Still lots of white but you can see red and blue all over. One of the things I love about this type of surface design is the wonderful figuring on the cloth. I will point out more after the fabric is batched and washed.

. The next thing I did was to take the squeegee with clear print paste and pass it over the print. It picked up enough color to tint the white spots.

I didn't want to mix the red screen and yellow screens so I used clear print paste directly on the squeegee without a screen and as you can see the white spots are now tinted without losing the definition. This is the power of the first strike. Once those catcher's mitts have balls in them they have a powerful bond. If you are relatively gentle with the clear print paste, you can add tint to the white without disturbing the original prints. This was Judith's idea. My idea was to place a used screen on the print and just pull tinted print paste on the small area that was white. This also worked and was a bit faster. It also had the safety of having the screen between the printed fabric and the squeegee preventing any smears.

This another screen in process

I forgot to get a picture of all the fabric covered. You will see it tomorrow after batching. This picture is after I tore off the last 2 feet of unprinted fabric which I will save for another time I need pretreated fabric. I took that last bin bag and placed it over the end of the fabric then folded it so that all wet sections were touching plastic. Four big folds below.

Folded neatly into a small packet to fit on my tray. I leave the tray on the top shelve of my parents bookcase. They live in an apartment off my kitchen. My house is 60 degrees which is too cold to batch. There apartment (especially near the ceiling) is about 80 degrees. That is perfect for batching. Another method if you don't have parents conveniently located off your kitchen is to use rice bags heated in the microwave oven, placed on plastic covered fabric and covered with a towel. It works beautifully.

See you tomorrow for the finished fabric and a comparison with some deconstructed pieces I did before filling in the white spots.

Deconstructed Screen Printing Tutorial

2012-01-22T17:14:00.001-05:00

First let me tell you that I am NO where near an expert justa beginner learning about surface design. I basically only “think” I know whatthe experts in the field are trying to explain to me. I DO know how variousexperiments I have tried have worked and I am willing to share them. I willstart in the beginning with what I THINK I know. I will also include littleside bits of info that I think are relevant marked with an asterisk(*) I willalso try to answer all question in the comment box so everyone can see the answers (yeah, Iwas wondering that myself).

What exactly does deconstructed screen printing mean? To me, it means that Ihave constructed a screen with dyes applied in a textual way which I haveallowed to dry onto the screen. Then I used a wetting agent to deconstruct thework (in dried dye) that I made, depositing the reconstituted dyes onto a substrate,which in this tutorial is cotton*.

* you can use any plant basedfabric. You can also use silk that has NOT been prepared in advance with sodaash by adding soda ash to the print paste – see below. Silk does not like soda ash so limit exposure to it by using it in the print paste not a soak.

First I want to talk about “printpaste”. Print paste is agar from seaweed which is also used in processed food and totally non-toxic. This is a link to thedirections from the company that I buy my supplies from. MY directions are abit different. I call them (my shortcuts) the quick and dirty approach. I useonly THICH SH. You get more bang for your buck. If you want regular viscosityprint paste simply use less THICK SH.

My directions for print paste:
In a kitchen blender that you use ONLY for your art materials mix 2 tablespoons of THICK SH with one quart of cool/coldwater. I use no other chemicals just water.

*My water is from a deep aquifer and is filteredthrough a very expensive water filter which removes all chemicals and minerals.Use a Brita if you don’t have a water filter.

Blend on high speed. Look for aused blender at Goodwill or any second hand shop. You’ll thank me. Trust mewhen I tell you this is the BEST way to mix it.

Second best way is with a kitchen whisk.
It takes about an hour for the print paste to “set-up”.
Print paste will last longer than the time it will take you to use it up (over 6 months in the refrigerator). ALSO thickened dye will last a LONG time. I've used mine months later. Keep refrigerated.

A few ways to use printpaste.

Use it to mix with powdered MX dye to create thickened dye.
Use it “as is” to wet a constructed screen on cotton that has been pre-soaked in soda ash.
Use it mixed with soda ash (powdered) to deconstruct a screen onto cotton* that has NOT been prepared with soda ash ahead of time.
I will also discuss another use for print paste later which is a discovery/experiment done by Judith.

