Steaming Saturday scarves and ties

I did actually steam these on Saturday. I got caught up in writing my entry for NPR’s 3-minute fiction contest. It took significantly more than 3-minutes, I can tell you.

I’m going to have a booth at the National Symposium on Arts/Cultural/Entertainment Districts being held at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore on April 5th from 12:30-6pm. I’ll spend the next week and a half painting up a storm so I have enough scarves for the booth. I don’t know about bringing the ties or not. If it was just a college crowd I wouldn’t, but maybe the Arts and Entertainment District people would like it.

National Pencil Day scarf – March 30

On March 30, 1858, the United States issued the first patent on a pencil with eraser attached. A standard wooden pencil can write 45,000 words or draw a line that is 35 miles long.

Reds scarf and tie

 

Matching red scarf and tie. (Darn, I forgot the pocket handkerchief.)

Nellie, Mae, Marie scarf finished

 

Here is the scarf I demonstrated for WOW (Women of the World, Baltimore). It’s not streamed yet.

Tag on the left is Nellie for Nellie Bly. I keep forgetting about this amazing woman and every time I come across her randomly I am reminded how strong she was. She got herself committed to an insane asylum and wrote and expose about conditions there that improved conditions. She circled the globe in 72 days, besting the fictional Phileas Fogg from Around the World in 80 Days and setting a new world record.

In the middle is Mae for Mae West. In her first movie she re-wrote her own scenes, including one of my favorite quote of hers:

Hat check girl: Goodness, what beautiful diamonds.

Mae West: Goodness had nothing to do with it, dearie.

I’m a modest person myself but I love how Mae has fun with her double entendres. She has a lot of fun. Sounds like it, anyway.

On the right is Marie for Marie Curie the passionate scientist, the first person to earn 2 Nobel Prizes, who overcame poverty and prejudice to pursue her passion.

Salt Tie Experiment – First Try

This is the first try using salt on a tie. In a cruel twist of fate (okay, that’s overstating it just a tad) the salt worked on most of the tie but not on much of the front. I’ve repainted the front green parts and put more salt on them. After 3 hours the tie was still very wet. I think it will still be wet in the morning!

Steaming Saturday scarves

Yay! Steaming Saturday! As you can see, I did two each of some of the scarves, one for the shop, one for future craft shows.

I was pretty bummed though, for the first time one of the scarves was ruined during the steaming process. Dye from another scarf or from the same scarf got on part of the pink pi. This sort of thing has happened a couple of times before but only on the graffiti scarves  so I was able to go back and draw some more graffiti over the affected areas and re-steam. However, on something so simple as the pink pi that’s not possible. It’s not Etsy or shop worthy but I have a few options, I can cut up the undamaged parts and use them for something else like a hair scrunchy or part of a pillow, sell it at a craft fair as a ‘second’ or wear it myself. I do like the light pink color.

New Salted Aqua and Green scarf

  

Here is a new aqua and green scarf. You can see a few large grains of salt still clinging because I couldn’t wait for it to dry before taking the picture. What I’m really excited about is the tie I’m going to try tomorrow using the same technique. Tune in tomorrow for that (whether it works or not) and pictures from Steaming Saturday.