Dye Happy 6 Discharge

Today was the last day of my 6-part Dye Happy class, and the topic was Discharge, or as some students called it, "undyeing fabric". As is often the case with classes that extend over a 6-month period, life happens and students disappear. But here you can see the die/dye-hards, who came to virtually every class, including the last one.

Left to right: Heather, Tatiana, me, Barb, Sylvia, Susan, Helen, Kirsten, Sandra, David

Fortunately it was a warm (by Ottawa standards) sunny day, and we were able to put the pails of bleach solution and anti-chlor solution out the back door of the community centre to keep the fumes out of the classroom. Speaking of anti-chlor, please please please use a bleach-neutralizing agent to neutralize any bleach that might remain in the fabric in order to avoid damage to the fabric over time. Also, it is a myth that vinegar neutralizes bleach; in fact the mixing of vinegar with bleach can result in an even more noxious chemical than bleach itself.

Some really cool pieces resulted, like Susan's T-shirt (which started out as a plain black T-shirt) and was fan-folded, twisted and bound.

Note, the sky was just about as blue today in Ottawa as in the California desert (see my March 17 post titled "Inspiration from California".

Here are some other knock-out pieces!

These two are just dyeing too happily!!

Students also brought some of their finished dye-painted pieces from our last class.
Tatiana's tulips:

Susan's spiral design, already quilted and finished.

Heather's tree and tulips, with an interesting irregular shape, also finished and ready for the Ottawa Valley Quilt show.

David's boat, trimmed to an oval, and ready to be placed into a larger piece.

Although developing this class was a lot of work, it was definitely worth it, and I am going to miss the class and this group. If this blog has been heavily weighted toward the subject of dyeing, that is because I've spent the last 9 months developing and teaching the class. Now I hope to turn to making some art quilts in between my teaching engagements and get to work on developing my new "Threads: Uncommon & Unforgettable" class, which will be offered at the Haliburton School of the Arts during the first week of August. The Art Quilt will be offered there the last week of July.

Understanding Jurors Decisions

Upon my return from vacation, a letter from the Canadian Quilters Association was waiting for me. I had entered four pieces into this year's National Juried show. Below are the four entries. Two were accepted, and two were rejected. See if you can guess which quilts fall into which category? The answer comes after the pictures.
1. Standing Ovation

2. Losses 2

3. Forgiveness

4. Sun Temple

OK, here is the answer. 1 and 2 (Standing Ovation and Losses 2) were rejected. 3 and 4 (Forgiveness and Sun Temple) were accepted. As it turns out, I happen to like the rejected pieces better than the accepted ones. So you just never know!!! I'd love to hear your opinions!

Inspiration from California

My husband and I just returned yesterday from a 10 day vacation in Southern California. We flew into Las Vegas and after an overnight rest there, we headed out to California, our first stop being three days in Death Valley National Park. My favorite part of the park was the Mesquite Sand Dunes, made especially gorgeous when shadows fell on them at the closing of day.

Zabrieske Point lookout was also pretty spectacular:

From Death Valley we headed through the Mohave National Preserve to Joshua Tree National Park. Here is an example of some very interesting tumbleweed near some dunes in the Mohave.

Why oh why is the sky always so much bluer in the desert? After Joshua Tree National Park, we headed west and ended up travelling on Route 78, through the Anzo Borrego desert, coming to the lovely little town of Julian. Thereafter, the terrain turned into more fertile land with daffodils, apple blossoms and orange groves. Wonderful to see since we won't be seeing anything floral in Ottawa for another two months!

We headed to Oceanside, on the coast, to catch the last day of the the Visions, No Boundaries art quilt show at the Oceanside Museum of Art
If you aren't familiar with this show, it is one of the most prestigious art quilt shows in North America. 39 quilts are chosen for this show from more than 600 entries, so the competition is pretty stiff! I was not disappointed.
But equally impressive were the largest Hens and Chicks plants I have ever seen outside our hotel in Oceanside. What I had never noticed before, was that some have a red rim on the edges of the leaves.

From there we drove south along the coast to San Diego. Our first stop was the Visions Art Museum.

The main exhibit at the museum right now is a joint show by Dominie Nash and Jean Lyons Butler called Counterpoint. One of the most exciting parts of the visit was meeting the Executive Director, Barb Smith, who recognized my name! I had forgotten when I walked in that this was the gallery where my piece Reach sold last fall, when the SAQA show it was in made its last stop there. Here is a picture of Beth and I.

I really enjoyed the spring weather in San Diego. Flowers were in bloom everywhere, especially Bird of Paradise.

Up close, they almost look like glass art.

Other types of flowers were also in bloom.

On our last day we visited Balboa Park. Bougainvillea were in full bloom, next to desert cactus.

This foliage photo was taken in the botanical gardens at Balboa Park.

I enjoyed the colour in the Spanish Village Arts Center. Many artists have studios within the Center, and visitors can see them working as well as have the opportunity to purchase their work. The Village is very colourful with pastel coloured stone walkways. These three turquoise chairs caught my eye!

We are back home safe and sound and now really eager for spring to arrive in Ottawa!