Soda Ash* – three ways

Make a gallon of soda ash (one gallon of filtered water with one cup of soda ash). I use no other chemicals because my water is very soft (mineral free). If you have hard water you might want to add Calgon water softener per instruction on container.
Print paste with soda ash added is 1 cup of print paste with one Tablespoon of soda ash. Don’t ever skimp on the soda ash*.
Preparing the cloth ahead of time. Soak your fabric in a gallon of soda ash/water 5 minutes and either wring out or spin. A spinner will help you recover MUCH more of the soda ash water and helps your fabric line dry faster. DO NOT ever put soda soaked fabric in a dryer – LINE DRY. Fold when dry and keep where air circulates (not a plastic bag)

*Picture this. Soda ash is the catcher’s mitt anddye molecules are the balls. Don’t let those expensive dye molecules fly aroundwithout a bunch of catcher’s mitts to grab them. Err on the side of caution.Soda ash is cheap.

My Spinner

Setting up/Constructing your screens

I am VERY fortunate and have a large space in my kitchen toset up my printing table which is 4’ X 8’. Yes, it is a ½ sheet of plywoodcovered with carpet foam (stiff) and synthetic felt. I cover the entire thingwith an ugly old flannel sheet which is absorbent and washable. I am mentioningthis because I set up about 6 screens to “do” a 45” wide piece of cotton 8 feetlong. You will need to arrange a spot to deconstruct. You might want to get asheet of ½” plywood 2’ X 4’ and cover with batting and muslin like I made hereto be my ironing surface. This is very handy because being 48” wide gives meroom for a 45” wide piece of fabric. Just a suggestion. However you DO need aprinting surface. Prepare as many screens as you think you can handle.

Making the thickened dyes: My thickened dye is dark and I like itthat way. Try it my way first. There is nothing as disappointing as “light” pastelprints. If you are afraid the dye is too dark you can add the dye to some clear print paste right in the well before you print. This is an example of the flexibility of dark dyes.

Recipe: 1 cup print paste with one teaspoon of dyepowder.(use a mask whenhandling dye powder)

*An added note. I try to use just enough and not too muchdye to construct the screens. If you do use too much dye, make sure to get allthe remaining dye out of wells or the dye will drip onto the screens belowwhile drying. Drops and spots of dye can add interest to prints but know thatthey will act as resists until they start to break down and become interesting.I will try to point this out later on when we look at actual prints. Remember,there are NO mistakes, just interesting lessons.

outside/bottom of screen - faces fabric

Inside of screen - where you place and squeegee the dye

Something I bought to take to my first art quilting class with Pamela Allen, a life changing experience.

It was a padded ironing board on one side and a cutting mat on the other. Very convenient.

I slip it inside a bin bag and presto, it becomes a padded surface for prepping my screens

Place somewhat flat objects between the drop cloth and the face (bottom) of the screen. You will be looking at the inside of the screen. Suggestions are wrinkled plastic sheeting, vegetable bags, stings or yarns, flowers, leaves, grasses. You want the objects relatively flat. This string turned out to be too hard and made blobs of dye on the screen. I was supposed to place a piece of soda soaked cotton on top of the plastic bin bag to catch dye. I remembered on screen #2.

Screen holding objects in place before first pull with dye

Place one, two or three colors in the well of your screen and pull the dye over the screen. When you feel you have the screen covered well with dye do a very firm pull leaving an even but NOT THICK layer of dye on the screen. First pull with these two colors. All I had in the refrigerator was a drop of orange, a drop of red, some yellow and some dark navy. Thought I'd use these up before making more.

Screen is covered without excess dye in screen

Marks made by dimensional objects

Lift screen off surface and remove any objects that are stuck to the screen.

As you can see I forgot to put down a piece of pre-treated fabric to catch the dye. I did add the cloth for the second to sixth screens.

The sun was a bit bright but you CAN see the variations in the amount of dye on the screen created by the objects.

Orange and blue #1 and #2 have big blobs

I removed the string because it was catching and holding too much dye. Screen below is my fave so far

You can really see the dimensionality of the dye on these two screens

"Printing" on the catch cloth, blotting the vegetable bag

I have now finished wiping all the utensils I used on the cloth as well as wiping up all spills. The clean up cloth usually turns out great. Below it is folded and in a bag for batching.

Place the screens on a flat surface and use jar lids as spacers between screens *(optional).
Allow to dry – very dry. I need to go get my spacers and these will be dry in the morning. Did I mention Maine is VERY dry? I stack them 3 X 3 and slide them under my counter which have legs.

Stay tuned for part 2 tomorrow.

The Crow part 3

2012-01-22T11:19:00.000-05:00

This was an experiment. I was looking for answers to many questions. Here are the lessons learned.

