What Is This Fabric?

Hey Quilty Friends!  I'm almost ready to start piecing the next Lone Star.  Most of the fabrics have been cut and ready since last fall.  About the only time I use solids is in Lone Star quilts.   Over the years I've made several of these quilts in the same colors.  So when I made four of them last year I thought why not go ahead and cut all the fabric into strips for later use.  It was a good plan until it wasn't.  There wasn't enough strips of the navy blue and the lightest blue.   A quick dig in the stash and I found a navy blue that would work but no light blue.  So I purchased the light blue a couple weeks ago.   I'm ready to knock this one out in a jiffy!

I just need to starch these two and get them cut into strips.  It should be easy to get all of them pieced and subcut in 2 or 3 hours.  

Then this happened.  The starch is beading on the fabric...what?

This happens sometimes with some fabrics.  I think they get too much sizing, no big deal, I'll just give it a little rub and it'll soak into the fabric.  Nope.

Okay, this one is being a little contrary.  Let's fold it over and see if it's soaking through to the other side.

Nope, well what in the world?  What is this fabric.  Even poly cottons will soak up starch.

What if I fold it over and smoosh it really hard with my hand?  Well it did soak through a little.  If you look real hard you can see where my hand was on the back of the fabric.

When I opened the fabric I got a good chuckle.  This reminds of those ink blot tests.  What do you see?  I see a candelabra.

This isn't cotton but it feels like cotton.  What in the world?  I decided to do the burn test.  Cotton will burn like paper leaving powdery chard flakes.  Synthetics will melt.  I pulled a scrap of white cotton, lit it on fire and it started making ash.

The navy blue burned slow, smoked and melted. BOOHOO.

This is the only navy blue I have on hand.  So....if I can sew it, I'm using it in the quilt.  TADA!  I can sew it with no issue.   But will it melt under an iron?

Will it shrink when pressed?  Test #2

I cut a two inch piece.

Set the iron to the cotton setting and gave her a press.  Please don't stick to my iron!

Well would you look at that!  It didn't melt and it didn't shrink!  Praise be!  What kind of magical fabric is this?  The recipient of this quilt will be non the wiser.  It's going in the quilt.

I decided to iron the larger piece with the starch still beading on the surface.  Of course it flaked and still didn't soak in to the fabric.  It just made an oogie mess.  Oh well, I'll shake it off and use it anyway.  Once it's in the quilt, quilted and washed no one will know or care.  

Until next time...

I hope you find time to stitch up something sweet!

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