27 January 2011

I have a little project going on

Do you remember my experiments with snow-resist dyeing? Well, here’s the next instalment in the series ‘Weird and Wonderful Ways to Dye your Fabric’.

It started innocently enough with low-water immersion dyeing. I used turquoise and lemon yellow Procion MX dyes that I poured over soda-soaked fabric crammed into an old ice-cream tub.

After rinsing out the fabric, I started thinking about texture. I went through different options and settled on this weird and wonderful technique that was described in the October/November 2010 issue of QAM (#47): oatmeal-resist dyeing. Who could resist that? It’s too weird to be left untried. So I set everything up and cooked myself some porridge. Now, the kind of oatmeal I have in my cupboard resulted in porridge that was a bit too mushy for my taste – I wanted more texture. So I looked through my cupboard again, didn’t find any muesli, but did find some pumpkin and sunflower seeds that were well past their best before-date. What better way to use them than to throw them into the pot? Then I spread a healthy helping of the goo onto the fabric, and now it needs to dry for a day or two before I add the dye. I’m very excited. Stay tuned and I’ll show you how it turned out. At the moment it smells a bit like dog food.


Jag har ett litet projekt på gång

Kanske du minns att jag prövade på att färga tyg med hjälp av snö för ett tag sedan? Här kommer del två i serien konstiga och roliga sätt att färga tyg på: reservage med havregrynsgröt. Jag fick tipset i nr 47 av QAM (oktober/november 2010). Jag började med att färga tyget i två fäger: citrongult och turkosblått. Jag var inte helt nöjd med resultatet så jag började fundera på hur jag skulle kunna få mera djup och intresse i det hela. Efter att ha funderat en stund valde jag att pröva havregrynsgröt som reservage. Det är helt enkelt för konstigt för att jag ska kunna låta bli. Så jag kokade en rejäl sats gröt och kletade ut det på tyget. Nu ska det torka en till två dagar och sedan är det dags för färgning. Jag återkommer till hur det blev i ett senare inlägg.

Procion MX dye bath - Färgbad med Procion MX reaktivfärger

 Cloth after washing - Tyget efter att ha tvättats
(the colours are not quite as pale as this - färgerna är inte fullt så här bleka)

 Oatmeal and seed-resist - Reservage med havregryn och frön

 I needed some colour therapy, so I also started this little wrist warmer project.
Jag behövde lite färgterapi, så jag började också med det här lilla pulsvärmarprojektet.

5 comments:

  1. The colors in your wrist warmers are gorgeous. I am waiting not so patiently for warmer weather so I can try out Lisa Kerpoe's resist methods. They look like so much fun. Have a wonderful week!

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  2. Thanks Jeannie! Those are my favourite colours. Thanks also for your earlier comment, which I haven't got round to replying to before now. It's been rather busy here, so I haven't really done any journaling for a while. I need to work it into my schedule in some clever way. A wonderful week to you too! :)

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  3. The colors in your wrist warmer are waaay yummier than that oatmeal concoction! Looking forward to seeing the results, though. By the way, when does someone use wrist warmers? I'm not familiar with them.

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  4. Super yummy and I am happy to see your creative flow bubbling

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  5. Yeah, it's bubbling alright, but Melly, you would have been appalled to see me in action tonight. You always advice us to work with our 'handedness' and be systematic and avoid messing about when working with dye. It was slightly (an understatement) chaotic tonight, as I was eager to continue with my little project, but didn't have enough work space. I think I managed to avoid any bigger disasters though.

    Cheryl: I use wrist warmers all the time, indoors and outdoors. My office is pretty cool and I'm always cold there, and the wristies (thanks for this word Aurely!) keep me warm. Outdoors they prevent that pesky Arctic wind from sneaking up on you through the sleeve openings.

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