Monday, April 23, 2018

Salvaging a worn doily


Years ago, I crocheted a large doily out of a pretty lime-green color crochet cotton that I was just wild about at the time. Not surprisingly, I quickly grew tired of that not-so-subtle color, and I would go on to use that doily outdoors, where it suffered the ravages of time and ended up a dirty and very faded shade of green. I couldn't bear to throw it out, though, because it had taken so much time to crochet, so I threw it in the washing machine a few times but eventually just stored it with a pile of old linens.

Recently I was going through some of the linens and ran across the old doily.

It featured the pineapple design shown here, that sort of fan-shaped motif that women like me have been crocheting for decades. And then it dawned on me: Why not let the doily soak in some tea for a few days? I had some old (loose) tea and boiled it in a pot, the brew stout enough to trot a mouse over, I'm sure, but it did the trick of bringing the doily back to life.

And my tea-dyed doily in the soft cotton thread is now in use once again! So if you've got some old linen piece that's discolored but usable, I thought you might like to know that my tea-dyeing solution worked out quite well for me here.

Funny enough, not long after the tea-dyeing episode, I came across this hardback book in Goodwill for a dollar and some change. "A Bit of Velvet & A Dash of Lace" by Robin Brown, it's called. Didn't I once own that book? I'm almost sure I did, but it had long since disappeared or been loaned out, so I bought this one.

And inside is a lovely feature on "How to Tea Stain Lace." Guess you could say we're on the same page!


5 comments:

  1. I'm so glad you found a way to make your doily usable again! I'm not at all surprised that tea-dying was your solution.

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  2. Perfect idea! I will keep it in mind for some of my mine. I think I have a lime green doily too!

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  3. How clever of you to think of tea-staining to bring that faded old doily back to life! It looks great now. (And I love that teapot with the small roses on it.)
    --from Vernona in DC

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  4. It is hard to throw out things you have spent hours making. The doily looks great in your setting. Lime green seems to be back, I've seen it in a few places lately but tea-staining is always in.

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  5. I love the tea stain doily and have used that trick a time or two. This post reminds me I need to go to Goodwill on Wednesday. I am looking for teacups for our tea festival this summer and two weeks ago I found some really nice ones, but on Wednesday is senior discount day so I will go looking again. Then I also must check out the books when I go too.

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