just a fraction

This is all I have time for this morning. A few were rinsed and little dye was lost...a good sign. Then I realized.why bother? Just lay them out on the work table and let them dry there. Some of these have been treated with clear school glue as a resist in preparation for other processes later on.

I'm letting these have their way with the white sheet that's covering the work surface. I have a stack of them - a cotton poly blend so not much of this excitement will stay when I wash it out.

If I wash it out.

these were suspect in that I was not able to determine if they were going to take the dye or leave it. the white markings are from discharge gel.

I forgot to take off the Grace note but I remember it said "what were they thinking?"


I can't imagine what those three badly stitched XXs were all about...

fall dye fest...day one

Some of you must be bored with these types of pictures but I never tire of seeing my Mason jars lined up filled with sparkling colors. That whole front row looks like a salute to Sangria. There are another half dozen, three-high stacks of stainless steel containers out of the frame all heating up in the sun this afternoon.

I didn't realize I had so much cloth ready to go. Wash out and further manipulations of color are going to take all week in small doses - I have a crazed work schedule with a lot of early starts coming up. This will be a first for applying the textured colors after the base color  - I normally do it the other way around. We'll see if there's any real difference.

perfect fall saturday

What a great time we all had yesterday! Jim and Colin had a spectacular day at the chili cookoff (we are still hoping to get some pictures from somewhere) the camping and cooking logistics came off perfectly, as did the food, but the camera was dead.  Jake and Missy visited the campsite and I'm told all the food was a big hit with the public but the judges missed the boat. Oh well! A good time was had by all and on to next year!

Janice and I went to our first bead show in a long time and I was actually moved to acquire the makings of a pair of earrings that I have been coveting.  These will be an homage to the art of Courtney Laine who creations I have long coveted. She uses real gold, silver, and gems. I will use whatever, spit and chutzpah and find out just how difficult this work is.

We pillaged the Norcross Goodwill library like pirates making off with all the books we could carry and then bought the makings for a great lunch, got it back home and served ourselves...shrimp scampi, linguini, guacamole and sangria. Yeehaa. No room for dessert.

When the sun comes over the yardarm and the ballgame game begins, there will be color and cloth!

Fall colors for the dyedeck

OK...the cornbread is in transit and I have a little time to kill so, time enough to make a fresh start, dyewise.


I washed out all my good stock bottles, made my choices and mixed up this set of dye concentrates which will have to take me through 'til spring. This batch will live in the deck fridge after tomorrows dye session. I'm a profligate waster of dye so I'll be more mindful of that for a minute or two.

Some of these are right out of the ProChem can and few are my own concoctions. All well and good on paper, I know. Time will tell.
 
Kinda sad that I had no golden yellow but hopeful that sun and sunflower together will zip.


I deliberately left out the straight turquoise..it dominates my magpie brain.
And no black...I never get it right anyway so why waste the cloth?

tomorrow...jars+cloth+dye+water+sunshine=?

it's Chili time!

 I was up before dawn getting cornbread into the oven for the Stone Mountain Chili cookoff. Jim camped there last night and is preparing the judges batch of the same recipe as I type this.

All the entries have to be cooked on the spot but I bake a dozen pans to serve little samples to the visitors, along with the chili and, this year for the first time, he's making Brunswick stew...whatever that is.

It's quite the rowdy party, and though I have attended in the past to help serve, it's not my cup of tea and I would only be underfoot so this year Colin will be delivering the cornbread and slinging grub for the masses. Later in the day there will be ear splitting live music, and with the spectacular fake summer weather we've been blessed with after a week of muggy rain, there will be mobs of party animals swarming the area. Me, I'll be at a bead show  waiting on the magic phone call to hear that we WON like we did in '03! Good luck my darling...