do you ever just need to do something totally different from your daily routine for a quick escape/inspiration? that's what happened to me this week. i took a little detour from drawing and papercutting and tried experimenting with a bleach pen. i had seen towels done this way in design sponge at home (i think i've said it before, but i love this book. a lot.) and filed the idea away last fall. it wasn't fancy or particularly well thought out - i took a nice cotton shirt that had a slight rib and was soft and worn, and laid it on the counter with stiff cardboard inside of it. this was to keep the bleach from going through to the back and also to give the fabric a nice stiff surface underneath to draw on. i drew on the shirt with a random floral pattern until i was happy with it. i wished the pen had a slightly finer tip, as it tended to blob a bit in places, but i didn't worry too much about it. once i was done drawing i let it dry for a few hours, then washed it by itself in the washer with hot water. (i've seen people say to use cold water, but i didn't and don't think it caused any problems. don't quote me on this, though!) i threw it in the dryer and put it right on. i like it! i'd like to experiment with other fabrics (linen comes to mind) and think about doing some curtains sometime.
it looked a little bit yellow while i was working, and i wasn't so sure about that. but it whitened in the wash.
i think this would be a fun project to do with kids. well behaved kids wearing all white, in a white, well ventilated room. but i can be a little nervous about mess sometimes, and bleach is messy business. all in all, a really fun project, and a nice quick distraction.
