Deep inside the rainbow.....

Week 2 at Cottenham Village College with Rikki Outis...

Having handed in my notice on Monday and feeling (and behaving) like a rain cloud since then it was blissful to go and enjoy being a teeny bit creative this morning. I was functioning in second gear....not my usual 5th gear and overdrive

We were busy space dyeing fabrics this moring. I love this techinque and have not done it this way before. We pre-soaked our fabrics in soda ash solution for 10 minutes and then poured a little procion dye into the bottom of a plastic cup. (See my previous blog entry for the proportions of dye) I didn't have a plastic cup luckily, so I had to use a glass jam jar which is great as you can see inside it.

I had set out the dyes in a circle and kept them in order. I started with a green dye and then pressed some of the wet fabric onto the dye and then added a little of the next colour, which was a different shade of green. Next came more fabric and a blue then further fabric and a bluish mauve colour.

I carried on around the 12 colours adding dye and fabric and topped it off with yellow.

Now then....I am going to do something UNHEARD OF FOR ME!!!! I am going to leave it for 48 hours if I can (want to take bets on this to see if I will?)

I might bottle out if it looks like it is going to turn to MUD!

Oh what a delightful mess!


I finished off this morning playing at painting dye onto soda treated fabric. I love the effect this sponge roller gave (from The Range cost about £1.00 intended for children but as I'm never going to grow up I count myself in there!)

I am SO looking forward to unwarpping and sharing the end results with you but in the meantime I am going to start thinknig about making a piece of work using words that Hope (7) sang to me on Sunday morning when she and her sister gave a little impromptu performance. Hope wore Grace's nightie and Grace wore her Christmas Angel outfit and played (well....she pretended to play) the guitar....!



Hope sang "Deep inside the rainbow I see you (in my heart)"

"Behind my eyes I see you in the flowerdust"

Then there was another delightfully random bit of singing "I see my house floating in the chimney pots"

WOW!

I grabbed pen and paper as she sang and floated about in her uninhibited way and also managed to get some video of her singing too.

What brilliant inspiration for a piece of work. I hope to get working on it very soon. I love to make something tangible from things they have drawn and this is the first time I have felt I could do something with words. Maybe I shall incorporate them into a piece using inspiration from their drawings last week.

I hope tomorrow I shall start feeling better.

PS: I think that my bottle of space dyed fabric could be the background....it looks like a rainbow in a jar... :)

Dyeing the Colour Wheel

Now then.....this is my kinda washing....a gorgeous line of colourful fabrics....the whole spectrum fluttering in the breeze. I dyed them on a course at Cottenham yesterday morning with Rikki Outis. Thank you Rikki!

The inner circle show the basic colour wheel....I did that first and then a further 6 colours were mixed to produce these glorious fabrics.

Method
for the basic colour wheelFabric was cut into 6x25cm squares (I used old white cotton sheeting as always!) and then it was soaked for 15 minutes in a soda ash solution to prepare it for dyeing

Meanwhile, we started by mixing 2 primary colours...each in 1 cup of cold water:
3 level teasp yellow (I used 4G)
2 level teasp blue (I used turquoise)
1 level teasp red (I used magenta)

To make the inner circle of colours (green orange and purple) we made three mixes as follows:
10ml red
+50ml yellow

40 ml yellow
+20ml blue

30 ml red+
30ml blue

Immerse each piece of fabric  in one of the 6 dye solutions for a minute, turning it over and make sure it is evenly dyed. Lightly squeeze and then place in a plastic bag. Now...BE PATIENT!

Leave for at least 2 hours but preferably 24-48 hours (Must admit there is NO WAY I could ever do that!!!!!)

I have not included the further mixes for the other 6 colours here

Rinse each of the colours out in plenty of cold water and then finally wack into the washing machine (I did NOT add the yellow!) Chuck in a couple of colour catchers and wash with mild detergent.Better still, use a speciality product such as Synthrapol.

Note to self: NO NEED to add quite so much Dreft another time! The poor washing machine spewed suds from every orifice!!!!! Happily, Tony was at work and I was able to clean up the evidence before he was home.

Oh....now that my energy is returning and BOY it has taken so long.....(still can't taste and smell) I rustled up 9 of these bags for our local hospital. They are for mastectomy patients for the drainage bags they have following sugery. They have a lovely long strap so it worn over the shoulder. This is my first batch. I have about 7 more half made because I cut out so many bags and didn't leave enough fabric to make the straps! Oh dear....I'm going to have to find a plain colour to use instead.

A couple of the members of our quilt group Cambridge Quilters have been patients there and now the group is very active in producing these, and the most delightful heart shaped cushions for under the arm of the affected side.