Dust Bunnies

No, the kind that may or may not reside under the bed, but the dust that collects under my drawing board on my easel.   

It is just a way of life when working in pastel.   But, this dust is pastel and I hate to waste anything.  It also contains enough of the binder that holds this colored dust into sticks to paint with.   So I collect it in a jar, where it makes a neutral mix of some sort, depending on what paintings were done lately.  

I put this into a mortar and use the pestle to be sure there are no bigger bits, and mix with distilled water....

I wanted this mix to have more blue in it, and lightened, so I added a chunk of pastel and ground it up within the muddy mix.   Also a good time to use those tiny bits that are too small to paint with.  

Oh, and you should use gloves when doing this...

With the extra chunks to change the hues, I made 4 full sized sticks of greyed neutral pastels.  Third from the left is the mix straight from the collection jar, the second from left had violet added, the end 2 have blue added.    When they are no longer cold to the touch, they are then dry and ready to use.