Up, Up, and Away!

I did it! I managed to get motivated with my chalkboard project, and I managed to finish my dining room wall mural. The painted metal hot air balloons we bought in Annie's Attic in Mt. Dora, FL no longer are floating in space. They are in a blue sky soaring over a sunny meadow. The only problem is that my projects sort of take on a life of their own. This one decided it needs to grow some flowers and be the view from a European garden. I now must continue painting to add the flowers. I have also gone to Home Depot once more and bought some wooden lattice work. I have sanded it and plan on using some cherry stain on it and sealer, then placing it against my dining room wall and covering it with fake vines to add to the garden vista. There is a JoAnn's Fabrics near me that is moving and is having blow out sales to get rid of their inventory, so hopefully I can get some vines cheap. The picture above is the current stage of the project. To check out more walls murals in my home and additional artwork check out http://www.kizmetkreations.com/artgallery1.html

Magic Walls!

It's funny how life works. As I mentioned earlier this summer, I have a list of half finished or unstarted projects that I was planning to work on this summer since my kids were home and I would have more time due to not being a class mom, chauffeur, etc. Well, I didn't get that much done because my kids were home.

This project actually happened by mistake. I went to home depot one day to get plastic cement for a rocket my son was making for cub scouts. It turns out that the glues are on the paint aisle. While locating the glue, I eyed the glow in the dark paint I needed to finish the constellations in my son's room. I then spyed the item that inspired this project: chalk board paint.

This was the simplest project I have done in a while. We are trying to make part of the garage into a play area to occupy my youngest while I am working out there. We have been trying to cover the walls gradually with tapestries and shelving because they are full of holes and old wiring. I started painting this chalkboard on the lower half of a wall so my kids could reach it. The directions said to use a roller, which probably would have been faster, but I used a brush. Two coats and it looks great. Of course, I got a little out of hand and started painting sections of other walls with the excuse that I could write work ideas or notes to myself. Then I painted the inside of two kitchen cabinets for family members to write messages for each other. The paint dried fast so I was able to apply two coats within a few hours. It was just like using regular paint.

The simplicity of this project inspired me further last weekend. I ended up painting the constellations on my son's ceiling with the glow in the dark paint. I also temporarily finished the mural in my dining room. Look for more on this in my next post.

Creating a Play Space in the Garage

Last month I started writing about my half started projects that I planned to complete this summer. Well, I am off to a slow start as I have been spending a lot of time organizing cubscout activities and dying clothes.

However, I did manage to get half way through my garage floor project. I drew a map of my neighborhood and measured my son's hotwheels cars so I could make the map to scale. My son helped me tape off the roads, and then we spray painted meadow green paint over the area. My garage ended up having a green dust all over it from the paint that I ended up cleaning up for days afterward. It got all over everything. Spray paint was definitely not the way to go.

The second problem was when we pulled up the tape. We had used blue painter's tape, but it still ripped up the gray paint from the floor underneath. Thankfully I had leftover gray paint and was able to touch it up.

The next thing I need to do is paint some houses and the yellow lines on the road before putting a sealant over the design. The problem is finding the time to do this without having my one year old play around in the paint.

Faux Pas Corrected

Here is the corrected ladies' top that was featured in Jamaican Tie-Dye Gone Awry.

After the fiasco trying the traditional Jamaican tie-dye, my husband and I had to come up with a new idea. We were stuck with a bunch of children's sets, men's tanks, and men's shirts that were not fit to be displayed on our web site. We realized that however hideous the clothing had become, we were lucky that at least the colors were fairly light. We ended up re-designing these shirts as if they were blanks. The result was that areas that would normally have been white in a finished design had a pale tan hue. We were able to save the projects with a little extra time and creativity. The main lesson here is that no matter how much you screw up a project, there is always some way to fix it. The results may not be what you expected, but sometimes they can come out even better.

-Donna

Jamaican Tie-dye Gone Awry

I was telling someone a few weeks ago about my tie-dye business. I don't remember who it was, but it had to be a parent of a young child, because they said to me, "Oh, I saw that segment on Sesame Street. It looked like fun." Now, having a one year old, I knew exactly what they were talking about. I have seen this segment several times myself.

For those of you who do not have young children or watch Sesame Street for fun yourselves, let me fill you in. Grover has just returned from Jamaica where he was given a one of a kind tie-dye t-shirt. The scene then flashes to a video clip where a man demonstrates the traditional Jamaican tie-dye technique. He wraps a shirt around a bottle and secures it with rubberbands and then dunks it in a pot of dye which he has heated over a fire. The shirt is then removed, the rubberbands taken off, and the shirt re-wrapped and dyed again in a second color. This process is done a few more times using various colors. The shirt looks very brown at the end of the process. After it is washed some of the dye fades and the shirt has become various earth tones.

Well, I am always trying new techniques so I figured I would test this out. My husband and I wrapped some shirts around some bottles we had, (recycling at its best), and tried this technique. I was skeptical, but after the wash I realized the results were worse than I expected! The clothing looks like the rags we use to absorb excess dye! Needless to say, the results were not up to our standards, and you will not be seeing these pieces on our site. However, I am posting one here for everyone to have a good laugh.

