penny-studionotes-2

To make a backing for my shot cotton "Spectrum" quilt (see here and here ), I decided to experiment with tray dyeing, a method of getting multiple colors on one piece of fabric that I hadn't tried before.  I've very happy with the results.  I picked up three color samples at the paint department of Lowes, and then used my swatch book from Carol Soderlund's class to match up a dye formula.   As you can see below, I got very close indeed!  I was especially pleased because the dyeing circumstances were not ideal.  My dye concentrates were a couple of months old, including two weeks not refrigerated.  I did the dyeing in the basement, with an ambient temperature of about 58 degrees.  Many dyers don't do dyeing if they can't get the temperature up to 70 or warmer, but this convinces me that colder temperatures work just fine.  I did leave the dye on the fabric for 24 hours before washing out; if it had been warmer, I could have done a wash-out a...

I've recently added links to a selection of my quilts in a box at the top right of my blog home page.  I wanted to include the quilt above, one of the earliest quilts of my own design (begun in 2004), but I had never done a post on it, so I'm putting it here so that I can link back to it in the list.  (You can double-click on the image for a larger view.)  So, this post does double duty--it gets "Circles" up on the web, and lets you know that you can see a sample of my quilts by looking at the newly posted list.  (If you're reading this from an RSS feeder, you can click here to get to the home page.) Each block is 4-1/2 inches square; the circles are sewn on with needle-turn appliqué.  I had some teal tone-on-tone fabrics left over from another project, so I bought a range of Oriental fabrics that included some teal, and used those for the circles.  I say a bit more about this quilt in the essay I wrote about how I came to quilting and my development as a...

I finished piecing the top today.  I wanted to give some close-up photos, to show the range of colors in the shot cottons.  They are really beautiful. And the whole top: Some sources for shot cotton: I bought my fabric from Glorious Colour , $9.50/yd, 71 colors, also available in sets , with a new full set coming out late in 2012.  Also stripes . Other sources carry the fabric also, but either less of a selection or a higher price: Hancock's of Paducah , $8.98/yd, 19 colors Portsmouth Fabric , $9.95/yd, 50 colors and a few stripes Purl Soho , $10.60/yd, 56 colors

A couple of years ago, I made a baby quilt from a pattern called "Spectrum" by Judy Turner, from her book with Margaret Rolfe, Successful Scrap Quilts from Simple Rectangles . I really enjoyed making this quilt, for which I used a range of shot cottons.  It was both relaxing and engaging to make the choices of color and value.  The quilt is made up of many rectangles, all cut 2"x3.5".  They are arranged into squares, with either two light rectangles as the center, or two dark.  My sister liked the quilt as well, and I agreed to make a larger one for her.  She stood me to a collection of about 50 1/4-yard cuts of shot cotton, out of which I am getting a lap-quilt for her, and something else for me as well.  It was a great treat to get this huge variety of shot cotton.  I ordered it from http://www.gloriouscolor.com/ , but they don't seem to have this big collection anymore.  Anyway, the blocks at the top of the page are the ones I've just finished ...

We've had lovely fall weather here in western Illinois, much appreciated after a blazing-hot summer.  On a beautiful day recently, David and I were spending the day inside at our desks; we both had things that needed to get done--no time for the longer walk that we sometimes take together.  So I suggested we just take a walk around the block, which we did, and then another several blocks beyond that.  I picked up these ash leaves along the way--glowing variations of gold.  I drew with a marker and colored in with Derwent Inktense water-color pencils.  I do love the fall. . . (You can click on the photo to enlarge.)

I recently came back from a five-day class at the Barn with Carol Soderlund .  The class was called "Visions and Revisions," and was aimed at experienced dyers.  Students let Carol know ahead of time the particular areas of dyeing that we wanted to work on, and then we worked independently with Carol's guidance.  There were only five of us in the class, so we got a lot of attention, and Carol was enormously generous with her time and knowledge.  I took my first class in fabric dyeing with Carol in the spring of 2009.  With the skills gained in that class, I have been able to successfully dye fabric for a number of quilts, but I felt I needed further help to go in some other directions, particularly in the use of thickened dye as "paint" that one can use to print, stamp, paint, and write with.  Knowing that I would like to create more fabric with the texture and/or color of stones, I worked with a limited palette of neutrals the whole week.  (For an ex...

I have a trunk full of old linens from my mother and my aunt, both of whom delightedly abandoned linen for permanent press.  I have pulled several tablecloths and sets of napkins that I use from time to time for special occasions (and that I can easily iron with the mangle that I also acquired from my mother), but that still leaves me with lots of linens.  This week I got up the courage to try dyeing some of them--they seem so precious, but surely it's better to do something that may give them a new life, rather than just leave them in the trunk in the basement.  The photo shows three different linen napkins on the right, compared to pfd cotton on the far left.  A little lighter in value than the intended color, but that's fine.  Now to consider how I might use the linen.  It is so beautifully soft.