soy & dye experiments

The dyes and soy wax that arrived yesterday kept me up thinking about them last night.
I've long wondered about mixing the dye/resist process somehow, as counter intuitive as it seems.  I know someone had written a book about it and can't find the thing - so here I am re-inventing the wheel cause I can't wait to read about someone elses discoveries..if you know the book I'm talking about please email me.

Meanwhile, I set my trusty muffin tin in a rusted frying pan of water on the side burner of the gas grill conveniently located on dye deck.

For the first one, I waited until the soy way was completely melted and stirred in a teaspoon of dye into each muffin.

It blended pretty quickly and working fast, I applied the colored wax directly to a huck towel that had been soaked in soda ash.

The backside is even interesting.  It's going to kill me to wait to wash this out but what a great excuse to get some chores done!




Below is the other half of the huck towel, also damp with soda ash. This time I spooned the dye into the muffin tin while the wax was still melting and it did not blend as well or easily with the wax.

I started out wanting some "white space" and used wax without dye (covered over now)  but it was looking so nasty that as soon as the wax cooled I rolled it up and put it in with a quart of monkey blood.

washout will be lunch-ish.

monetizing?

Have any of you fellow bloggers taking the invitation from Adsense to "monetize" your blog and, if you have, are you needing a wheelbarrow to take your money to the bank?
Somehow the term "Monetize" conjures up visions of Jesus kicking the moneylenders asses on the temple steps  or Miss Cleo taking folks' grocery money for bogus card readings and spells. Am I crazy, stupid or both?

On a happier note, the UPS man just dropped a box from ProChem on the doorstep. And me with almost no white cloth!

PS....Yeah, I've decided that monetizing sound a lot like a case of the cooties.

signs of fall

This is view right over the back edge of the pool. there are several trees even closer than this one off screen right. The shade keeps the water cool and relatively algae free right through the summer but they (and the critters that live up there) drop endless loads of crap into the water.

Since I am the daily swimmer, it falls to me to keep ahead of these Augean stables and now that the buses are rolling the signs of fall are setting in.

But today I witnessed first hand where these leaves keep coming from. I mean, do you see one single brown, yellow or sickly leaf in my woods? Not.



Right on the other side of the fence my neighbor has a towering tulip tree  and the leaves are coming off it like confetti on New Years Eve...

catchup

I was not as fully divorced from electro-doings as I wanted these past days  but  still, lots got done.

On the other hand, there's nothing like a new bed to make one think about becoming an Olympic class sleeper. You just don't how bad the old bed was until you get a new one! I wake up feeling taller each day.

Work continues on Rêver 3 but there are stronger value changes in this one and I am anticipating even more vivid ones in the future. Dreams will sometimes pass into nightmares without you noticing.

A pair of swan feathers underway...I keep telling myself "less is more"

  and finally, finally
I am tackling the construction of this large piece. Getting these very disparate types of cloth to lie down and true up is crazy pesky.

The darkest one in the foreground is vintage cotton sackcloth (thanks Rosemary), the middle part is the last of the Nantucket flea market damask tablecloths and the pale strip on the far edge  a vintage percale - a sheet from my Aunt  Jo's lodge in Flint Michigan.

These three pieces of cloth have been only been joined because of the colors I gave them. The whole process seems to be against their individual wills but I am taking the wheel with a firm hand.

Happy FRIDAY!

Even though I have to work the day job this weekend, I'm taking a break from the computer and hand stitching.
My hands will be doing bigger, different things and my eyes will look for far horizons.

And if you are a fan of the game and can tune in, don't miss the Braves game tonight. Tonight they retire #6 and honor legendary manager Bobby Cox.
It will be a very big deal