Experiments

Last week I escaped the heat by retreating to the basement to do some dyeing.  I did some gradations--tried a new yellow that produced a rich, lovely gold that I will definitely use again, dyed some purple because I can never have enough purple and then I decided to play.  I tried some folding, tighter and more regular folding than I had done before and here are a couple of the results:

I don't really have anything to say here, although you can see that beautiful yellow in the above piece.  I just thought these two needed something to separate them.  

The next day I finally got around to trying out a flour resist.  Remember that flour paste you might have made as a child?  Well, this is very similar, except you smear it all over a piece of fabric, let it dry and crack, and then put dye on top of it.   Here is the result.  It is not the prettiest fabric I have ever dyed, but I am intrigued by the patterns created by the cracking and will definitely try it again to see if I can work up to something I have a little better control over.  I might even find a full description of the process somewhere, since I was making some of this up as I went along.

You can click on the image to get some more detail.  Part of the learning experience was realizing that leaving the flour resist in the basement over night while it was drying was not a good idea.  A very small critter--probably a field mouse--paid a visit and left tiny footprints in the flour goo and sampled it in several spots, memorialized by the bigger splotches of dye on the fabric.

While I was waiting for the resist to dry, I searched out my Setacolors, painted a half yard of fabric, put it out in the sun, and swirled it to see what would happen.  I brought it in after about an hour, ironed it to heat set it, and, as usual, magical things had happened.  It is definitely a favorite!

Now back to those quilts I must have finished by the end of August.  And if you are still reading, thanks for the company!