Washed out

Here are fabrics that have been washed out & boiled out. I'm losing dye somewhere. I rewatched my class on wax resist and dyeing so will try something new next time. I was combining what I learned for that class with what I learned in my class for just dyeing (without any resist). Anyway, here are the results after all the steps.

Faded. Even lighter in person than in the picture. 

Funny story: I couldn't find my jalapeño cookie cutter to make a potato stamp. I thought I had it, but it turned out to be a goldfish. So, I used the goldfish but added some extra leaves on about half of this piece. Then I found the pepper stamp, which made the goldfish peppers look like red carrots. Oh, well! 

Better, but lime green isn't what I was going for. 

Not at all what I wanted for flowers, teacups & teapots. Might overdye this one. 

Cool fall design, but colors are kind of weird. 

I tried using lace as a resist. Not a good thing. This one is really a deeper purple & a cool look after overdyeing it in deep purple. 

This is closer to maroon in real life. Weird. 

Tried using a water based resist & painting in Texas. Where it didn't run past the resist it looks cool. Otherwise, you have Texas with Arkansas, Louisiana, Mexico , New Mexico, and the Gulf of Mexico. LOL! 

I will either redye some of these or just use them where I can. Trial & error. 

Dyeing and Waxing

When women mention dyeing and waxing, they are generally referring to hair. Needless to say, when I tossed boiling into the mix on Facebook, my friends were a bit taken aback! I've been trying my hand at dyeing fabric for a couple of years. Recently, I added wax printing (batik) to the process. I'm loving the process, but my results aren't usually how I've imagined them in my head. It's a learning process. I would love to become good enough at this to sell my fabric pieces. In fact, I may even try tossing a few onto my Etsy store soon just to see how it goes.

Here are some pictures of initial attempts at the process.

This was supposed to be the Yellow Rose of Texas. The blue shows up somewhat in this picture, but in person, it was very hard to see the Texas. This piece got more wax, some bleach, some dye, and more wax and dye. Waiting for it to dry now!

Butterflies in pink on peach. Except you can't make out the butterflies. I did more waxing and overdyed it. It's now a maroon funky piece that will have to be used as a filler for something. 

Love this one. It faded when I washed it, though. Still pretty, but a very pale pink. I need to use more dye next time. The "stamp" is a part of a back massager from Walmart! LOL! 

Cheap potato masher & a mini bell pepper provided the stamps. Added some more color & stamps to this. Waiting to see the final result. 

Way too pale a red. I re-dyed it in red for vibrance. I stamped hearts in Texas (as in "deep in the heart of Texas) and added some jalapeños (or red peppers, to be accurate). We'll see how it comes out. 

The part I don't like that I need to find a work around is removing color in between dyes. You can't get some colors next to each other (they'd mix) so you have to remove some of the color. The best way is with bleach and vinegar. NOT together! One, then the other. I want to see if there are any safer ways to do this. The fumes aren't good for any of us. If I do it again I'll try going outside & using dishpans. 

I've also hand "dyed" some fabric with fabric paint. I've used Dye-Na-Flow from Jacquard and have some Lumiere to use, too. I tried just adding Textile Medium to craft acrylic, but the paint is still too stiff when it dries. The Jacquard fabric paints are very soft when they dry, just like dye. 

I'll share pictures of these fabrics finished when they're ready!