What I've Been Dying

I've been dying wool, one yard pieces on request. I've been pretty much given free reign as to what color and values but they are for a customer that prefers their colors to have a tinge of gray whereas the colors I dye for my personal use are more vivid and I never attempt to dull the color

These are pretty much the wools I've been overdying. A creamy white, an off white with pale green/tan strip in it, an ivory/beige/gray plaid and these are the end result.

In addition to the pinks and greens I also did some reds and blues. The blue was a specific request. A very grayed light blue was desired. I started out with Cushings Blue. It looked purple and scared me, so I added ProChem Brilliant Blue 490 now I had blue but it was a bright blue so I added Cushings Orange to this vivid mixture. Then I only used a little over the white and the stripe ad additionally I had a heathery cream with flecks of gray in it. It was about the desired color but a little bright. So then I made a solution of just the Orange and overdyed it again in a very diluted bath of orange. Now it was dull enough (the white/cream) but not deep enough, so I overdyed it again with some of the original solution of the blues and orange combined. It turned out as desired, I wish I would have taken a picture of the 1" x 1" scrap I was given to match. So on the left we have the particular blue. The other two it wasn't as important and I didn't give them the final orange bath and they remained a little brighter and a touch more blue green vs blue gray.

I had much fun with the reds I dyed and finally hit on a red I like. It actually leans towards orange, but I'm ready to dig out one of my patterns with poppies that I dyed yards and yards of wool and never hit on a color I liked. So I've never finished any of the rugs with poppies in them that I have.

These are the reds. And they don't even look like they look in person. This picture is really washed out as the yellows are deeper. The pink is close to actual and than what appears to be coral on my screen is really more intense.

And next we have a terrible picture of the rug I started in July. Notice anything wrong here? I sort of lost my mind and ability to measure apparently but it's fixable. I've already ripped it out. If you count 5 horizontal stripes down, you can see where the two middle boxes of gold are larger than the others, I didn't make the purple stripe wide enough. It's easy enough to fix and I'd rather fix it now than later.

It's Growing, ever so slowly

I'm not breaking any speed records on this rug that is for sure. (There was the 13 day rug.) However, it is coming along nicely.

In the mean time, I needed some instant gratification. Hand hooked rugs are labor intensive and time consuming. So how to break the monotony and get a rug done now? Weave it.

I spent last Saturday cutting up old sheets with my brand new, worth every penny, killer, 12" scissors. Let me tell you, these babies are sweet. If you're aren't careful, you could literally cut your finger off with em. They are sharp, sharp, sharp; and it is so nice to have a pair of scissors that cut easily. They cut straight, they cut curves, they can even cut skinny strips of wool for rug hooking. Nancy from The Hen House ordered em for me, thank you, thank you, thank you. I just folded up the sheets and laid em out nicely and just cut my strips 2 1/2 inches wide.

I finally have a "cutting table" of sorts. I'm tall, I can't do this bending over the dining room table stuff, it's just too low and besides my house is really too little to have a 6 or 8 foot long dining room table for cutting fabric on even it it would be too low. So I've been dreaming and scheming and I think I've finally got it.

I took an old wooden baby bed with adjustable legs and set it up at the heighth that works for me. Then I took the hollow folding door off the closet, simple and easy enough, and put it over the top of the baby bed. Incredibly cheap ($10.00 for used baby bed), and it provides a ton of storage also. Almost all my fabric fits in it. Maybe some day when I get real bored or real organized I might actually put it all on bolts and make it real neat. For now, it's just in the baby bed, most of it anyway.

Sunday I went over to Allegan to Baker Allegan Studios and met and friend and we wove rugs. You pay by the foot. You can bring your own materials or use theirs. My friend took the loom with the off white/natural warp with a stripe at each edge, and I took the one with 4 different colors. I really, really, like her rug and it would not have looked good using the warp I used. How's this for a first rug. She used plaid and polka dots. Who says you can't mix plaids and polka dots. I think they look spectacular together.









My rugs are okay. They had changed the warp to a dark warp whereas I had been expecting to use a light warp. It turned out okay though, I have lots of scraps and whatnot to turn into rugs and, as you can see, using upholstery selvedges, you can't even see the warp. I just wish I'd made better color choices for that first inch or so that gets turned under and sewn for the edge, but I'm not going to fret to long about a rag rug that one of my dogs will just claim as theirs anyway. It's a rug. On the cotton one I think I should have used black. Blue/Grey? What was I thinking. I would say I quite obviously wasn't thinking. BUT I was having fun and I happen to think that's more important. And we all agreed the upholstery selvedges felt great on the feet.

Rug Progress

I think I need a different name for this rug, so I'm open to suggestonsto an alternative to "Purple n Poo" as the name of the rug. I've always wanted to make a rug using purple, gold, and olive green and while I don't quite have gold or olive green in it, the center squares are sort of a combination of the two.

I'll be on the hunt for a plaid that I can use for the outer border, though I fear that could use up major quantities quickly and so by the time I get to that I'll probably be overdying something, something.