ON THE ROAD - TUESDAY

JUST LINES SKETCH

THE ATHENIAN

LUNA PARK FOR BREAKFAST

IT'S A JUNGLE OUT THERE

Because I had a neckache/headache for the last few days and didn't feel like making 'art', I picked this simple little project to make instead.

I took the 'jungle' fabric and cut it into squares then used an assortment of solids to make the sashings. 

It took very little time or effort.  It's still just a top, not a quilt yet, but it's on it's way.

If you know some kid that needs or wants a little quilt let me know.  This one needs a home, and that will give me a reason to finish it.

YELLOW WEEDS FROM PARK

I was bad.  I picked these yellow flowers from a local park.  I know it's not a good idea to pick flowers that are there for everyone's enjoyment, but, it is late fall and they won't be lasting too much longer, and, I only picked a few flowers from each plant (to minimize their absence).

And, I was bad, because I used these plants and I have no idea what they are!  I should make some attempt to figure out their name.  I've seen them around different areas, like a weed.  The plants grow to about 30" high, and are about 24" across a clump.  I didn't notice until I started to pick them that they have a very sticky 'sap' on them.  It's on the flower petals and the receptacle.  I picked the whole flower, and then when I got home, I separated the yellow petals from the green receptacles.

I made up three dye baths.  One for the green and yellowish receptacles, one for the yellow petals and another using onion skin from a yellow onion.  I left the fabrics in the dye baths for about three days.

Here are the results:

Left, the weed's receptacles, middle is the yellow petals, and right is the yellow onion skins.

I really like the unexpected variations of color from the receptacles.

BLACKBERRY RESULTS

Kind of boring results!  

I left the blackberries rolled up in the fabric for several days - until the fruit flies were starting to get thick and the whole concoction was beginning to ferment!

I think I made a mistake by washing the fabrics with synthropol in the machine and drying in the dryer.  They ended up just a boring purplish grey.  Hmmm. The one pictured above is the darkest of the group.

Off I went to get more blackberries.

I took the two fat quarters that were the lightest in color and slathered them with the fresh blackberries (I didn't freeze them this time and I wonder if that made the difference in the color I witnessed) and mashed them in.  This time the color was definitely redder.  I rolled the whole mess up and let them sit for a whole week!

When I unrolled I rinsed them really well in the sink, catching the seeds in a sieve.  

I let them dry and then gingerly ironed them - I was worried the heat might change the color, but it didn't.

I'm really pleased with the results this time - 

I rinsed off the captured slurry of blackberries and tried to separate the seeds from the pulp.  I wanted just the seeds, but it was too much work to get it all off, so I rinsed as best I could then spread the seeds over a fat quarter that had been prepared for 'flower pounding' with alum and soda ash.  I sandwiched the seed-covered fabric in plastic and ran it through my etching press.

The press tends to take all the liquid and push it to one end.   It was fun, I could hear the little seeds exploding.  I thought there would be some kind of liquid in the seeds that would burst open and squirt it's essence onto the fabric and I'd get...well, who knows what I'd get!

The purple juice that was developing this time was definitely different than the juice from the berries.  It's more purple.  I rolled it up and left it for several days.

 Look at that color!

But, what I got was probably the opposite of what I was expecting.  The seeds acted as a 'resist', meaning there was color around the seeds and little white spots where the seeds were embedded into the fabric.  I hope you can see that in the photo.  It's a very interesting texture.

Sorry, my camera doesn't like closeups!  But I think you can see what I mean.

BLACKBERRY FABRIC DYEING

I picked some blackberries and put them into the freezer for a few days.  I took them out this morning, to let them thaw a little, then put them into a colander and started crushing the liquid out of them.  That got old fast, so I just took the mess and spread it over a fat quarter of pre-mordanted cotton fabric.  I put another fat-quarter on top and rolled the mess up in a piece of plastic sheeting.

I'll leave it like this for a few days.

