Fabric Printing Part 1

My hobbies of Scandinavian baking and pickling, and cross stitching are not keeping me busy enough. So over Christmas I started dabbling in fabric printing. I bought 3 awesome print rollers from The Painted House a couple of years ago and after 1 disasterous attempt on a cupboard door which I knew wouldn't work (I used the wrong type of paint) I packed them away. However, I found an old tablecloth at home a few weeks ago, and in the spirit of austerity, rather than chuck it out I cut it up and did some printing with one of the rollers.

It doesn't look like much in this photo, but I was over the moon with this (it's bigger in real life, and less creased). I planned to make a couple of Christmas stockings with the fabric, then some decorations for the tree but sadly ran out of time. So it ended up as the table cloth on the children's lunch table at our Boxing Day Party and they were pretty happy with it. At least I think they were, no one was sick on it like last years boxing day tablecloth so that was a bonus.

Then I found some of my sons' old baby muslins (sob). So I printed this using an old stencil I had for making cards with, and made my son some handkerchiefs which he used once and threw on the floor:

The fabric paint is by is made by Pebeo and once the paint is dried, you iron it with a hot iron to set it then the fabric can be washed at up to 40 degrees. After the fabric has been washed the colour faded quite a bit but I quite liked the 'vintage' effect it made. 

Then, yesterday morning, as the weather was horrid and we were trapped indoors, my son and I got crafting again and I cracked open a yellow Pedbeo fabric paint. As you can see, up until this point I'd only used red, my local supply of fabric paint being very limited. However, this time, I used some old fabric which I had picked up for £4 from my local Emmaus (one of the Colchester's great Charity shops). I'm not sure what this fabric is, it looked like something that had been bought to make a nativity costume with. Pretty bland and sack like but once I'd washed it, it softened up a bit. Anyway, it was cheap and I've got plenty of it to practice on.

I bought this old printing block from a 'vintage' shop in Long Melford last year ((Rosehip) who told me it was French. I don't know if it is, it looks like it might be Indian to me, and I didn't know what I was going to do with it until yesterday, but actually it printed pretty well for a first attempt , while simultaneously trying to placate a toddler who was extremely angry that he couldn't touch "mummy's stuff" for the first time ever.

The yellow wasn't such a success on this particular colour fabric but if I had an indigo colour paint, I think it could look really nice. It would make a lovely cover for a footstool. Or a deck chair for the summer.

I then went back to red and printed this piece using another stationary stencil I had. I am really pleased with this and might try and make a cushion with it. With the proceeds from my eBay sale I am hoping to buy a sewing machine so until then the printed fabric will sit gathering dust. However, folding it all up and packing it away once we had finished printing gave me an excuse to hang out in my favorite room of the house. The Utility room.

I've never had a utility room before, I'd never had a tumble dryer before we moved here but I think you'll agree there are some perks in moving to Colchester. I could quite happily spend all day in here. It's tiny but I love it. And it will be even better when Wig finally gets round to hanging up my royal collection. 

This little room has lots of things in it that make me happy:

My glass bottle collection.

My lead toy collection.

My collection of Wedgewood and Sylvac vases, collected for use at my wedding...

Dried Hydrangeas from my best friends wedding last summer. I swapped my liver for these.

First Aid Cupboard with my life saving Berocas in and my sons life saving Micky Mouse plasters.

But best of all, this sink. Perfect for chucking all the dirty print stuff in, closing the door behind me and leaving for another day. Thanks utility room, you are the best.