Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Dyeing Results

Here are the results from the dyeing I did on Monday. I think the second and third pieces from the top actually belong in the purple run in the next picture. In each group I did I put 1 piece of fabric in right away and then waited 15 minutes and put a second piece in. It's interesting how the different dyes are used up at different rates.
The gray piece on tip is a gray piece I over dyed with black. More interesting. It's also interesting how the pieces that have more red in them are more mottled than the bluer ones. I don't know if the colors would have come out differently if my dyes weren't so old but since they look fine, I'm not too worried about it. I just won't do anything that I'll want to duplicate down the road.


This piece and the next I put dye in the bag directly onto the fabric and then added the soda ash solution. I love doing this because you never know what the results will be but they are almost always really neat!!




I did some more dyeing today. Started out early in the morning since everything was already out. Couldn't go anywhere since we got at least a foot of snow last night. Now just have to wait to rinse everything out. I also tried Robbie Joy Eklow's method for direct dyeing but did it on a lot smaller scale. I should have taken a picture of my set up with everything draped in a plastic tarp. Still have some dye left over that I may use to over dye some pieces but had to quit for the day to get something done around the house!! What am I doing? Blogging - not housework!!!

Monday, February 25, 2008

Dyeing Day

This is what I have to show for today. I've been really wanting to get some dyeing done but it takes so long for me to get everything set up that I keep putting it off. I don't have a space that I can use just for dyeing so everytime I want to dye I have to pull everything out and set it up. I will rinse these out tomorrow after I get home from work. I've kept everything out so I can set up easily again on Wed. and dye some more. I have the bags sitting on top of the pellet stove so they would stay warm.

I'm really hoping these come out ok. My dyes are getting really old. I can't believe some of them have 1/02 written on them!!! I also want to see if I have some fabrics to over dye. I should be able to get more dyeing done this summer since we shouldn't have to worry about the water level in the well with all the snow we have!!!

Monday, February 18, 2008

Old and New

The kids had another snow day from school!! They are never going to get out for the summer the way things are going! Alex doesn't care but Kara is really getting frustrated. It was so icy last night that Gary couldn't make it home from work. He made it part way and ended up having to stay with some people we know. There were lots of accidents and I93 was closed. Glad I didn't have to go into work today!!!

I already showed this postcard in an earlier post but I really like it and decided I would finish it up and send it to Susan Lenz for the Cyber Fyber swap. She really has put alot of work into this swap and exhibit!!
This is my piece that I made from Anita's picture for our round robin. I had a lot of trouble figuring what I wanted to do for it. I finally decided to to do a sillouette (spelling?) of the mountain against a night sky. This picture came out lighter than the actual quilt. For the mountain, I fused stips of blue fabric to some muslin and then put black tulle over it. I made wrinkles in the tulle to make it look like shadows on the mountain. Once I had the mountain sewn onto the background, I added gold beads for stars. You can see a few of them on here.
I'm working on my quilt from Marilyn's picture. I used Shiva Paint Sticks to make the ridges for the shutters. I couldn't remember how long it had to sit before I could iron it so I let it sit 48 hours. I now have to figure out how I'm going to put this together.
Tomme Fent is doing the Grab Bag Challenge again this year. I'm really excited about it. I had a blast doing it the last time. Each person puts together a grab bag of fabrics and beads, yarns, found objects, etc. This must fit into one of the cardboard Priority Mail envelopes. We send this to Tomme and she swaps them out. We then have a couple of months to make a quilt using someone elses grab bag. You can add from your own things. Once the quilt is done, you send it back to Tomme and she sends it back to the owner of the grab bag. I've already sent my grab bag off to Tomme. Can't show a picture of it though since we don't know who's grab back we get and we don't know who has our grab bag until the quilts are done.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Pictures from Quilt Group

Well, a week after our meeting I'm finally getting pictures posted of our round robin. This first one is Lynn Elkinton's picture. It was taken up in Maine. She e-mailed us this picture and I already know what I want to do for it but have others I need to get done first.

This is what Lynn did from her photo. This was done on her embellisher. She did a really great job with it. Really makes me want to go out and get an embellisher. I can't though. I have enough I need to focus on and perfect right now as it is. Don't need to add something new!


This is Lynn Elkinton's piece from Carmen's picture. I don't have a copy of Carmen's picture yet. Again Lynn used her embellisher. Lots of texture to her pieces.
This is Carmen's piece from her own picture. Hers also has a lot of texture in it. She used all sorts of neat things in hers. A crumpled paper bag painted green, cloth wrapped pipe cleaners for the logs, 3-D leaves that she made. The red one was out of some silk paper she made at one of our meetings and alot of other neat stuff.

I did this backwards, this is Anita's quilt from her picture. Her picture is at the bottom. It came out really good.

This is Marilyn's piece from Anita's picture. She used all sorts of different kinds of fabric for this. I can't remember what they were though.
Here is Anita's picture. I think she said she took it in Nepal. I have her picture now and am stuck on what to do that isn't just a landscape. I'm still working on Marilyn's picture. The nice thing about having the pictures on my computer is I can pass on the original and still be able to work from them.
For Marilyn's I'm making a piece of paper fabric for the background, which is a building. I will add a door and windows with laundry hanging out. It took me a while to come up with the paper fabric for the building. I wanted to do something different for the building instead of just plain white fabric. Took the liberty of changing the building color from white to a brownish tan but it does look more interesting.
Better stop blogging and go and actually get some stuff done!!







Saturday, February 09, 2008

Cyber Fiber and Round Robin Quilt

My card from Susan Lenz for the Cyber Fyber swap and exhibition came today. I really like it!! Now to finish up mine to send to her!



This is my quilt I made from my photo for our quilt group project. It's a little dark since I forgot to take a picture during the day!! You can see the actual picture I used here
I will be posting more photos from our meeting soon. I forgot my camera so Lynn Elkinton took them and e-mailed them to me. There are so many creative ideas and quilts coming from this. It's really interesting to see all the different ways the photos are interpreted.

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

Cyber Fiber Trade

No pictures today. Just wanted to let everyone know about the Cyber Fiber Trade that Susan Lenz is organizing. I've already signed up and and will recieve postcard number 96. Now to get busy and make a postcard to send in exchange. What a great idea to organize a trade and exhibition like this!! Click on the above link to get more info about it.

Tuesday, February 05, 2008

Mixed Media Quilt

I was inspired by the "Go Green" article and challenge in the newest Quilting Arts Magazine and made this 5"x5" quiltlet. I call it Remnants of the Past. I made paper fabric from old patterns for the background. I colored it with some paint and when it was dry, I went over it with my ink pads in brown and tans to highlight some areas. I added old lace that had been cut off of some piece of clothing. This I also highlighted with the ink pads. The old buttons are from my button box. I added some cross stitches to hold the lace down on the button side but you can't see then very well in this picture. I used a piece of old linen from a stained and torn dresser scarf for the back. The binding is an old paper tape measure. The tape measure was folded in half down the length and sewn together. I was able to take the stitching out and open it up and use it for the binding.
I even have a square frame that I picked up a long time ago at a yard sale or second hand shop that would work perfectly with it. I'm always keeping my eyes open for frames at second hand shops or yardsales. I have found some really neat ones this way.