Garden Photos

Had to get out in the garden today. It was way overdue. Did some raking and weed pulling,

 then threw lots of mulch on it. I have quite a few pomegranates.  

Played around with the photo above in Photoshop and came up with this.

  The shadows really add a lot.

The last of the Sunflowers

More Hand-dyed fabrics

Had time last Sunday to do a little dyeing. Here's the results.

This was folded and dyed in a small box, with orange in bottom of the box

 and blue added to folded edges.

Closeup of piece.  Definitely needs something more in the middle, silkscreening 

or some kind of texture.

This one I accordion folded the fabric, rolled it up, put a few rubber bands around it to keep  the roll together and  placed it into a small container.  Next I squirted dyes into the folded edges on both ends.

Really like how this one came out.

Closeup

This one was scrunched up into a small container, adding one color at a time, scrunching up more fabric, adding another color and so on.

Close up

Another Closeup

This one was placed in a large garbage can lid.  I pleated the fabric at tboth ends, tyeing it together and made small circles using rubber bands at random in center.  Then I squirted different dyes onto it.

This closeup shows the floral like designs.

New Quilt

The mother of one of the teachers at our school has been battling pancreatic cancer for some time now.  A few of us decided to get together to maker her a lap quilt.  My job this weekend was to sew together the blocks for the top made by a couple other staff members and myself, cut the backing and get it ready for a layering party at lunch Tuesday.

It's from a pattern called Take Five by Deirdre K. Brown.  Not my usual kind of quilt but am pleased with how it turned out and hope it will comfort her.

Arte de Tiza in Paso Robles

This week was all about getting students geared up to participate in the annual Arte de Tiza chalk art festival in Paso Robles, which is a part of the Taste of Paso Robles.  Twenty of my students showed up.  I was very proud of the work they created.

 Above are some of the winners from yesterday receiving their awards and prizes!

Below are some other pictures of ones I really liked.

More Shibori and Discharged Fabrics

Here are a couple more fabrics I made recently.The one below was an ice-dyed piece that I arashi shibori dyed.  Below is a closeup of one area.

This was an ice dyed piece as well which I then stamped using a bleach gel.  I think the gel was little old and not very strong.  Might need to do more of that to this one when I have a chance.

Itajime Shibori Over-dyed and Batik with Discharge

Below is an overdyed itajime piece.  Here is the original fabric.  I liked it but felt it needed more complexity.

So I accordion foldeded it, used two round coasters clamped together and squirted yellow, orange, red and black carefully and strategically around the coasters. 

Closeup below

Below is a piece that was batiked and became very dark.  Sorry, I couldn't find a picture of the original.  I shibori discharged it using bleach/water in a 50/50 mix.

New Shibori Fabrics

Over Labor Day weekend I had time to do some over-dyeing and discharging of fabrics that already had patterns previously created upon them.  I actually did more, but will need to post those later when I have a chance.

Below is the closeup.

This fabric had been previously low immersion dyed and stamped.  I accordion folded it and rolled it up, placing it in a small plastic container so it stayed in a roll.  Next I squeezed red and black dye on the crests of the folds on both ends.

Below is the closeup

This was an itajime fabric made previously and I wrapped it around PVC and did 

arashi shibori using black.

This fabric was itajime dyed, then discharged, re-tied and dyed and then arashi shibori dyed yesterday.  I think it's done.  Love the layers of pattern in all of these.