Back to School

After being so relaxed from our Salado trip, I almost forgot that my Quilting U class, "Quilter's Palette," started yesterday! By the time I signed in last night, everyone had introduced themselves and there was a long list of discussion topics to wade through. I HATE being late to class! On the other hand, I didn't have to drive myself nuts waiting for the first lesson to be posted.

This is a class on dyeing fabric in colors that are good for landscape and portrait quilts. I wish I had taken the introductory dyeing class first, but it was held earlier last year, and I didn't want to wait for this one to come around again, so I'm jumping in. Dyeing is somewhat labor intensive, and even more so if all of your workspaces are cluttered up and you have to clean up before you can even begin :-)

I spent almost 2 hours this morning preparing, setting up, and getting the fabric into the dye pots; another hour waiting to pull the pieces out, and an hour rinsing them and getting them into the washer. According to the formulas, the colors should be, left to right in the photo, a mottled brown and a darker shade of mottled brown; mottled green and a darker shade of mottled green; mottled blue and a darker shade of mottled blue; and a light and dark variegation of grays. The browns came out too olive green, and the blues are too solid and not mottled enough. I love the gray piece, though!

With the exception of the blue pieces, all the mottling and variegation is just beautiful. But I hope I can get to the point where I can predict the outcome of the dye colors--even if it is a little like Christmas morning now, waiting to see what comes out of the dryer.