Working in the Mines

What a day! What an amazing response to my hand dye sale. Thanks to everyone who stopped by and just had to have what I was selling. I can't wait to see what you all make of this stuff so don't forget to send pictures! I have been running up and down the stairs all day alternating between the ironing board, the design wall and the computer. Apart from selling off fabric that I will never, ever (I keep telling myself that as I iron and fold) and making the money I need to go to Florida in April, I keep uncovering these jewels that got squirreled away without a backward glance! Time passes and the things I took for granted or even common have come back to some kind of new life. I have a growing pile of inspiration for new work and the closet still looks full! Does fabric breed in the darkness like rabbits and wire coat hangars? More about the Yellow Rabbit another day..........

hand dyes for sale & new works

I've spent some time rooting around in my closet pulling out pieces of hand dyed fabric that I made a year or two ago. It's time I let go and put this things out where others can take a look and maybe bring them to fruition. The pieces are big and the prices are low! And, I started something completely different

dye day preparation

These are just some of the stitched and clamped resist techniques I'm going to be experimenting with. There are also another half dozen pieces with soy wax on them ready to go. Now all I need is for the weather to warm up just a few degrees. In the meantime, I'm busy digging through past pieces, re-shooting them and posting them for sale on my LikeHotcakes! site with the object of raising the money I need for FOF08- it's a Send Deb To Art Camp Sale! As the new hand dyed pieces emerge from the dyepots they will be going on the block too.

Valentines Day

Here are a few more images of my "slow cloth" work that show the wonderful way that vintage cotton or linen damasks will take dye. This was the last of a piece I called "Tomato Freckles" now in the body of a giant horned newt. Old cotton cut-work doilies are great finds too. I wonder if they take the dye so well because they have been washed so many times or because they were made before the processes that prevent a good dye job? Any notions? The white fabric is lawn cut from an antique Italian wedding trousseau. I wonder when I'll know there's enough stitching on this one. Maybe when I can't lift it anymore. Oh, and by the way, I failed a studio inspection this morning. Voodoo only comes by once in a great while to hurk on something (last time directly into my clever little bobbin holder) and be critical. This morning the criticism was about an empty food dish.

Exquisite cloth!

There is nothing like coming home to a package that was an impulse buy that you had forgotten was coming! I won this incredible embroidered Irish linen tablecloth on Ebay for little more than a song and some postage. It's so sumptuous. I know I'm going to be hacking it apart and dyeing it all manner of colors but for the moment the snowy acres ( 82"x80") has me completely intimidated. Look, Dijanne, it's Banksia! The embroidery runs all the way around the four sides. How to color this stuff? What a problem to have. Can you imagine what the lady of the house would think about my plans for her finery? {{{boo.boo.boo.boo.boo}}}