Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Shades of Bygone Days


 When my sister Brooke was visiting Sunday, we browsed through some of my hand dyed fabrics and ended up looking at some really old pieces from the early 90's. In those days I wanted large background fabrics for fused quilts, and decided to dye on our ping pong table, in our walk out lower level. I found a sheet of vinyl flooring at Home Depot to cover the ping pong table (60x108") and spread out my three yard x 60" fabrics on the surface. Then I poured the dyes on the presoaked fabric and watched the air bubbles form, and the excess dyes drip onto the floor. It made a mess every time. I didn't think to put two or more layers of fabric on the table at once, thus absorbing the excess dyes. That idea came much later, after I had finally given up the ping pong table idea.
I made lots of these background fabrics and then made lots of quilts using the watercolor effects of the surface for interest.


 

As I opened the fabrics to look at them again, knowing I am not going to be making larger works anymore (seriously, not gonna do it) I wondered what I could do with this fabric, besides putting it back on the shelves. Then the size of it dawned on me. It is a twin bed size! So I tried one piece out while I washed my bedsheets and it worked. It may look like a hippie bed, but it was fun to bring out the old colors, and relive my glory days.

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12 comments:

  1. Anonymous8:42 AM

    You could always cut them up and use them in smaller pieces or sell them....

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  2. I think you're still in your glory days! It's always fun to see the previous works. The coyote(?) is amazing...what a puzzle!

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  3. Beautiful pieces! I think you could sell them in flash!

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  4. Beautiful pieces, I love the summer themed one

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  5. Great idea for doing a bigger piece should someone be inclined to do a larger piece. I will be curious to see what pieces Brooke and you dye up.

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  6. Bring on the hippie days! I also love the pieces from the past....that mosaic must have taken forever and a day to put together! I think my favourite is Summer...maybe because we are in the throes of winter right now. We don't get snow but we have ranges on two fronts that are currently covered in snow resulting in spectacularly frosty mornings...even the donkeyplonks stay inside until the frost has melted!

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  7. Rebecca in SoCal5:07 PM

    Ah, I remember these! So beautiful, so cheery.

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  8. I am so there! I'd happily use sheets or bedcovers dyed like that :-)
    DH and I now have enough rainbow tie dye tshirts to last more than a week :-)

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  9. Ooh such exciting colours. Your bedspread would look good at Glastonbury music festival (its on this weekend and Im feeling very hippy because of that!)

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  10. Relive your Glory Days? Surely you are still living them!

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