Supplies For My Car Road Project

I stopped at Home Depot this morning and inquired about what paint to use for my garage floor neighborhood project. The salesperson suggested some indoor/outdoor spray paint and recommended that I use painter's tape to mark the areas I want to paint. Since I already painted the floor gray, I figured this would be the street, and I would paint the residential areas over the gray. I chose meadow green to spray for the "yards" and found a beige color to paint "houses". After that, I think the spray paint won't work for the details so I will have to break out my acrylics and a small paint brush. Hopefully nobody will walk on it until I put some kind of protective coating over it. I want to get started right away, but need to clean my garage again. We recently moved the baby into a toddler bed, and her crib is right where I need to paint. I'm contemplating a garage sale, if I can get over the heat.

Ideas O'Plenty

I recently bought a copy of Artful Blogging at my local book store. It was an easy read that has inspired me to get off my butt and start some of the creative projects I have been wanting to do. I have been very busy with tie-dying lately and building my online store. I am still going full throttle with this but am waiting to hear back from a knowledgeable website with some tips for dying rayon.









In the meantime, summer is starting and my kids will be home with me, so gone are the short quiet hours during the baby's nap where I can work on line. I decided this will be the perfect opportunity to work on some household projects I have been putting off since last year.

• Neighborhood Map-We recently painted our garage floor a light gray. I promised my son I would draw and paint our neighborhood on half of the floor for him to drive his hot wheels cars around on.




• Faux Mexican Tile-My home was build in the '70's and is surrounded by a hideous concrete patio. I would love to put down tile, but it is too costly and we would need to resurface the concrete due to cracks and it being uneven. I found directions on BHG.com for creating faux mexican tile with paint, so this is my current plan




• Wall Mural- I started a project in my dining room where I wanted to paint a french countryside as a background for these metal hot air balloons we bought. I started it several months ago, and left the project incomplete




• Faux Marble Desk Top- In addition to tie-dying, I do custom scrapbooking at Kizmet Kreations. Anyone that scrapbooks or does other crafts knows that a traditional desk is less than ideal as a workspace. Instead I created a series of large pieces of wood placed on top of filing cabinets to allow for a 14' desk space. The filing cabinets hold my supplies. I saw step by step instuctions on BHG.com and thought this would jazz up my work space at an affordable price.

I will keep you posted on by creative adventures around my house and document my work with my trusty camera to allow you to view my creations. See you soon!

-Donna

Simple Tie-dye Designs

1. 
   In my previous post, I discussed some of the chemicals and procedures used in tie-dying. In the next few posts I will discuss some easy designs that are great for kids or beginners.

The Crumple

1. This design is most easily done by taking the soda ash soaked fabric and placing it in a pan or small baking dish. I found that an old glass pie plate works well. Whatever you use, MAKE SURE YOU DO NOT USE THE KITCHENWARE FOR COOKING AFTER IT COMES IN CONTACT WITH TIE-DYE CHEMICALS. It is also important to get a tight fit. Once the fabric is crumpled into the pan, squirt some dye randomly across the top. You can lighten the shade by diluting the dye with some water. However, what I do is squeeze the fabric to spread the dye. The areas where the dye was applied will be darker than the areas where the dye bleeds because the dye that bleeds out is further diluted with soda ash. It is important to spread dye randomly and leave some areas lighter than others. When finished, turn the shirt over so the undyed parts are on top, and repeat the process.

NEXT: How to create gradations of color

Getting Vibrant Colors with Tie-dying

When I tell most people that I make tie-dye clothing, I usually get responses like, "Yeah, I used to do that in the sixties." People think of camp projects where you take rubberbands and place them randomly on a shirt and dump the shirt into a big pot of dye. The colors were weak and usually faded after a few washings.

Times have changed.

I started experimenting with tie-dying to make gifts for my husband, using tie-dye kits from a craft store. These are great when working with kids or for experimenting, as they have simple instructions. The dyes didn't fade as much as the old school tie-dyes I did in college, but still they weren't of professional quality.

I since have done a lot of research to find out how to get the best results. It starts with the fabric. We use only 100% cotton clothing bought from Dharma Trading Company, a company specializing in clothing blanks and fabric arts. Most clothing is treated with chemicals which make them more resistant to dying, so it is important to buy clothing that is chemical free. We also wash our clothing in Synthrapol, a fabric detergent, to remove any dirt and oils from the clothing prior to dying to prevent uneven color where we don't want it. The clothing is then soaked in soda ash solution, a mild alkali, for at least 20 minutes which enables the bonding of the dye with the fabric.

We use only Procion MX dyes to give our clothing more lasting color. The dye is mixed with urea which is a moisture drawing agent. This helps keep the clothing damp during the curing process, leading to more brilliant colors. We also mix a small amount of sodium alginate in with the dye to thicken it. This gives us more control over where the dye goes on the fabric. After dying, the clothing must stay damp for at least 12 hours for the fabric to bond with the dye. Longer times are needed in colder climates. ALL DYING SHOULD BE DONE IN A WELL VENTILATED AREA. While the chemicals used are not known to cause severe harm, it is always important to have adequate ventilation when mixing or working with any chemicals.

After the color has set, the clothing is rinsed in very hot water to remove excess dye. Most amateur tie-dyers make the mistake of rinsing in cold water to prevent color fading. However, cold water will not remove excess dye and will lead to bleed out in future washings and on skin. If the proper procedure and chemicals were used for dying, the color will not wash out with hot water. After the clothing is rinsed, we then wash the items with Synthrapol in the washing machine, also using hot water. This further removes excess dyes. After the clothing is washed and dried, it is washed yet another time with vinegar in hot water. This helps prevent dye from bleeding when coming into contact with other chemicals from perspiration and precipitation.

You can witness the bright colors of our clothing by checking out our store at http://www.kizmetkreations.com/