sylke

Today was spent getting into the holiday mood. Huge icicles adorn the eves (which Nathan says means the building is leaking enough heat to melt all the snow on the roof - thank goodness we don't pay for heat!), and I spent the day (and yesterday) wrapping and mailing presents. I'm also making a velvet quilt, and I went out and bought a bunch of velvet in various jewel-tones, so I have a pile of luscious fabric on the futon. The place I got it has bolt-ends for $7/yard, but you're not sure what you're getting exactly. Some of my pieces are a bit tattered at the edges (the black has about half the selvege ripped off), but they otherwise are perfectly good velvet. I did some burn tests to see what they're made of, and the results weren't bad. At the very least I could identify the backing as either natural or synthetic, and often as either plant (cotton/rayon) or animal (silk). The pile was more difficult since I think the high ratio of air to fiber made things burn differently or more readily, but if I read the results correctly, I have at least one velvet of 100% cotton, and no more than one is 100% polyester. Except for one that was obviously polyester, the backs of the rest were all natural, mostly cotton, a couple I thought were silk. One of the piles on the natural backs I thought was poly or acrylic, but the rest were natural. Regardless of what they are, except for the polyester one they're all very soft and scrumptious. :)

But now I have a dizzy headache like I'm dehydrated, so I need to go drink some water and finish a presentation.