Something old

My parents were divorced when I was in 4th grade. They are now much happier with their current spouses. When I was much younger when my mom gave me her dress and said that I could make whatever I wanted with it. It did not feel right to just make a skirt out of it. Now I am getting married and I harvested all the lace from my mom's dress to sew on the under layers of mine as my something old.

The lace was white and my dress is candle light so I had to dye it I followed these instructions:

How to Tea Dye Lace

Beautiful lace that has a wonderful aged appearance makes a great statement in any craft or decorating

project. Old lace can be expensive and hard to find.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Lace
• Stainless steel pan
• Water
• Tea bags
• Wooden spoon
• Disposable gloves

1. 1
   Wash new lace to remove sizing. Wring fabric out but do not dry.
2. 2
   Fill a large stainless steel pan with water and add 10 family-sized tea bags. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat. Simmer for 15 minutes. Mash tea bags with a wooden spoon to release more color, being careful not to break the bags. Remove and discard tea bags and let mixture cool completely.
3. 3
   Stir the cooled mixture well. Slowly submerge wet lace in the tea dye liquid. Use the wooden spoon to move the material around to distribute color evenly. Let steep for a while. Check periodically for color depth. When satisfied, remove the material, wring out and dry.
4. 4
   Darken the color if you are still not happy with it after lace is dried. Accomplish this by repeating the process again. Each time the color will be deeper.

Once the color matched I began to sew. On Friday I finished the first layer, there are five more to go. Each rose and it's leaves takes about and hour and forty five minutes to hand stitch in detail. 

Mikey always says that any project of mine is a big project the first layer that I completed had forty two roses it took me about ninety hours. It is looking just lovely. It keeps me out of trouble. It has allowed me to catch up on TV shows like Grey's Anatomy, One Tree Hill, Prison Break, Bones and In Plain Sight (Yay! for netflix streaming). And I think it is a really cool way to honor my mom.