SNOWDYEING

I've really been neglecting this blog for some time but current discussion on Quilt Art about snowdyeing stirred me to action -- once we got snow! Vermont snow has been a bit sparse in my area this year. Early this week we got a nice 6" so I set about using some of it to dye with. The dyes were no problem and I mixed them in some plastic cups:

but the physical part of the dying took a little thinking -- and serendipity! While rummaging in my storage room some plastic flower pots caught my eye and produced a Eureka! moment. The problem of what I could set them on so that the melted snow would not stay with the fabrics was solved with some clean cat food cans that were awaiting recycling.











Some scraps of white muslin were soaked in a soda ash/salt solution, the liquid squeezed out by hand and crumpled into the flower pots then set outside to (hopefully) freeze overnight.
The next day these were topped with snow and dyes added.











They were left overnight and rinsed and washed the next day;






















After washing and ironing I had these pieces:

















































With the dye and snow 'drippings' I dyed these scraps without presoaking in the soda ash solution:


















And when I contemplated the used cand emptied cans I thought they also made an interesting photo:

















It was all so much fun that I did a second batch before the snow melted -- but those pieces will be on the next blog!