You CAN use water soluble stabilizer to draw a quilt design on. I drew the crow and stitched in detail all his feathers.
If you try to use a full sized sticker to mask out a quilted image the printed sticker image will be bigger than the quilted image. I had to continually cut the printed image and overlap it here and there to expose/cover because of the shrinkage due to the process of quilting
Heat setting acrylic artists paints does not hold up to machine washing with hot water. Note to self: Use fabric paints and heat set.
When using an image mask to cover/protect your painted image from dye, you can just as well use a piece of plain paper. The sticky didn't hold on paint
When masking the background in preparation to roll on the black paint, I missed three spots where the sticker had been cut but not replaced. I used white paint which was fine on a white background but was unaffected by the dye. See below. Note to self: Be very careful that you don't forget all parts of the mask.

You can see the area I forgot to mask between the wings and feet.

ANNOUNCEMENT

Starting tomorrow I am doing a step by step tutorial on deconstructed screen printing. This is a "Do Not Miss" because of all the experimentation Judith and I have been doing. Be there or be square!!

The Crow Part 2

2012-01-21T17:59:00.001-05:00

Still not finished but much more colorful. Today Judith came over for some deconstructed screen printing. I just can't stop myself and Judith came over for some of the fun too.
I used some of the thickened dye to color the background of the crow.

I used the sticker to "mask" off the quilted crow to protect it from the dye. Then I saturated the quilt that you see with a spray bottle of soda ash. The fabric was pretty wet when I started applying the thickened dye. I placed thickened dye dye and print paste on a piece of plexiglas. The dye was very dark so the print paste was used to lightened it.

I used a credit card to scrape the thickened dye onto the quilt front.

One of the things I like about using this technique is the minor combining of the colors along the lines where they meet. Maybe will will see this in Crow part 3 when we have the BIG REVEAL. That would be tomorrow.

Later I added some darker brown under the crow as shade. This was Judith's idea and a good one at that.

NOW for more deconstructed cotton. Please remember this is still wet. It is batching as I write this. Come back tomorrow for the fabric washed and line dried (still no dyer).

First I want to tell you about 2 things we did for the first time. One was my idea: placing the used screen when it was exhausted on the light or white blobs and screening color in just that one spot I think this is something you need to see in action to "get".

However, Judith's idea was a great stroke of genius. Her idea was to load the squeegee with clear clean print paste and draw it over a finished print to try to drag a bit of color over the white spots. I was afarid this would smear the print but it didn't. Don't ask me how BUT I can tell you here is a lot of power in the first "strike" of dye. We found it so.
Here are my wet prints which are now batching.

I took the cup of sludge (used print paste) and made a few prints. I think they were very effective. Two are below the sludge cup.

The Crow, Part 1

2012-01-20T14:32:00.000-05:00

Those who know me or have been in my house know I L-O-V-E crows. I don't mean a little either. I have always wanted to make a crow quilt but didn't really know how to create what was in my mind and heart. Well, I decided to try something really cool. This, by the way, was the experiment I alluded to in my post from about a week ago. This was how I proceeded with my experiment.

I took a sketch of a crow and laid a sheet of water soluble stabilizer over it. I found that a pencil would leave a permanent mark on the film. I pinned the film to a white quilt sandwich of cotton (top) felt, and non-woven polyester for the backing. I bought a 100 yard roll of this non-woven polyester thinking it was like lutrador. It isn't so I am thinking of all kinds of uses for it and a thin quilt backing is a great use.

I took a light grey thread (aurofil) in the shade closest to white. I wanted (in this experiment) for the thread to not be white but not dark or a color. I stitched along the pencil lines, clipped the stabilizer film close to the outer most stitches and gave it a warm bath. It is now drying. I also wanted to mention one of my BEST studio acquisitions - a spinner. When I soda soak fabric, I spin it in my spinner, recapturing the soda water to reuse. That alone paid for the spinner. My dryer died and the replacement won't be here til Wednesday. More about the incredible spinner in Part 2.

Because I used the spinner, this thick quilt sandwich was dry in about an hour. Then I ironed the piece. I used 2- 8.5"X11" peel off labels tapes together on the back (backing side) and printed the now 11"X17" sheet in my wide format printer.

I used an X-acto knife to cut neatly the image and stuck the negative part of the label to mask off the background leaving the crow exposed. Then I took a foam roller and rolled black paint on the crow. The quilting makes the "mountains" black and the "valleys" stay white.

Later I will use the positive part of the label to mask the crow and do something for a background. I may do some more quilting before I start the background coloring. Right now all I have is the rock the crow is standing on.

