Observations.

I have always used Dylon dyes. They are tried and tested for me, over the decades that I have used them. They have not let me down. Over the years they have slowly gone up in price. Until about a two years ago, I used to always buy them from the same shop, a beautiful craft shop in the Town. They then went up to £5 each, that is a lot. Then two years ago another shop in the Town, I found out, that they sold the same dyes but for £3 I was more than chuffed to bits. So, I mainly went there depending on what colours I wanted.

Over the last three years, when I see, plain white t-shirts I buy them for my Husband, for when I am ready to tie and dye them for him, and I throw out the older ones, that I have dyed in the past that are no good now, as he has a degree in fine art, so they eventually get ruined. I did start of tie and dying for Paul, the t-shirts for him to wear, for to me I saw him as a walking billboard, adverting my art! What a sneaky and better way to do it.  But hey, other people have to pay, he gets free, state of the art, eye catching tie and dye tops.

Recently I have bought beautiful linen clothes for myself, and have decided not to dye them, but just to enjoy the colour and the material. I have plenty of clothes now that I have dyed for myself.

About a month ago, I had tied up the t-shirts that I was going to dye for Paul, and then I was ready to dye them, I wanted the colour black for a great stark contrast, so I went to the shop, that sells them for £3 Wilko or Wilkerson but they had other colours but black was sold out.  I came home and looked in my craft boxes to see if I had black, but I didn’t, so eventually I decided to go the craft shop and spend the extra two quid, but to my horror when I got there, they too it seemed had sold out of black. I asked at the counter, “Have you got any black dyes?” The very helpful and knowledgeable staff, replied, “I will go and look in the basement.” I was hopeful. But not for long, when she returned and came back with the biggest dye I had ever seen! She said, “We have just this, it is brown, I informed her, “That is to put into the washing machine, the one that I wanted was for hand dying.” I left it, as it wasn’t what I wanted. I bet it cost a bomb!

I came home and informed Paul, he said, “I will look on line, for a different brand and will read the feedbacks too.” I reminded him, “Dylon is tried and tested for me, I don’t want to use another brand,” Paul added, “There will be other brands out there, that is just as good as  Dylon, but will be much cheaper.” I don’t like change, and yet if I did have the other brand for a fraction of the price, I will have wished I had used it sooner.

I did go to the Range, a larger craft shop, and looked for black there, but there wasn’t any there either, most of what they had, was the new trendy, put into the machine type, no skill needed to get my desired effects. The hand dyeing gives me control.  As it looks like Dylon is fazing out the hand dying method, when I return home on Monday, I will ask Paul to look on line for me for, the next new stage in my life, a different brand of dyes is about to begin.

I love Wilko store. They do cat litters there, used to be very cheap, but as we couldn’t park outside their store, it was difficult to carry. Their floor wipes are brilliant for cleaning up cat sick! Another thing I got from Wilko years ago was the old-fashioned type aluminium bucket for our mop. But the one before that, eventually became rusty and sprang a leak. So, when I needed a new one, they were only selling the plastic ones, so I bought that instead.

I was overjoyed when I saw in Wilko and saw a new range of aluminium buckets, I bought one. I also at the same time bought a posh mop with a fat, cushioned handle at the top of the mop. The pole of the mob can be adjusted but the cheaper one that I had bought would slip down as I was using it, to press down to squeeze the water out. I wasn’t impressed neither was Paul. Some mops were SO expensive, I decided to put up with it slipping down. Then a month ago I saw in Wilko a plastic handle mop with an old fashioned looking cotton mop head, it reminded me of when I was young, before all different types of mops head started to appear in the shops, it wasn’t too expensive so I bought it, and it would be on standby if the current mop broke.

Then this week when I went into Wilko, I saw the perfect mop! It had a plain, no nonsense wooden handle and a 100% cotton head! Think it was, expensive at £6.50 but it was perfect and it would go great with my metal bucket. I was chuffed.

I decided to use my new mop the next day, bypassing the plastic handle one, with the cotton head. Having swept all the wooden and tiled floors, I then put weak bleach in my bucket of hot water and dipped my cotton mop in and squeezed out the liquid.

I noticed a lot of things straight away, it really hurt my hand as I pressed on the top of the handle to squeeze the liquid out of the real cotton head, and because the wooden handle wasn’t that strong, I was unable to squeeze as much liquid out as I would have liked. So, my wooden floor in our living room, that I don’t like to get too wet, was soaking! Because I was unable to remove the excess liquid from the mop, and the tiles in the kitchen and hall floor took ages to dry, causing Paul to even slip on the floor. I was not happy, I felt I had gone back in time too much, and the hard, horrible wooden stick was not nice, I had become ‘soft’ to the cosy, comfy, curvy soft easy to hold handle. The cotton mop head, seemed on paper to be perfect, but it was impossible to ring out sufficient liquid to get the floors damp instead of saturated. It seems the other clever types of materials that is out there, now is easier to wring out like those that are like strips of materials, they are the perfect ones. Only I didn’t realize it until I had this last mop from Wilkos. One thing I wouldn’t do, would be to leave a bad review for them, as I love that shop. And the next person may just love it as much as I dislike it lol.

But I have got it out of my system and bought it and tried it and didn’t like it. When I bought the last two cotton head tops from Wilko, I threw out the one before that. So, my plan is to use the one I haven’t yet used, the plastic, adjustable, cotton head one and leave the wooden stick one to dry out…….somewhere.

This is the observations, of MJG, some of the stuff that goes around in my head. Thank goodness it doesn’t keep me awake at night. As I sleep like a log. xXx