I took some of the liquid and put it into an aluminum pot and heated it to 130 degrees F and then dropped another fat-quarter into the pot and removed it from the heat.  I'll leave it in there overnight also.

Boy, does this smell delicious!  No kidding...way better than rotting petunias!

FUN WITH FLOWERS

I had an irresistible desire to find out what fabric dyed from the petunias at work would look like.  So, I couldn't help myself and picked some last weekend and put them in the freezer.  These petunias are everywhere, there are plenty of them and I only picked a few from each plant and picked them from the backside, so no one would notice!

I was intrigued because of the color.  The only way I can describe it is FUSHCIA pink:

According to Eco Colour: Botanical Dyes for Beautiful Textiles  by India Flint freezing the delicate flowers causes the individual cells holding the dye to rupture, so not much heat is needed to release the dye.

I was surprised when I brought the flowers out of the freezer they had changed color to a deep purple.  In fact, when I started stuffing the frozen petals into a nylon sock they were already releasing the dye all over my hands and the countertops!

I put the sock of flowers into a pot of hot warm (from the tap) and heated it.   After squeezing all the liquid from the petals in the sock, I divided the liquid into four glass quart jars.  I left one of them 'plain', one of them I added a little alum to, one of them I added a little copper sulphate and the last one I dropped some rusty pieces of steel, which would be akin to adding iron.  Then I put a fat quarter of cotton, which had been prepped with an alum mordant,  into each one:

Instantly you could see the color differences.  The plain is, well..., plain.  The copper has a decidedly blue-tint.  The alum leans more to the red, and the one with the iron is definitely blacker.

At this point, I realized that I had made a big mistake by heating the flowers too much.  And, I probably added too much water to the dye pot.  These mistakes resulted in a very poor showing of the fabulous color I was seeing from the iced-flowers.  The next day I took the fabrics out of their baths and let them oxidate for about an hour and then put them back in.  I will leave them for another day or two, but I don't think that they will improve or get darker.

  

Pretty sad looking at this point.  But, I have really learned a lot.  And, after all, that's what this is all about!  I think next week I'm going to gather some more of the same flowers and try again.  This time without the heat, and less water.  

(I went out into our garden and picked all the petals off some of our flowers.  We don't have a lot, but I picked all the blooms off of our purple petunia, one red geranium, and one small yellow plant.  They are in the freezer, I'll be putting them in the dye pot tomorrow! My husband was stupefied as to why I decimated the flowers!  Hey, it's raining, they'd be gone soon anyway.)

RUST CONTINUED

I quilted the Rust Experiment today.  I wanted to just quilt around the 'rust' circles made by the metal disks.  But I don't think I've ever quilted or sewn 'perfect' circles.  I've seen a device that attaches to your machine that holds the fabric in place for sewing perfect circles.  Since I don't have one, and don't even know where to get one, I came up with a simple solution - a pin inserted through the center of the circle into my sewing machine's table.  Good thing it's wood - huh?

After I got the initial circles quilted around each of the rust circles I felt it needed more quilting.  So, I did the easiest thing and just echo-quilted around the circles.

Usually, I put binding around the outside to finish a quilt.  But the colors on the outside of this piece of fabric I used as the background is very interesting!  It has picked up stray dyes somewhere, making these interesting changes from blue to green to yellow.  I'm not sure how I'll finish it now.

RUST EXPERIMENT

Being bored, I started cutting out rectangles from the group of fabrics I recently sun-dyed.  (A great group of fabrics, I really like the colors - and more than that - I love the fabric.  I need to find a source for it.)

I arranged the rectangles on a piece of fabric I had made in the recent workshop at Pratt.  It was one I made, with sad results, using a paper litho-plate technique.  It works well as a background.

I've taken numerous design classes and workshops.  I want there to be a 'formula', you know?  But, I'm realizing, there just isn't.  I can't say what makes a design work, for the most part.  But I can 'feel' when it does.  I just moved the squares around and around, until they 'felt' right.  I would take them off, and put them back and realized there are endless possibilities that work just as well as the next.  Hmmmm.

