Wednesday Words: New title for studio: The playroom

My sewing room/studio is now officially my playroom. The word "studio" sets up too many expectations. A-R-T has to come out of studios. Not experimentation, and trial and error. I need a space to play. Out of that play it is possible that art may come.

I've been watching this TED talk by Dr. Stuart Brown on the importance of play. I've always known that I needed time alone. I'm an introvert, and one of the best insights anyone ever gave me is that introverts don't not like people. They just find their energy from being alone. Being alone and being fiercely concentrated on a creative project is like crack for me. I actively seek out the experience, and I become cranky when I can't have it.

Per Dr. Brown, play is not just for kids, play is not optional, play is not an activity for when we have nothing else to do. Play is intentional, restorative, and builds our ability to function better in the other aspects of our lives. As my dear friend Margi, a pre-school teacher, once impressed on me: play is actually very serious work. 

 While I was thinking about play/work I was doodling a sign for my studio playroom door. Once I had the letters on the page I started to free-associate words to decorate the page. I doodled mememememe, and, boy, did that make me uncomfortable. Society has certainly done a number on me. Playtime is only for when all the chores are done, and the chores are never finished. Playtime is selfish. Playtime is self-indulgent. Grown ups have better things to do (such as fall asleep in front of the TV??).

It is going to take time to give myself permission to play unreservedly. I know that play replenishes my spirit and makes me a nicer person to be around when I'm done playing.

You'll find me in the playroom. I'll be coloring my new sign for a start! I'll even share my toys...

Pale doesn't necessarily mean boring - more Procion MX experiments

I have been doing Susan Purney Mark's class Shifting into Neutral. This is radical stuff for a color freak, but there's a place for gentler colors where texture really comes into its own. I'm very much liking the color play across this one. For me the trick is to get light areas that aren't just white cloth. It's a fine line!

Neutral experiments

Dyeing a gradient with Procion MX

Lots of dyeing = little blogging!

The chemist has been tie/ice-dyeing her heart out. So nice when you can go home and leave the washout to someone else..On the other hand it is wonderful to mix dyes and have someone to hand you clean utensils all the time! She took all the pics on her phone, so I will have to browbeat ask her to do a guest post some time. It is so interesting the difference between us. She is all about the folds and I am all about the color!

Lemon//Grape gradient

Here is a gradient I dyed with lemon yellow and grape, both pure colors. It is magical to see how the ambers and browns emerge in the middle of the range. None of these are colors I particularly want to reproduce, but is was good to see what happens.

To dye a gradient figure out how much total dye you will use for each piece of fabric, based on the weight of the fabric. See Paula Burch's invaluable site for information. For convenience let's say 60ml total. Determine how many steps you want in your gradient. Divide 60ml in half, 30ml, and that's your midpoint where you are adding equal quantities of each color. Parse out the rest of the graduations based on how big a color step you want. You also now have a recipe for each step. 

If you liked any one of these colors, but didn't like the range, you could now try adding black or water to the recipe for the color you liked to make tints and shades. I like to use a bigger gradient normally, as I am interested in where the color starts to change. Sometimes it takes several steps, but with some of the stronger colors even a touch of the second color pushes the first color in a whole new direction. Infinite possibilites, so little time! Of course when making a shade with black, the black you use will influence the color. There is a good exploration of the undertone of blacks here.

Here is an example of a ratio creating a 7 step gradient, with 5 mixed and 2 pure samples.L is lemon yellow and G is pure Grape. Each time you are changing the ratio by 10ml or 1/6. 

60L
50L:10G
40L:20G
30L:30G
20L:40G
10L:50G
60G

Dyeing thread or yarn with Procion MX dye

Here's how I dye yarn for couching.

On a piece of shelf liner (Bed, Bath and Beyond has the widest I've found so far) put separate patches of dyes in the colors you wish to use. My stash is short on blues, so that's what I'm dyeing here.

Preparing to dye yarn

 Remember how we organized the yarn so it wouldn't be a tangled mess after dyeing? You can see the synthetic wool I used for tying. It will not take the dye and will make it easy to untie the bundle after dyeing. The yarn is already soda soaked. In fact it is dripping wet. I find that soda saturated fiber takes the dye best. If it is dry it will take a great deal of dye to get good coverage.

 Now I take my gloved hands and mix and mingle the dye as desired to make the colors I want in the yarn. I prefer to work with small amounts of dye and add more as needed, since the soda ash from the fiber is going to be all over the work surface. This will contaminate the dye, so I don't want to put any dye back into my dyestock as the soda ash will start reacting with the dye stock. What's on the shelf liner stays on the shelf liner! Once I have the colors I want, it's batch and wash as normal. I tend to handwash the yarn as I don't want felting, and since I use it for couching it's ok if it's not as colorfast as the standard I hold my fabric to. Commercially dyed variegated yarns and threads tend to shoot for a one inch change in tone/color, so I aim for that too. Ish.

