fini

I'm so glad I waited to do part two until this morning. The paler colors you see here were just hatched out from the group that went into the dyes this morning - a very tempered hand at the color helm was necessary. 

And for once, I got a set of greys that I like - MX Gunmetal and a tad of mystery mud to warm it.

Keep in mind that these colors will all  be stepped back a bit once they are washed and dried. For tonight, I'm just going to let them pickle.In the lower right corner are three or four damask table wipers.

August dyefest - day one

It was much hotter out on the deck than I expected and I was delighted when a brief thunder storm passed over and cooled the proceedings  down just a bit.

My personal thermostat seems to be broken these days. I overheat like an old Ford and cannot be cooled down quickly or easily.  I had to call an early halt but will pick up where I left off tomorrow.


I'm planning on a more subtle group of colors this time out. The dyestock that I'm using was mixed two months ago and has not been stored under optimal conditions and so, hopefully, will give the paler colors I hoping for.

All the cloth I'm working with is vintage - tender as Jude would say - and feels like it wants a gentler color touch than I'm used to dishing out. Some color whispering is underway.

I bought a heavily starched and ironed damask tablecloth at a yard sale this morning.
A little yellowed around the edges, it was tied tight in a bundle with jute and weighed several pounds. When I got it home and unfurled it for washing it was four by ten feet!

my soul restored

I got in the pool today for the first time in too long and found my legs were weak for walking against the water..step one in my patented pool cleaning process..get it whirling.  Must get back into form.

The pollywogs got on just fine without me peaking over the back edge down onto their busy little worlds.


I found the missing soda ash and got the cloth in to soak for the dye days to come. When the sun gets down behind the trees - when the light is not so severe, I will mix colors that I have been daydreaming about.
 

Dinner is prepped for later and I finally sat down with the sewing basket to get some stitching in. I am loving each of these elements and they are starting to reach out to one another in unplanned ways.

more here...

making ready for color

 This is from a previous dyefest earlier this year.

 After looking over the piles of white cloth in the studio - I feel a dyefest coming on. Preparations today=color tomorrow and Sunday.
There are color promises to keep.

Home again from NY

Not a speck of fiber to report on unless you count picking up one damask tablecloth at a local thrift shop. All the shops I had planned on visiting were closed for the summer! I spent the week visiting with Mom in the nursing home and Pop at Casa Useted. Both my sisters had grandchildren visiting too.
Four generations under one roof!

We had Bryan's first birthday party (one of three I think). I was not able to get one single shot of him that was not blurred - a champion wiggler!










That  same day Pop got acquainted with Amy's French Bulldog, Junior.  He was perfectly happy to take a ride with Pop on the scooter. A good time was had by all.

sewing to go

 


There's a long post here about the two on-going hand work projects that I'll be taking along. 

There are some much bigger things on the horizon.





Here's most of the contents of my scrap jar flattened out and stacked tight. When it's rolled up, a mere cookie dough log in the sewing kit. It's SO aggravating that my tiny kit has to be checked and I can't work on anything during the flight.
So dangerous, these sewers, armed to the teeth with needles, pins and tiny scissors!

I don't know if I'll have easy/consistent computer access where I'm headed
so this may be a blog vacation too. Ciao4now.

change of direction

Looking at these together on the wall and marking the feeling I had when I determined that it was OK to baste the first layer in place, I reflected on something Grace said about the cloth she is working on for the mcd class.

It's made me recognize that my choice of path/project  for the class was incorrect, which would account for it feeling forced and disorganized. I'm still going forward with it because it's intent was utility all along - I need a Magic Cloak. The cold will return here someday.

The reason I named this series "Rêver" was all about the state of mind I experienced as I made my choices of color and shape within the gentle bounds of the gridded white base cloth, each relating to it's neighbors in comfortable ways and bounded by a comfort zone of whitespace. Each small rectangle now becomes a canvas on it's own - a second, and sometimes third layer of expression.
All the cloth for these comes from my scrap jar where I keep snips as small as postage stamps because I can't just throw them away.

