I’ve been in a funk. No energy; don’t wanna do anything. Perhaps it is the everyday sameness of dreary, cold winter days. There has not even been a gorgeous fresh snowfall to break up the monotony of the greyness of ice and fog.
I decided I needed some playtime. Try something new. Pull myself out of the doldrums, whatever the cause may be.
Last night, I spent considerable time trolling the internet and reading lots of snow dyeing blog posts and tutorials. Looking at all the luscious results got me excited to experiment (funny…I’ve never been excited about snow dyeing…must be the timing). I love the serendipitous aspect!
Which is a good thing, because I can’t tell you the last time that I used my procion dyes. They are old, and have no doubt lost their potency. Keeping that in mind, I won’t be disappointed (well…maybe a little) if the dye doesn’t perform well. It is my own fault.
A trip out to the dilapidated chicken coop was called for this morning. It hasn’t been used as a chicken coop for years; I should be calling it a garden shed. It houses yard tools of various sorts, as well as, on occasion, cats, skunks, and raccoons. And on at least one afternoon, a bear.
I am on a treasure hunt for window screening. I don’t think Hubby would like it if I cut the screening from off the screen doors or windows. And I am one lucky girl, too, because there is plenty of window screening coiled up in a bucket!
I’m using one yard pieces of soda ash soaked pima cotton fabric. I am also using plastic shoe sized containers. There is a layer of fabric scrunched into the bottom of each container to take advantage of the dripping dye solution.
Window screening is clamped to the containers with clothespins, and another layer of scrunched fabric is sitting on the screening.
I went outside and shoveled up a bucket of snow to bring in. The snow is thickly packed around that top layer of scrunched fabric.
Dye is squirted on that snow. I’m having fun making a mess! It looks like very large flavored snow cones!
I’ve got the fabric resting in front of the heater. It is also covered with plastic wrap.
Now we wait.
Probably for a couple of days. I was going to wash it out tomorrow, but I’ve been called to work. I won’t be able to handle the suspense too long, so I’ll get to it as soon as I can.
And then I will know if I can still use my dyes, or throw them out. Even if the results are muted, the fabric may make great background fabric, or can always be overdyed.
By the way, the sky is a bright blue today, and the sun is shining in full glory!
What do you do to get yourself out of those blah times?
LC's Cottage 