Gardens and Dyeing

The wild flowers are blooming, I wanted to try this flower, I believe it's called tick seed, I was suppose to get a orange

but I got a nice yellow gold.

My daughter sent me some sweet gum leaves from down South, some I simmered in a pot with wool, linen and cotton and some I wrapped up in wool fabric and steamed. The little balls are the seed pods.

They took wonderfully on wool (cotton and linen not so good).

I love the detail on this piece. This will go in the quilt I'm making, well actually all these pieces will.

I also wrapped wool fabric with mullein leaves, steamed them and left them wrapped for a week. One piece I placed them running in a straight line and the other like a flower or sun.

They are a beautiful bright yellow.

Some of my dye garden plants are starting to bloom, on the left are orange cosmos, the right is madder root I planted this year. It is not a beautiful plant, with little yellow flowers and sticky, picky stems and leaves. The roots must be 3 years old to be of use for the dye pot.

Close up of the Cosmo.

I didn't have a lot of flowers but they are full of dye. I love the color. From left to right wool fabric, next wool fabric thrown in at the end with a little dye left, next an vintage linen napkin, and a piece of cotton fabric. The color of the linen and cotton are much peacher in real life. I love this dye and I have a lot more flowers coming.

A few skeins of yarn I dyed awhile ago and finally washed out, chamomile, dill, carrot top in iron pot, and black walnut. I think they are so pretty hanging there, I hated to put them away.

A few more pictures from Dow Children's' garden. This was a wonderful rain barrel with a spout at the bottom to hook a hose to.

The raised beds are part of a community garden, you pay $25.00 a year, you take care of it and enjoy all of the veges. Each family makes their own scare crows for their garden.

Another part of the children's garden with a great straw scare crow. I felt like I was in Peter Rabbit's garden.

Along the sidewalk was this tunnel with grape vines growing up it.

And from the inside you can see all the grapes.

This was the cutest "green" turtle in one of their ponds.