It Snowed, So I Snow-dyed

Last Monday morning I woke to snow-----so instead of working on a quilt (anything not to work on that quilt) I did some snow-dyeing. There wasn't that much snow and it was melting fast. I soda soaked a couple of yards of fabric, mixed dyes and scraped snow off the driveway. I used a combo of red/violet and yellow/orange. The second piece I used blue/violet and yellow/green. I set these to the side to melt and do their thing. When I looked outside the snow had stopped and was quickly melting (faster than it was on my fabric). Tuesday after my guild meeting I rinsed the fabrics.

My dh came out to the garage and advised me that it was to snow again Wednesday, so instead of washing my fabrics I let them air dry and got more fabric ready for the snow.

I woke Wednesday to more snow than Monday so I decided to dye 4 more pieces.

Orange and green

Orange and blue/green

Orange and blue/violet

Red/orange and yellow/green

I had a little dye left over (can't let it go to waste) so I did a 3 layer parfait.

Left side is Layer 1 - orange, middle is Layer 2 - fushia with a little blue, right side is Layer 3 - blue. These are dark saturated colors.

I enjoyed my 2 days of snow-dyeing, but lets face it -------

I'M SICK OF WINTER!!!!

Now back to the quilt.

Finishing Up

The snow-dyeing fabrics are finally rinsed and pressed, (that's what took me so long). I loved how the green and red turned out and will be quickly used in a quilt I'm starting.

The blue and yellow came out good but would have liked more mixing of green.

The 3 layer parfaits are great. The first two layers came out with mixture of colors and the third layer was the combo of red and blue, not a wow!! fabric but will be useful.

Its much easier doing the parfait layers with low-water immersion and I think thats how I'll continue to do them.

I have also been busy quilting. I finished a few quilts that have been sitting around waiting to be quilted.

This started out with monoprinting on a gelatin mold 2 summers ago. Added some turquoise hand-dyes and 1/2 square triangles.

Next is a sunprint of assorted leaves. I added bias stems to separate the leaves, then traced the leaves for applique. I offset the applique leaves on the sunprinted fabric to create dimension.


Tomorrow I have to get started quilting a baby quilt for my grand niece. She's due to be born any day now. Will show pictures when finished.

1st Snowfall of 2011

Over the past year I have neglected my blog, once in a while posting on quilts made, fabric dyeing and painting. But I wasn't posting as frequently as I wanted or should have. I always had some excuse, then time would get away from me.

This years resolution is to post more frequently and on a more regular basis. That being said, as I watch the snow falling my mind is reviewing different color combinations for snow dyeing.

The first couple pictures are of fabric I did after our last snow fall at the end of December.

Above, I used grape dye.

This one I used ultra violet and golden yellow.

Today, I'm going to use green (coblat blue and golden yellow) and chinese red combo. I'm trying a different way by laying the fabric flat on a mesh drying rack instead of on a slant using lids from my containers.

This is sky blue and golden yellow on a cover slanted in a container.


This one is totally different than what I've tried before with snow. Its 3 layers of fabric with dyed snow in between each fabric. I started with golden yellow on layer 1, chinese red on layer 2, and sky blue on layer 3. Hopefully these will melt down through the layers and get multi colored fabrics.

These will sit till most of the snow melts, about 12-18 hours then rinse.

Results soon.

Snow-Dyeing

During our last snow fall I decided to try snow-dyeing. Recently there has been a lot of hiipe about it on the web and it really intrigued me. So, when the snow started falling I got out my dyes and snow shovel and got to work.

My first attempts I mixed full concentrated dyes with snow and covered the mixture over soda ash soaked fabric.

Fushia and sky blue on the left and sky blue on the right.

Fushia and fire red on the left and fire red and golden yellow on the right.



Black

I waited till the snow melted, about 4 hours, then left the fabric cure overnight. Rinsed, washed, and ironed. Below are the results.

Fushia and sky blue.

Sky blue accordion pleatedFire red and golden yellow.Black, it came out a purple

Second try I diluted the dye with water, as I would doing low water immersion dyeing, mixed with snow and covered soda ash soaked fabric. Chino and gold yellow

Ultra violet

Navy and gold yellow

Burgundy and gold yellow

I let the snow melt (again about 4 hours) and let cure overnight. Rinsed, washed and ironed.
Below are these results.

Chino and gold yellow

Ultra violet

Navy and gold yellow

Burgundy and gold yellow

The results were not quite as dark as the first ones but gave just as interesting results.

Using this method, you can't get duplicate results, but thats the fun with this method.

Can't wait for it to snow again!!