Sunday 14 April 2019

Tea and crafting

I've had a fabulous crafty day!  Was desperate to start a new cross stitch project, but only had a creamy coloured Aida fabric.  Much of the stitching in the new project is in very light colours, and they wouldn't show up on that.  So - after some thought I decided to tea dye some of my fabric and see how it turned out.

Finished tea dyed fabric beside original.
I kept my morning used tea bags (yes, I drink a lot of tea!) - and shoved some fabric in a pot with them and some boiling water.  I left the fabric to soak for just over an hour, stirring occasionally.  Then I took it out and rinsed it under the cold tap.

Looks really yucky, doesn't it!
My trendy (in the 70s) orange colander!

I patted it dry with a towel then ironed it to take some of the moisture out.  Then I left it on the windowsill for a while (not that it was particularly sunny here in Greenock), ironed again and it was dry.  Ta da!  A nice dark(er) piece of fabric without a trip to the shops! 


I have tea dyed paper and lace before, but not tried this type of fabric.  It seems to have worked quite well and the fabric was great to work with when I started my project.  Don't usually like these random shaded fabrics, sometimes I think they look a bit messy.  But for this new project it will be ideal!

Original colour Aida 16 count.
I have been following Pricilla's blog and I got the idea from there.  She has some great ideas for finishing off cross stitch pieces and has completed (and designed) some fabulous cross stitch patterns.  Go on over and have a look - here.

Hope you had a great weekend.

Love, Liz

4 comments:

Julie said...

I've seen a few bloggers tea dye fabric for a project, yours turned out really well.

Crimson Kettle said...

Great idea!

Polyester Princess said...

What a great and thrifty idea to tea dye that fabric! xxx

Maggie said...

I've dyed fabric for cross stitch a few times usually with coffee and tea I think it looks much better than stark white on most things.
Look forward to seeing what you are going to be stitching on your piece of hand dyed fabric :-)