After I was tired of this game, I stopped at the latest arrangement.  Then I stitched around them to secure them to the background.

Then I dampened it and arranged some metal discs on it.  I wanted rusty circles!  It took two days until I was tired of watching it rust.  I had to re-wet under the discs the next day.  I removed the aggressive rusters and moved some of them to the lazy ones positions.

Here it is now.  I think I want to quilt around the rust circles.

ASHTRAY - DAY SIX

I got some thread work done on the 'background'.  I particularly wanted to lighten it up under the chair because there isn't much value change.  I accomplished this by putting some free-motion thread work in a lighter shade of gray over that area.  I'm still not sure it's light enough, but the quilting, if done in a lighter shade will lighten it up even more.

Here you see it pinned and ready for quilting.  This is the part that makes me nervous!

ACCEPTED - REJECTED

I took the same two paintings that I took to Renton River Days and submitted them to the Western Washington Fair's Fine Art Competition.

As you might recall, the snitzel 'Lines' won a Juror's Award, and my favorite 'Steel Plant' (above) won bupkis.

I got a little envelope in the mail today from the WW Fair.  They accepted 'Steel Plant' into the show, but they cannot abide 'Lines'.  They want me to come and pick it up where it now resides with the rest of the rejects.

Bummer...that means I need to take time off work this week, too, to pick it up.  And, it means an extra trip to Puyallup.

I wish the jurors and judges would let artists know what they like and don't like.  It's so baffling!

Just proves, it's all so subjective and it doesn't really mean a thing.

WEED - QUILTED

I spent a little time up in the studio today before I have to go back to work tomorrow.  I got 'Weed' quilted.  It's hard to tell in this photo - I stupidly took the photo too close to the window, again, and it's got a flare on the top left and the colors are a little screwy.

I really like the colors, too. They are very soft and warm.  So is the fabric.

ROAD TRIP TO BC

My husband, Darrell, was scheduled to do some demos at two Lee Valley Stores in British Columbia Friday and Saturday.  I've been looking forward to this because while he was busy demoing, I was going to Maiwa.  If you don't know about Maiwa, check it out:  http://www.maiwa.com/

They have everything for fabric (and yarn) dyeing, plus some really great imported stuff.

I've been following their blog http://maiwahandprints.blogspot.com/ for a while and had noticed these really neat leather bags, reasonably priced, too.  I decided I was going to go and get one for myself.  So, Friday, Darrell dropped me off at Granville Island and I spent the next five hours shopping and eating and sitting and watching the people.  The weather was grand and the area is wonderful.  Granville Island is a wonder mix of artists workshops and their galleries and shops of all things artistic to peruse and buy.  

There is also a wonderful Market where you can get fresh fruits, vegetables, baked goods, meats, fish and whatever you desire!

I got the leather bag (I love it!)...

 and then went a little nuts - I bought a few things to check out natural dyeing.

I went back a third time to get the Indigo Kit, after I had read some of the literature they had given me when I bought the first dyes.  The instructions sounded very easy, and the clerk assured me it was a breeze.  We'll see - I've heard that indigo can be very difficult.

Saturday morning Darrell had to be in Coquitlam at 10am, and I hadn't really planned anything.  But, all night long I'd been thinking about the great books I'd seen in Maiwa.  So, having nothing better to do, I drove back to Vancouver and Granville Island just to buy a book - so I bought three.

I started looking online for a fabric store and found one less than a half a mile from where the husband was, so I headed back there.

It was just a big box fabric store with a lot of everything, but I did find the threads I was needing for my 'Ashtray' project.  I stuck to my resolution not to buy anymore fabric, but I'll admit, I looked a little bit.

I spent all my allowance for the next several months!  I need to get back into the studio and use some of this stuff up!

Here are some random images I saw:

I almost forgot to mention we also went to the Vancouver Art Museum to see the Degas (and others)  Drawings Exhibit

Great weekend.