Saturday Night Date

Saturday night I had a date, with me that is, and 17 bottles of dye and 51 yards of white fabric. It was intense! A great artist’s date. It was the first time I dyed fabric in my new house and the first time I’ve ever dyed inside a house. Before I bought this house I always dyed outside on the back porch of my apartment. If I dyed at night I had to get out this big utility light and extension cord and then had to endure the bugs or the cold. Sometimes I would put on my long underwear, fleece hat, and glove liners under my rubber gloves and dye until I was too cold. Sometimes I would last up to an hour, depending on the weather, but it wasn’t near as much fun as my new basement. I love it! I can drip everywhere and no one cares!

My dye studio

Since it was sunny outside today and sorta warm (40-ish degrees) I went out to mix the dye. I know the neighbors thought I was crazy. I was sitting in the grass with two large buckets, lots of squirt bottles, little containers, measuring spoons and an industrial strength mask. They just stared and didn't say anything and it's hard to strike up a conversation when you are breathing through filters. Just wait until this summer when I have yards of fabric spread all over the backyard!

Once I got started with the dyeing I decided to do 50 yards, but after 38 yards I had to scrounge around the house for more buckets or containers to put the fabric in. I transferred the yogurt into a Tupperware, emptied two trashcans, and retired a couple Tupperwares I didn’t like anyway. Finally, at 11:30pm I got to 50 or 51 yards; I threw in an extra yard in case my counting was off. Here are some photos. Now tomorrow I get to do a lot of laundry and then a lot of ironing. It’ll be worth it! 50 yards of beautiful fabric! Oh, I can’t wait!

Dyeing Table



Rainbow gradations



The streaky, twist method

More buckets, each with two yards of fabric