My sister Ann’s been in town. She came out from Massachusetts, first to be with family in Northern California then down to be with me. Even though the trip was unexpectedly sudden and made because of sad circumstances, it is always, always wonderful to have her here.

She and I have not lived geographically close for many, many years. Even though our lives are content and we see each other plenty, I do regret not having enough adventure time, enough creative or messing-around time with her.

Well. We had some messing-around time this time! I wanted to experiment with fabric and textile dye and see what we could come up with. Annie, being an artist and being fun and totally game,  jumped right in with me. We splashed around and tried ombré and threw other stuff in the bath. Wow, RIT Dye is a weird and challenging brand. Ever since my grey costume had became a lavender one because of RIT’s supposed “black” dye, I realize that if I want to get serious about coloring textiles, I’ll have to go elsewhere.

But that didn’t mean we couldn’t get some compelling effects.

We couldn’t stop! I’m almost glad I only had a couple yards of muslin.

This all started as a challenge put forth by my Modern Art Guild — make a monochromatic quilt block using fall colors.

I starting thinking about how dense and grey November used to be when I lived in New York. And then Annie and I started thinking about birches. And it all started getting interesting.

A preview:

I think Annie may be happy that she got to play with crafts this time, instead of fixing my quilting mistakes, showing me how to repair garments, or generally being the best big sis ever.