Uh Oh....

My new Dye-na-flow paint came from the Dharma Trading Co! This is a very dangerous situation, as evidenced by the photos...

I've painted (wet in wet) 3 M of bleached muslin today and have already prewashed some of the silk I ordered to play with!

This is actually two 1 1/2M pieces of fabric with a chromatic gradation. I'll be doing another set of pieces in cool colours as I'm putting together a super sized Convergence Quilt in the next few weeks and wanted to try doing it with hand-dyed fabrics first, then with print fabrics. Part of the reason for the first quilt is to work out some math questions I have about how this will go, and I wanted to use 'renewable resource' fabric instead of purchased fabric until I get the kinks worked out. Also, this way I get to learn more about what kinds of things I can do with this dye/paint.

These pieces are done by first wetting and wringing them out, then placing them on plastic. I don't have a big enough table to lay them out flat, so I crunch them up a little. The goal is to make peaks and valleys, rather than folds. I want light and dye to hit a lot of the fabric, not to have TOO many big whitish patches left over.

I do dilute the dye-na-flow somewhat. Never a good measurer, I eyeball this (no surprise there, eh Mom?). Once the paint is diluted, I drop it on from a big brush, lightest colour first. Usually I'll mix in a colour that doesn't totally belong - just for interest's sake, but today I was very restrained.

The leftover diluted dye was poured on in both cases, then scrabbled - that's the technical term - around on the plastic until the other colour just starts to blend with it.

It's not nearly bright enough today for the fabric to sunprint properly, so I have removed the bits of bracken that were scattered over it. I like sunprinting the uneven surface. It gives such lovely unexpected bits of shadow here and there.

I'll let you know how these come out. Promise.

Off to buy more muslin!

Lisa