Tea or Coffee?

I'm making lavender stuffed sleep inducing pillows/sachets using some of my doily collection.  Inevitably old table linens and doilies will have stains - especially tea stains, so I thought I would try dying a few using tea.

Its an easy process - find a suitable dish or baking tin to fit the doily, add tea bag or bags, and pour on hot water.  Swish about a bit to release the tea from the bag.  Leave until you have the colour you like.  I left mine about 45 minutes then squeezed out the tea and rinsed them a couple of times.  I dried them flat on kitchen paper towel sheets, finishing off with my iron to keep them nice and flat. 

We only use loose tea for drinking but I had a gift box of Harrods English Breakfast teabags in the cupboard and as you can see the colour has turned out rather more of a pretty coffee shade than tea.

These two are hand crocheted - such very fine work!  They must have taken hours to make and really deserve a second life on show.  They are next to be transformed into pretty lavender sachets.  I hand stitch the doilies onto squares of suitable fabric, add a plain back, machine stitch into a square and fill with dried lavender and polyester filling.  Although rather a long process, its best to stitch down as much of the doily as you can so that it doesn't catch on something and tear.

My room is filled with the scent of lavender - lovely..... zzzzzzz!