Discharge Fabric with Bleach

Today I discharged  fabric with bleach, namely Soft Scrub.  I used an inexpensive stamp to make the leaf design.  I'll play with this stuff again sometime.  The interesting thing about this is, you never know what color it will discharge to.  The green fabric became orange where I stamped, the black fabric was a darker orange and the blue fabric came out with a brownish color once rinsed.  The photos I have were taken during the process so the bleach is still on the fabric.  I'll post more pics later.

Work in Progress

Today I worked with some of the fabric I have dyed, screen printed and painted.  I've also used some commercial batiks from my stash.  This is what I have up on my design wall right now.  I printed some ancestors on silk organza and will probably include those too.  Not sure the dragonfly will stay but we'll see.

Discharge Paste on Black Commercial Fabric

Today I tried using discharge paste on black fabric.  The results are pretty much what I expected.  You just never know what color it will discharge to, this time it was tan on one and a slight green on the one with a little print.  I liked doing the process although using a respirator wasn't that fun.  I'll probably cut up the fabric and make a small wallhanging.  We'll see.  Double click on picture to see larger image.

Screen Printing with Ink/Paint

Well, finally it was less humid out and the lawn has been mowed.  I did more screen printing yesterday and today.  I'm looking for the right time to do some discharge dyeing, (taking the color out of fabric I have dyed.)  I know it sounds crazy but I love to try new techniques so we'll see how it goes!  You can see a couple more pictures on my Flickr on the right side of this page.

Deconstructed Screen Printing

I'm back at it again! This time I did some nice blue that I really like and yesterday I used some red dye. I'm asked what I'm going to DO with all of this fabric, well....I will make art quilts of some sort I guess. Right now I'm just enjoying the process and I'm going to try more with resists. I have some ideas twirling around in my head when I look at the wonderful colors and designs so I'm sure I'll come up with something. It's a beautiful Monday, the sun is shining and my lawn won't be mowed yet another day. Too humid!! It will probably be a field by the time it gets done. Froggy came back. I might not have mentioned he seemed to be gone for 2 days. He has gotten very fat so I guess he's finding enough to eat out there.

Cape Cod Visit

Daughter Karen and I left for Cape Cod on Thursday morning. We had a nice visit and returned home on Friday night. I was a beach bum most of the time while there. We went to a National Park Beach that was nothing like I'd ever seen in New England! Words that come to mind when I think back to the Cape: Sand dunes, seals, blue sky, wonderful sea breezes, light house, family fun, large fried shrimp and salt water taffy...Wow!

More pictures from the Cape on my Flickr, lower right of page.

Hot Day at the Hot Rod Show!

I went to the Ganite State National Hot Rod Show today. It was hot, but a beautiful breeze saved us. I took a lot of pictures and have posted on Flickr at the right of my posts. I sure wish I still had my '67 Camero. Well, it's the end of a Beautiful Summer weekend.

Warm Enough?

Wow, what a hot one today! I had to work this morning but the office is air conditioned so I didn't really mind. I thought I would do some screen printing when I got home, but it's just too hot. I think a better choice right now is watching a movie. Tomorrow we plan to go to a Car Show at Castle In The Clouds. It will be hot but I know they are going to have some beauties there. Here's a picture I took at another car show. I wish I could afford one of my own.

Mancuso World Quilt Show

Yesterday I went to the quilt show in Manchester with friend, Kathleen. I wasn't disappointed, the quilts were many and they were fantastic! I took a lot of pictures and I'll post some of them. I was pleased to see the Pro Chemical & Dye Company there as a vendor. I needed more things and this saved me the shipping costs. I'm going to try bleach discharge and soy wax design on fabric so I bought some of those products. Kathleen was drawn to all the bags and purses and happily bought a few patterns. We saw all the quilts and checked out the vendors making it quite a full day. Now I'm excited to get moving and play with more fabric.

Playing with Fabric

I've finally taken pictures of the process I use when I dye fabric or do screenprinting.

First the fabric is washed unless it is purchased as "PFD", prepared for dyeing. If I'm doing screenprinting, I will do a soda ash soak of the fabric and hang it to dry. Once dry it's ready to print.

I've been doing "deconstructed screenprinting". To establish a design, I place items under the screen. I like to use bubble wrap but you can use a lot of different things to get an interesting print. I take thickened dye and pull it through the screen. The screen is left to dry, usually overnight.

When the dye covered screen if fully dry, I'm ready to print. I place the dry fabric on top of a protective table cover. I then place my silkscreen frame on top of the fabric. Release paste is placed in the well of the screen and I pull the print. With this process it is possible to print the screen perhaps three or four times depending how quickly the dye releases from the screen. Cover the fabric with plastic, and let it sit overnight before washing. Wash in cold water then rinse in hot water. The colors do fade a bit after washing but I like the subtle differences. Sometimes I'll use two or three colors of dye on the screen. There are no mistakes and I'll use the dyed fabric in some quilt projects. If you plan on trying this, I recommend you check out some books at your local library on Fabric Dyeing or check out sites on the Web.  I have added a link (click on title of this post) that I like that was posted by Fibermania called "lazydyer".

Hummingbirds

Yesterday I did some fabric dyeing and worked out on my deck. I noticed the hummingbirds had arrived so I went and got my Nikon. I had taken several pictures of hummingbirds but was not very satisfied with them. I chose another setting and took a few shots. I'm very pleased with these and I hope you enjoy them. I will be printing some of these for notecards. More pictures to follow of my dyeing and printing experiments on cotton fabric coming in the near future. Stay Tuned.

Quilt Show and Quilt Documentation

We had a good time at the Quilt Documentation held during the quilt show in Wolfeboro. There were many quilts to see and as usual many vendors. I especially enjoyed the exhibit of Antique Quilts that was displayed. Here's a picture of one. I'm hoping to have a photo site linked to this blog soon. Maybe Flickr or something like that. I have several more pictures and would like to post them. We had a successful day of documenting and we are well on our way to working on a book of New Hampshire Antique Quilts.