Challenge Quilting

Have you ever had a piece of fabric that was soooooooo ugly, you just didn't have any idea what to do with it, yet you can't seem to part with the goofy thing????? Well, this was my issue when this piece of spotty brown stuff was "gifted" to me years ago. It was course and rough feeling, not quite like burlap, but close, and so darn ugly that it intrigued me enough to hang on to it for years. I found it again and decided that it was time to use it, or loose it. After some thought, a pattern for a sweatshirt design surfaced and the idea of the wall hanging came to life. I had all the fabrics in my "stuff" to complete this thing accept 1 piece for the overalls for baby bear. I did have a nice plaid print but it was a very bright black and white plaid, which was not going to work for this. So I put on my thinking cap. I have tea dyed things in the past, so I thru a piece of it, in tea. It tinted a little, but it wasn't dark enough, so I tried coffee dyeing. That didn't really do much for it either. I was bound and determined to not go out and buy anything for this ugly fabric thing I was about to embark on, so I opened up the cupboard and searched for something to use to make this fabric darker. Ah hah, there it was Soy Sauce. Nice and dark. I soaked this piece of tea and coffee stained fabric in soy sauce and Yahoo, it worked, the perfect shade I was looking for. Who would have guessed. Now here is where the lesson begins. Let me start with "DO NOT DO AS I DO", do as I say, and forget this stupid method. Yep it worked, but when I decided that the fastest way to get this thing dry and ready to use, was to press it. Well...

Not sure if any of you have had the opportunity to smell burning soy sauce, but it ain't one you really want to experience. Can you spell NASTY? There was a thick layer of smoke hanging over my sewing room, that burned your eyes, not to mention the horrid mess that was left on the bottom of the iron that took forever to scrap off. Even "iron off" groaned about cleaning up that mess. What was I thinking? A drive to get some fabric dye might just have been the best solution after all.

I am happy to say, that after the mess was cleaned up, I was delighted with the end results, but they will not and I do repeat, NOT be repeated ever again by me. This wall hanging is one of my very favorites though, and is one of the three that I will have hanging in the library.

Hope you all have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend. Please don't spend it trying to prove or disprove my soy sauce dyeing experience. Just trust me on this one!

:-)