Dyeing Vintage Fabrics

I love to dye and I love old and vintage fabrics. When I’m shopping at thrift stores, the place I first head to is the area with napkins and tablecloths.

Here at Happy Acres we try not to use a lot of paper products. We quit using paper napkins many years ago, using old and vintage napkins instead. Unless the meal is really messy, we can get several days out of our napkins. Then they all go in the washer with other towels and return clean and ready for the next meal. We even use them on picnics.

On my last trip to the local thrift store I found these lovelies. They are made of the same fabric that I’ve found in old tablecloths. I absolutely love them and will be using them on our table. I’m thinking about scanning in the art, printing it out on fabric, and adding it to placemats so they’ll all match. Or easier still, I could make some placemats and dye them one of the napkin colors.

vintagenaps

I have a boat load of white vintage napkins. I love to dye them. The patterns just pop with the color.

3vintagedyed

We also don’t use Kleenex. I’m not sure when that started –  maybe when I ran out of them – that we started using hankies, or in my hubby’s case, dyed bandanas.

On my last trip to that thrift store I  found these beautiful hankies.

vintagehankies

Over the years I have bought a lot of these men’s hankies at thrift stores.  The pattern is hard to see on the white.

whitehankies

Here they are dyed.

dyedhankiesYou can really see the pattern now that they are dyed.  The yellow hankie’s embroidery  is also lovely dyed.

dyedhankiecloseThey are almost too pretty to blow into, but what is better than when you are suffering with a cold than to have a colorful hankie to suffer with you. It’s also nice to open up my purse and see some color peeking out!

Hope you are having a colorful week.