An experiment with left overs...

When I was working on the as yet un-named pink and white baby quilt last week, I had some leftover white circles.

One of the blogs I read has been talking a lot lately about dyed mandellas, and because of that, I had already decided that I was going to try my hand at making some with my procion dyes, but since I had these circles pre-cut, I decided to play with them first.

So, what fancy-pants method did I used to achieve this effect, you ask?

Crayola Gel Paints from the dollar store. No seriously!

Ever since I first started using things from the dollar store to create with (i.e. my shaving foam experiment using craft paint, and using craft paint directly on fabric), I've wondered what other surprises the dollar store had for me.

So when I saw those gel paints for $2, I had to pick them up (of course!)

I first gave the fabric a thorough soaking and then squeezed it out until it was damp. Then I folded my circles into quarters until I had a little slice of pie. (Sorry I didn't think to take pics as I went along.)

And then I just painted rows of colour on the slice of pie, and squeezed and rubbed it in. I didn't thin out the paint, I just painted it directly on. When I unfolded the fabric, if there were spots where the fabric didn't have enough paint, I just added some more with the paintbrush until I liked the coverage.

After that, I wrung out the little circles which got rid of the excess paint and also helped to blend the colours, and then I microwaved them for four minutes to set the colours. Even with the first washing there was no colour loss whatsoever; and afterwards, the hand of the cloth was almost exactly the same as it was before. Because of that, I actually liked this result better than using acrylic craft paint which leaves the fabric with a sort of crunchy feel.

I don't know what I'll do with these circles (which are eight inches in diameter); but I'll think of something eventually.

In the meantime, I'm really pleased with the fun. :)

Cheers,