Now I have to figure on how to bring that entire jar with me on the plane. I was going to just take a carry-on but it looks like I'm back to checking a bag.

preparing to fly

I've laid the groundwork for another "Rêver" using a chunk of that silk/linen blend skirt and find myself gravitating to stronger colors this time out. I've been looking at the other two long enough to go forward in a slightly different direction. I recognize and honor the comfort of the grid even if I am disorderly within the lines. 

 
Now I have to round up enough raw materials to hold me through a week away and remember that I will have to check a bag whether I like it or not because traveling with projects full of pins and scissors demands it. 

Have to remember to pin the note on that says "Dear TSA, Warning - Pins Here -please don't get blood on the fabric"

And here are the books I scored at the GW. I have looked at and handled a few e-readers but can't imagine not holding the real thing in my hands.

"Everything happens for a reason..."

I heard that expression a total of five times in the day yesterday. I always add on "and in it's own time". Something is demanding my attention.


Meanwhile, my buddy J. and I hit the road yesterday in search of a new Goodwill to pillage. Another  J. gave me the notion of finding Goodwills near more affluent neighborhoods..and was she ever was right, but we didn't consult the map before we went questing. The light purple is how we got there, the darker purple how we got home. 

Still, my little car sits for too long unused, is good on gas even running the AC and it gave us time to catch up, reflect and plot.  Over lunch I found out she had reconnected and made peace with the spouse who had abandoned her to single-motherhood so ago. It was wonderful to hear the relief in her voice from putting down this burden of anger and bitterness carried all these many years.

When we got back to my house with our finds, we sat in my newly AC'ed studio and chatted over most of a Braves game on TV, re-hydrated and generally relaxed like the queens of our world that we are. Blessed.

SNOWDAY!

It's snowing white cloth here in the studio. Once I picked out the sewn down pleats and a hem that actually had a silk ribbon edge, this size 12 skirt has yielded about two yards of what I think is a silk/linen blend. And look! a grid! This morning I'm going to start another in the "Rêver" series. Bliss....

Speaking of Bliss, my Goodman forced me to accept a small air conditioner in the studio late yesterday. I've lost my view of a shrub and the neighbors roofline but the sacrifice will be worth it until the fall. When Colin first

plugged it in the temp readout in the room was 99 but I suspect that was as high as it could show.


The pile of white things I keep stumbling across continues to grow. I plan on saving a sleeve or collar here and there but there will be a dyefest sometime late in August. I'm heading for NY next week and invariably bring (or ship) home amazing finds of vintage cloth that's just begging for color - there will be Monkey Blood, Robin's Egg, Butternut, Granite, and more as the daydreams add up.

even the labels are pretty. I never knew what "ramie" was until I did a little research. This blouse fooled me into thinking it was cotton. I also know it should take the dye nicely.

It was pleasant enough in the  studio last night for a little hand stitching. This is one of the elements I'm making for the Magic Cloth Diaries project.

It's time to set aside the trixie stuff and start work on the actual garments, now that I can handle the fabric without feeling smothered and getting everything all sweaty. 

You did WHAT?

Of course we're never supposed to talk about our day jobs  but JEEZ LOUISE!! When you call up an organization to make an official report do you think that you might know what time it is where you are???? That you might have most of the pertinent facts and information is just too much to ask - I wear out the U-N-K keys typing the work Unknown over and over. Could you possibly be holding a pen or pencil in your trotter?!? Why BOTHER, Why call? I know !! it's COVER YOUR ASS TIME!

This work calls for me to be polite, civil and non-judgmental with people who are often covering up their own malfeasance about 30 times a day. (And I wondered why my hair was falling out) - to be compassionate would be too much of a stretch.

Between callers and calls I take a moment to swear in a way that would make sailors faint. Anyone passing by my home office would hasten away, heart quaking.
I curse their lineage and pray they have not yet reproduced.  I am a strong proponent of the Darwin Awards. I could hand them out daily in my line of work.

although the Buddha might cringe, I think the balance is appropriate.