Burlap

2012-01-15T11:42:00.001-05:00

This is the piece of dyed burlap.I applied great blobs of thickened dye with a 3" paint brush hoping it would be absorbed into the burlap so that it would transfer to the pre-treated cotton on the opposite side. It was marginally successful. The burlap is a bit blobby with color but then again burlap was a vehicle and not an intended target.

There are lots of "bald spot" and none of the flow you get with space dyeing. These are previously space dyed burlap pieces that were the intended target of the dye. I love the gradation from one color to the next. I call this tray dyeing and I will have to do a tutorial on how I do it.

deconstructed results

2012-01-11T14:33:00.000-05:00

You can only get results like the piece below with a wipe-up rag

This is a pic and close-up of the fabric that was untreated cotton with the burlap dye side down , rolled with the brayer and sprayed with the soda ash water

And the last pic is of the pretreated cotton placed on the side of the burlap that didn't have the dye applied to it.

I forgot to take a picture of the burlap...well, next time.

It was all a dream

2012-01-10T17:20:00.000-05:00

I had 6 silk screens set up to deconstruct today, a personal play day. Last night I had a dream. In the dream I was applying thickened dyes to a large piece of burlap. This is the burlap from garden stores, not a fabric store. I then placed a piece of unprepared cotton on top of it. Then I took a piece of fabric that HAD been soda soaked and line dried the same size and put it on the backside of the burlap. Then I took a hard brayer and rolled it all over the fabric trying to get the burlap to leave an impression on both pieces of fabric.
About 8 o'clock this morning, I started to make this dream come true. I put plastic down on my two tables set side by side ( 2 at 30"X72" making it 60"X72"). I started to paint thickened dye onto the burlap with a paint brush.

Then I added the untreated cotton to the dye side of the burlap and the soda soaked fabric to the other (back) side of the burlap and rolled it with a brayer.

Then I flipped the "sandwich" so that the untreated side was facing up and started to spray soda ash water on the untreated side. In my dream both pieces of cotton got dye on them. In real life, not so much. The now wet cotton was starting to look interesting but the soda ash treated piece only had small spots of color. I worked harder but the soda treated dry piece of cotton just never really got much in the way of color. Then I thought, so who cares. Its still interesting and a good first layer of color.

Untreated but now wet side

Peeking at the treated side. Not as colorful but still nice figuring

The "sandwich"
I wrapped the sandwich in heavy plastic and batched.

I used a piece of cotton dampened with soda ash water to wipe the dye off the plastic. I also used 2 pieces of scrim to finish the "washing" of the table.

This clean-up rag (always the best thing made during the day) and the clean-up scrim tucked inside the sandwich packet. THEN.......
I did the 6 screens that I had set up. I LOVE, love, love deconstructed screen printing. I will add pics tomorrow when the fabrics are batched, washed and ironed. I get one good picture of a section while wet.

There were many great pulls but the camera wouldn't focus so now we'll all have to wait til tomorrow.

Interfacing Stencils

2012-01-08T14:14:00.001-05:00

Kind of wish I had taken a photo of these stencils all taped to the silk screens before I started but you know how it is with an experiment. First I took photos

I covered the images with a square of medium weight interafcing and marked the parts of the images with the darkest value. Then I used an x-acto knife to remove those darkest spots.

Then I cut out the image of the birds from the paper with an x-acto knife leaving a bird shaped hole in the paper. That would be my paper stencil which will only allow the dye to be deposited on my cloth in THAT bird shape. You can see the stain from the dye on the stencil. Get it?
The premise for this technique is on Jane Dunnewolds website under tours.
I would go there to read about applying the dye to the stencils.
OK, now I taped the paper stencil to the interfacing stencil and taped it all to the bottom of my silk screen with the interfacing in the middle of the sandwich. Here are my results washed out. First, I must say I always use color catchers to trap stray dye particles in the wash EXCEPT I forgot this time and had tons of dye-back. YUCK.

Not all screaming successes but not bad for a first try.

on a personal note

2012-01-08T10:00:00.000-05:00

Thought I would show a few pictures I took this morning

and my beloved dogs Aidan

and Niamh

This is a shot of my 96" X 96" traditional quilt that has serious personal meaning to me

and the reading nook at the top of the stairs near the quilt

I am planning another deconstructed dyeing session today as well as an experiment with free motion stitching. I REALLY hopes the experiment is a success. You will love to see the result.