Dye Another Day

I've always wanted to create a dyeing class called "Dye Another Day", a spoof on the James Bond Movie, "Die Another Day".  In my mind I thought of this class as a continuation of my introductory low-water immersion dyeing class, but I have decided to use this name for any custom-designed dyeing class I am asked to deliver.  It just so happens I now have the chance to deliver my first "Dye Another Day" class.  My husband and I are heading up to the Northwest Territories in September (you may recall that I taught in Yellowknife in January and fell in love with the North).  We found a deal on flights and booked for September, which is considered peak aurora month. The Yellowknife Quilters Guild is once again offering two days of my workshops.  They've asked me to put together a dyeing class that shows how I dye my multi-coloured fabrics, as well as how I dye some of the specialty fabrics in my Textile Temptation Packs.

"Dye Another Day" also describes my days during this past week.  I spent a day with a very keen class of new dyers on Wednesday while teaching at Dragonfly Fabrics.  Also, since I will be selling my hand-dyed fabrics at the QuiltCo Quilt Show September 29 and 30 here in Ottawa, and given that I have only a few days after I get back from Yellowknife to get ready, I've had my head in the dyepots since last Saturday.  Then after that, I dyed another day, and another day. and another day, and today I am up to 119 meters, with about 20 to go.  Once my order of velvet comes in (probably this coming week) I have several colours of Textile Temptation Packs to replenish as well.  So things could well turn into "Dye Another Week".

Here are the results so far, still to be ironed, cut and (in some cases) bundled.  Greens are still in the dyepots.

I also have something exciting cooking up in the studio, inspired by the section below that I cropped out of a larger photo.  I like the way the curve of the leaves pulls the eye from upper left down through the middle and across to the right and brings it around again to the upper gold leaf.  I also like the triangle that the three leaves are arranged in.

I would really like to see the piece finished by the end of this month, but I need to be realistic given the remaining dyeing, a lot of ironing cutting and bundling.  In between now and the end of the month there will be a house guest and a friend in town.  This new piece will also be larger than any of my existing end of season hosta quilts, probably about 42" wide by 20" high.  The good news is that I don't need to dye another day for this one as I still have a wonderful stash of end-of-season hosta fabric I dyed at the end of 2010, and which you can see at this blog post.