Monday, September 27, 2010

Easy Dyeing without Dye....







Does anyonelse live on the computer?? Facebook, Ebay, Etsy, Blogging, Email, OH MY! LOL!



Well, it is time for snowmen.. A bit a gray is nice sometimes, but I lean towards a warmer shade of off-white. Sometimes I get it a bit too dark with dyes and have to make reindeer or bunnies...lol....

This was very simple to do. If I plan to dye, I save that day's old coffee, it is great to tone down colors that went bright, etc.. I knew I needed more creamy white for sheep and snow folks, so I took 1/4 yard of Dorr Natural. I grabbed just a few onion skins, like about 6. I threw wool and all into a pot. I used the coffee instead of water, sorta wrapped my wool around onion skins. I turned on the pot, let come to a boil, turned it way down for a few minutes, say maybe 10-15 minutes. I added my vinegar and turned the heat off and let it sit until I had time to rinse. I ran it through a spin cycle and dried it, and....this is the result......FUN & EASY!




Almost forgot my gobbly guys! Above are my latest creations! I used my turkey pattern for both, and just modified it a bit it for the pillow.




5 comments:

Kathy (woolfind) said...

Cathy, Loved your onicn skin/coffee dyeing! Great look to the wool.
your turkey's are adorable too. Soooo much, that I had bought your turkey pattern and made a couple. Sold 2 at Colonial day(posted on my blog a couple weeks ago) and had to keep the 3rd one for myself. Still need to assemble it. You have such sweet patterns!!

Kim said...

Your turkeys turned out great. And thanks for the tip on the dyeing.
And yes, sometimes it can be overwhelming with blogs, emails, facebook.....but we would be lost without it! I keep saying I'm going to deactivate my facebook account but I never do.

Rock River Stitches said...

Thanks for the tip on dyeing with onion skins!! And your turkey...I love it!

Tammy

Hooked on Primitives said...

Thanks so much everyone! Kathy, Joanne mentioned you were making the turkey, it goes fast and I am so glad you like him!! I will have to get over to your blog and see! Sounds fun!

That Facebook, it is addictive..lol!

I like using coffee on light colored wool, it seems to come out really "natural" or something..lol Thanks! Cathy

Dog Trot Farm said...

Cathy, thank you for all the wool dyeing hints. I do tend to dye my winter whites in a tea bath. Just gives the white a "softer" appearance. Your hand work is just lovely and so too are your wonderful patterns.