I really like dyeing t-shirts for Dave. He knows to buy 100% cotton ones since fiber reactive dyes are made to work on natural fibers. Well, he’s been taken lately with 50/50 shirts.
When we were in Hawaii this year we bought a couple souvenir shirts, and I have to admit that I really love the feel of those shirts. They are so light, and they always come out of the dryer looking perfect. So he challenged me to dye one of them. I decided that I’d low immersion dye one of each and see what happens. I”m using Royal Blue, that color I had trouble back in the very first session with these old dyes Dawn gave me.
The first dyeing session – yes, it took me more than one dyeing session – resulted in weak colors, but on both shirts. The shirt on the left is the 100% cotton. It has a bit more color and much more texture.
So I decided to over dye with same Royal Blue and see what would happen.
Yikes, they turned light purple. What happened to all of the blue?
So let’s try it one more time. This time I didn’t use the Royal Blue. I used Cerulean Blue and Magenta dye solutions I had mixed up from an earlier dyeing session. I also applied the dye solution in strips, alternating the colors on the shirt.
Here are the results.
The 100% cotton still has more texture and has a bit more color, but really isn’t that much different from the 50/50. I’m still not sure this was a good test because I still think the Royal blue is not working as it should. I ice dyed several of the dyes Dawn gave me including the Royal Blue and it came out again real light.
I expected the color to be muted due to the fact that half of the shirt is poly, but it should have performed much better on the 100%. But in the end, I like both shirts and he does too! My next experiment will be ice dyeing a 50/50 shirt with dye I trust.
And talking about beautiful color, this week my first iris appeared. Her name is Protocol. My iris area is so much smaller than it was several years ago, but now I can give them more attention. Looking forward to the next ones that are about ready to pop open.
The weather is still cool here, although we’ve had some warm days. However, the cool temps have made it great to work out in the garden. So I’ve been spending a lot of time out there.
But another time suck I’ve gotten into the last several weeks is genealogy. I go in spells, diving in every so many years. But now I’m in deep, focusing on my maternal grandfather’s family. My big question is when he ran away from home at 16 in 1909 (I know why he did which has been supported by other oral histories), where did he live? He ran away to Evansville, Indiana from his home in Rockport, which is 32 miles and currently 45 minutes away. I believe he stayed with his widowed aunt because it just makes sense, but have yet to find anyone or any documentation to confirm that. But I’ve just begun. Meanwhile, on this journey I’ve learned some other interesting things about his family.
Here he is plowing up his garden. I knew this sweet, generous man for just a short time. He died in 1963 when I was in the 6th grade. My last memory of him is the day I rode my bicycle over to his house to see how he was feeling since he had been terribly sick. He told me he was feeling better, and was looking forward to putting out his garden. I rode home happy. He died the next day.
Gosh, I sure didn’t mean to end on such a sad note. Looks like I have another good day to get out and weed. Hope you are enjoying your Spring.
What a good photo of your grandfather! Black and white photos have stood the test of time. I tell parents to occasionally print out images in black and white and then tuck them away. While we have photos of our grandparents, I’m not so sure the present generation will as people don’t seem to print out photos often; there just somewhere floating in the mysterious cloud. 🙂
Thanks for your post about the dyes and fiber content.
Genealogy takes hours upon hours. I work at it, too, and have 495 pages in a number of PDF files for one family line and 265 pages for another. Backing them up as PDF files as been a life-saver as our old computer died and the desktop publishing program I used is no longer available for Apple computers. PDF Editor (program) lets me add and edit text and add, delete, and remove photos. I can also add new pages. I am now trying out Affinity Publisher which is in beta testing to give feedback to the programmers. It is looking like a powerful program which I hope will be affordable when it is ready for sale.
This is a great photo of your grandfather doing something he loved and something you love.
Janice, You are so right about all of the pictures floating around. I’m also guilty of that after years of taking 35 mm pictures which are in boxes in the basement! I was amazed how well that scanned, as did a lot of other pictures some from the 30s. I’m so glad I have them. I also have gobbs of photos that I have no idea who they from the early 1900s. Too bad grandma didn’t write names on all of the pictures. Thankful for some of the ones she did.
Jane, Wow! That’s a lot of pages. Glad to hear you’re also working on it. The Heines side of my family had printed info in a 3 ring binder. Since I got on ancestry.com I’ve moved all of it there, although a lot of it was already there since others had researched it. But it’s a long journey but way interesting. Yeah, that photo is very special. Thanks for commenting.
I have some 50% cotton/50% polyester white Hanes EcoSmart clothing that I wanted to tie-dye. I have some darker colors of RIT all purpose dye and some of the RIT Dyemore made for snythetic fabrics. I really preferred some of the darker colors of the all-purpose dyes, and I was hoping to get some insight from you on whether I could initially dye the clothing in the all-purpose dye, then subsequently in the Dyemore (or vice-versa). Or could I mix the two types of dye together and dye it in the combined dye? What would be my best to get as much of the color from the all-purpose dye and then supplement the parts that didn’t pick it up with the colors from the dyemore for the synthetics?
Randall Jennings recently posted..ABC’s of Art Part 1
Randall, I don’t work with Rit, but I have read where with other dyes you can combine them and dye at the same time. If I were you, I’d check with Rit about combining them. Sorry I’m no help. Good luck!