Chinese Whispers

[Maureen A.]

Great fabrics and scarf. I can see the difference now between Maureen's vibrant pieces and Rosemary's more subtle shades using the Dylon.

Limbania your method has far too many stages for me

Wendy, I think you will find that Rosemary used indigo dye, not Dylon for her scarf.

[Nancy R.]

Lotti - What wonderful colors! I especially love the silks, too! I have plans to do more with silks, starting with some wholecloths, but I'm sticking with commercially dyed fabrics for now. Although I'd love to dip into yours!

Nancy

[Maureen A.]

Lottie, I love your dyed fabrics especially the silks. I have dyed silk as well and the colors are georgous.
One day :lol: :lol: I will use them in something. :wink: :wink:

[wendy w.]

Wow Lotti those colours are fabulous, I can only aspire to a collection like that 8)

[Rita C.]

Okay what is going on here? I go away for a few days and suddenly your have all turned into alchemists! :lol: Maureen it was great to see the photos of the Chinese Whispers quilts from this years show at Loch Lomond. What a fascinating progression it took. Lots of room for artistic license thank goodness. :roll:

As for all the beautiful dyed fabrics... what a wonderful collection. Terrie, I bought myself a bolt of plain off white cotton from Ikea and used that to dye lots of different colours. I did the low-immersion method and had mixed results. I also just used Dylon because that's all I can get here. Thanks for the links to the UK companies for Procion dyes and cotton for dying Maureen they will be useful. It is great fun dying your own fabric as you never know quite how it will end up. I used one of my own hand-dyes for the borders on my Laura Nownes quilt and I used the same fabric on the back. Here's a link: http://www.thequiltshow.com/os/class...lasses_id/1028

My thoughts were that if it was not good enough to use in a quilt I could always just use it as the backing for a quilt. And the Ikea fabric is 54" wide so that is big enough for a small quilt. I also used some of my own fabrics on the Primitive Blocks quilt challenge. Here's a link: see-quilts/show-and-tell-quilts/

I could be very easily tempted to do some more fabric dying but I think I would want to get some of the proper cotton for dying fabric rather than just the Ikea stuff. So I would need a little time to get my act together.

As for what I have been doing, well i finished my floral applique piece that I started ages ago and turned it into a cushion cover. Here's a photo:

I also took away with me and finished making about 150 3/4" hexies for a project I will be working on for the a long while to come.

Marilyn I am glad that you are getting a bit of a respite now and hopefully it will continue.

Now back to quilting my Sampler.

[Lotti D.]

Rita, what a wonderful floral appliqué. Thank you for putting in that butterfly - flowers are so much more 'so' if there's a bug present... Well you know that I'm bonkers about beasties that hang out in and near flowers, well the butterfly, bumblebee and honeybee type of beasties anyway Welcome back

[Rita C.]

Thanks Lotti! I was just wondering as I was posting a comment on your B/W quilt, what are you going to make with all the blue fabrics you are collecting? And is it going to be a blue and white quilt or just all blues?

[Rita C.]

If you gals would just keep on posting all this eye candy, and keep it coming, I could save a lot by just looking and drooling over all those great fabrics. Of course, it's not the same if you can't touch.

[wendy w.]

Beautiful little quilt Rita. You really are putting yourself through it making so many hexagons :shock:

I hadn't thought of Ikea, of course their fabrics are very reasonable. Trouble is that I'll get tempted with all sorts if I visit the store.

[Nancy R.]

Rita - Your applique cushion is wonderful! I love everything about it! I can't imagine making something out of 3/4" hexies! You have a lot more patience than I do! I've got a hexie quilt that I started years ago, but I'm using 2" or 3" hexies. That's about the best I can do!

We got an Ikea in Denver a year or so ago, but I've still never been. I've heard it's great, so it's on my someday list.

Nancy

[Renata L.]

Wow, I am forced by current circumstances not to be able to get to my sewing machine or log on as I would like to so when I do log on... wow! look at what is going on, all that hand dyeing... such beautiful colors and fabrics all of you! I just keep scrolling up and down at all your pictures in total amazement. Rita, your cushion cover is lovely and I'm so glad you finished it because this way I got to see it!!!

[Renata L.]

Welcome back Rita. What a beautiful floral applique cushion cover. I like the butterfly too

Maureen, Rosemary and Lotti, you hand dyed fabrics are gorgeous. Do you dye silk same as cotton? What kind of silk? I'll have to do some research and give it a try. Any advice is appreciated :wink:

[Renata L.]

Lotti, your hand dyes are gorgeous, thanks for the view.

Rita, your cushion cover is beautiful - again wonderful eye candy.

The thing with dyeing is it is all experimental, and if the results are not good, you can either over dye it or just cut it into smaller pieces (isn't that what they recommend for ugly fabrics :wink: )

[Rita C.]

Thanks ladies for the kind comments. Rosemary you are right about that. There isn't a fabric I wouldn't use somewhere sometime.

[ANNE E.]

Hi Rita,
You can get cloth for dyeing at
http://www.doughtys.com 60" wide £3.99m or
http://www.ladysewandsew.co.uk 44" wide£5.00m
I don't know what the postage would be for you
I loved your cushion cover the colours are gorgeous
Anne