Home Again

I just returned last night from an 8 day teaching trip around Southern Ontario. Three workshops and two lectures in the space of three days, then a day off, and another day of workshops. One more day off and a lecture! My first day of teaching at the York Heritage Quilt Guild in Toronto started with a fabric frenzy when I opened my bins of hand-dyed fabric. Members were eager to have fabric for their projects. I could barely get their attention to teach the class! The Mustard Pickle Textile Temptation Packs sold out before I even left Toronto. Day one was my Surface Design class. You can see Erica applying Shiva Paintstiks with a stencil brush on a freezer paper stencil she cut.

Here is the result:

Day two was "In Full Bloom". Joanne's tulip was coming along nicely by the end of the class:

After class I drove to St. Catharines to deliver a lecture to the Niagara Heritage Quilter's Guild. Traffic in Toronto and on the QEW was slow so I screeched into the meeting with only 10 minutes to spare. My stay at Robinsong B&B in Thorold was delightful, and my only regret was that I couldn't stay longer. I must have been very tired on workshop day because I didn't take any pictures!
I had Friday off and was back in top form by Saturday when I headed off to Toronto again, this time to teach for the Yorkshire Rose Quilt Guild. The workshop was once again "In Full Bloom".

My last stop was Orangeville, a small city northwest of Toronto, where I delivered a lecture to the Dufferin Piecemakers Quilt Guild. Orangeville is a wonderful blend of urban amenities and country charm. I was billetted at the lovely home of Janet Slater and her husband, and their two charming cats, Rebecca and Fiona. The Slater home was once a one-room schoolhouse, built in the 1880's. What was the schoolhouse is now a large and comfy kitchen. Upstairs in the loft is Janet's studio.

Major additions and renovations have taken place to expand the house over the years. Although I am told she is usually shy, Rebecca was my best friend from the moment I arrived.

All through breakfast the next morning she sat on my lap.

We looked for Fiona and found her cuddled inside the quilt that Janet was working on.

Cats sure know how to spend a winter day!

Dye Happy 5 - Painting With Thickened Dyes

Today was session 5 of my Dye Happy class, Painting with Thickened Dyes. I found it to be a very relaxing class as almost everyone spent the afternoon painting. Once students got their design to fabric, they mixed up their thickened dyes (using Print Paste from Prochemical Dyes)and got to working painting. Fabric was soaked in soda ash solution ahead of time and line dried. The soda ash raises the pH and causes the dye molecules to bond with the cellulose molecules in the cotton. Here are just a few of the designs in progress.

Susan's spiral design:

Dorothy's bird:

David's boat:

Kirsten's poppy:

Tatiana's tulips:

Sylvia gives the crotons a try:

Textile Temptations

Last week I dyed more Textile Temptation Packs in preparation for my upcoming teaching trip. This week I ironed, cut and packaged them. My studio was filled with packages them this morning.

This is what they look like up close.

The packages contain a fat quarter of each of silk-rayon velvet, cotton, silk dupioni, silk organza, and a half meter of cheesecloth. Everything in a package has been subjected to the same dyebath, but each fibre takes the dye a little differently. I've been dyeing these for a few years now and they've been popular. Haven't shown them on my website yet, nor have I made it easy to order fabric from my website. It's great to have the fabric to take on the road with me when I'm teaching, but it would be impossible for me to constantly be filling mail orders when I'm on the road, not to mention that I can't and don't want to spend every day with my head in the dyepots. Most of the packages have food-related names ... can you tell where my heart is?
Here we have the greens, from left to right: 1) Pistachio, 2) Pesto, and 3) Mustard Pickle

Here from left to right are 1) Pomegranate, 2) Raspberry Cordial, and 3) Grape Jam

1) Butter Creme, 2) Creme Caramel, 3) Spiced Pumpkin

1) Des Bleuets, 2) Marine (couldn't think of a food this colour!)

and finally 1) Cafe Mocha, and 2) Chocolatini

One of the things I'm realizing today though is the reason I'm so busy is because I'm often dyeing fabric for a particular class, in addition to preparing to teach that class. I do this, for example, for the In Full Bloom class, to ensure there are a good variety of values for each flower. I need to think about this as I'm not getting in the studio to work on my own work much, but on the other hand I'm making a living from what I love to do. I wouldn't worry so much if I didn't have a joint show with Cathy Breedyk-Law coming up in September. I really need some new work because I'm sure folks don't want to see the same stuff as at my last two shows. Oh well, April should have a little time in it for the studio! Busy is good!

113 Meters

No, I'm not talking about snow, although it might have felt that way yesterday when I fired up the snowblower and shovel!! I'm talking about the 113 meters of fabric I've dyed in the last couple of weeks. Here it is. I was smart this time, and took up my friend Denise Cloutier's offer to iron it for me. Frankly, I was a tad whacked after just the dyeing. In record time (2 days) Denise had all 113 meters ironed. I'm still working on the velvets, organzas, dupioni silk and cheesecloth for the Textile Temptation packs. All this is in preparation for my teaching travels later this month.
To hear me talk, it sounds like I'm impressed by volume. Yup, I'm a "more is better" kind of woman" More fabric, more chocolate, more silver jewellrey. More is always better.
After yesterday's storm, my oldest kitty, Johnnie, is enjoying a nap in the sun, and I'm tempted too... If you subscribe to my e-newsletter, you may remember that 17 year old Johnnie had to retire as my studio assistant when he went blind earlier this year. He's still doing well, as long as his enviroment stays the same. Speaking of my e-newsletter, the latest issue will be available later today. If you'd like to receive it you can subscribe here.