Yarn dyed by pulling the colors together from pools of dye concentrate

Dyeing mercerized fabric - worth it

Sometimes I buy JoAnn Fabrics muslin to dye, mainly because it's cheap and they have amazing coupons. But if you look at the difference below, you have to ask if cheap is really worth the price.

The mercerized fabric on the left has taken the same dye recipe so much more vibrantly and with so much more texture.

The mercerization process is pretty brutal for the poor fabric. It is given a bath in caustic soda, which causes the fibers to swell, increasing the surface area, and thus enabling them to accept more dye. Mercerization also makes the fabric stronger, gives it added luster, and makes it pre-shrunk to some limited extent (Of course this process also  leaves a nasty chemical mess to be disposed of).

Fabric pots for putting things in - super easy!

A favorite Winnie-the-Pooh story in my house is the one where Pooh discovers that it is Eeyore's birthday and no one is celebrating. Pooh and Piglet rush around and find him presents, but Pooh absentmindedly eats the present of honey on the way, and Piglet falls down and pops the balloon he was bringing Eeyore. When presented with an empty pot and a tattered balloon, Eeyore finds he has both a pot for putting things in, and something to put in it, and is uncharacteristically happy! There is something very satisfying about a pot for putting things in.

The chemist and her dad are off to South Africa, and I am resisting the urge to fill their suitcases with presents to take. I saw this awesome tutorial for making a fabric pot for putting things in, and am busy making some. They will be unfussy travellers, and light to boot, so perfect. They are pretty quick to make, depending on how much stitching you add. You cut and sew 2 squares and fusible batting, which I finished with hand-dyed thread, fold, sew the 4 seams, hand stitch the pockets and you are done!

You can make the pot as subtle or as wild as you like!

And I chose to make each button decoration different.

See the light shining through the needle holes? Couldn't have got that shot if I was trying!

It was fun to play with the Sweet Sixteen again, it's been a while. It made doing all the free-motion stitching a doddle.

If you widen the base size, then increase the size of the triangle seam or you end up with a very floppy end result as there is no peltex or timtex in this pot or bowl or box or whatever you want to call it.

What not to ask someone to take on an aeroplane for you, or no, I cannot take your canary's ashes to be interred in the land of its fathers...

The chemist is traveling to South Africa on Thursday. I was there in November. Most of our family is there. Suitcases bulge with presents. It made me ponder some points about the etiquette of asking if someone could take an item with them on a journey. Most people understand that it is hard to be separated from one's near and dear, and the chance to send them something to let them know you are thinking of them and missing them is rare and special. Most people are only too happy to do someone a favor. Unfortuately, sometimes ignorance or a lack of common sense leaves the traveler feeling abused, and less willing to be helpful in the future.

In the interests of fostering happy travels I offer the following musings:

If you want to send an item with the traveler it should be

LIGHT
COMPACT
UNBREAKABLE
UNOOZEABLE
UNWRAPPED
ABLE TO BE JETTISONED WITHOUT GUILT
ABLE TO BE DELIVERED EASILY


1. Space, space, space. If you don't travel a lot you may not think like a seasoned traveler. An international travel allowance is around 20 - 23 kg or 40 - 50 lbs. For a 2 week trip, this can get used up surprisingly fast. Someone once gave me around 15 kg of used children's clothing to give to someone in South Africa. I am not a charity. I am a traveler. I have my own luggage which I need to transport. If you wish to send a lot of things, or something very bulky, feel free to use FedEx.

2. Security. No one wants to end up in a small room with a man putting on a rubber glove in a meaningful way. Airlines have virtually no sense of humor about items which may constitute a threat. Anything you send needs to be unwrapped. However much you would like to cover your gift in ribbons and bows, the person who is transporting it needs to face stern TSA personnel and swear that they are familiar with everything in their luggage. Educate yourself as to what cannot be safely transported and don't send it!

3. Self-contained. No one wants their clothes to smell like your item, be covered in your item, or be colored by your item. Do not send those cinnamon pine cones, the scent of which penetrates your very skull. No Tennessee fire water. No home made jelly. If there is the slightest chance your item may cause issues, wrap it very well in clear plastic.

4. Delivery. The onus on making sure the item reaches its end goal is on you. Do not expect someone else to spend their vacation trying to connect with total strangers to deliver your gift.

5. Make it clear that should the item be lost or damaged, or should it prove impossible to deliver the item, you give full permission for it to be donated to someone else, or put in the trash with no hard feelings at all. Do not ask someone else to transport a priceless family heirloom.

6. Timing. Let the traveler know well in advance that you would be delighted if they would be kind enough to donate a corner of their luggage to you. Do not pitch up the night before they leave and begin showering them with items to fit in. Do not see them off at the airport and expect them to start squeezing things in for you.

All of these points also apply to people who are going home after a trip. It is terribly kind of you to want to give me a gift, but mainly I am delighted to see you, and would rather have a drink with you than be given a bottle of wine to take home.

Kudos to my extended family who give some of the most thoughtful small, light presents ever! Your compassion and ingenuity is much appreciated!