By the way, yarn color photography is tricky, especially when you live, as I do, in a house with no white walls or ceilings. I did the best I could with what I have, and I think the first and the last pictures are very representative of the actual color. The stuff in between isn't bad, but it's not perfect.
This is what I started out with. It's Yarn Place Chaussant, 92% wool and 8% acrylic sock yarn, 100 g or 306 yards. This is the undyed version.
Here's the dye I used on day #1. First I presoaked the yarn in 3-1/2 cups of water and 1/2 cup of vinegar. Then I added this, which is 2 packets of pink lemonade Kool-Aid in 1 cup of water (and a little vinegar for extra setting). This actually exhausted very quickly, and I put 2 more packets (and more water) in about an hour later.
This is what it looks like right after the dye is poured in. You know when it's done (or the dye is exhausted) because the water turns clear and all the pigment has been soaked up by the yarn).
After drying, it looked like this. Pretty enough, but the pink was a a little too light and there was way too much white remaining for my taste. Turns out I had way too much water in the crock pot, and the result of that particular problem is uneven color uptake.
So yesterday we went back to the dye (crock) pot. This time I pre-soaked the yarn (as I had done on Wednesday) but i drained it before I put it in the crock. On Wednesday I pre-soaked in the crock and poured dye on top, a mistake I won't make again. Then to 2 cups of water I added 4 packets of orange Kool-Aid, 1 packet of watermelon-cherry, and a good glug of vinegar. Supposedly you don't need vinegar with Kool-Aid, because it's very acidic by itself, but I wanted to make sure the color took, so I added it in. I put the wet but drained yarn in the crock and poured the 2 cups of water with Kool-Aid on top. Then I pushed down with my (gloveless) hand, ensuring that I had a very orange right hand for a good part of the day, to make sure all the yarn was covered. Then I put the lid on, turned the crockpot on low (just like yesterday) and walked away for a few hours.
After the dye exhausted, I cooled (very important) the yarn to room temperature, rinsed well, and then put the yarn in a lingerie bag and put it in the washing machine on high spin (no rinsing) for a cycle to get most of the water out. Then I hung it to dry, removed the extra ties (yes, I left out some steps, but if you ask, I'll tell you all of them), and hung it to dry. Later I retwisted it into a skein and took this last picture.
This is a pretty good representation of the final colors (taken outside, no flash, cloudy day, on a white towel for contrast). There are definitely lighter and darker areas throughout, particularly where the yarn was pink before I put the orange on. (Click on the pictures to make them bigger.)
Now, this is safe to do at home, with adult supervision of course. No toxic chemicals were used. I have to tell you, though, that Kool-Aid (as well as food coloring/Wilton's icing dyes) only work on natural fibers of the animal variety. So you can dye fibers like wool, alpaca, angora, cashmere, and silk with this method, but not cotton, linen, hemp, or bamboo. The plant fibers will stain but it won't be colorfast, and so will bleed on your hands while you work with it and then fade every time it's washed. There are dyes that work with those fibers, but those are not food-safe dyes and so definitely not a family-friendly project, unless you and your kids have matching respirators to wear, etc. I think you might need nuclear material to successfully dye acrylic, so I'll leave that to the experts and just buy the small amount of acrylic yarn that I do use precolored.
I tried to upload all the photos to a Facebook album earlier but I was having trouble. I will try again later, and there will be more pictures of the in between steps that my FB friends can see.
After drying, it looked like this. Pretty enough, but the pink was a a little too light and there was way too much white remaining for my taste. Turns out I had way too much water in the crock pot, and the result of that particular problem is uneven color uptake.
So yesterday we went back to the dye (crock) pot. This time I pre-soaked the yarn (as I had done on Wednesday) but i drained it before I put it in the crock. On Wednesday I pre-soaked in the crock and poured dye on top, a mistake I won't make again. Then to 2 cups of water I added 4 packets of orange Kool-Aid, 1 packet of watermelon-cherry, and a good glug of vinegar. Supposedly you don't need vinegar with Kool-Aid, because it's very acidic by itself, but I wanted to make sure the color took, so I added it in. I put the wet but drained yarn in the crock and poured the 2 cups of water with Kool-Aid on top. Then I pushed down with my (gloveless) hand, ensuring that I had a very orange right hand for a good part of the day, to make sure all the yarn was covered. Then I put the lid on, turned the crockpot on low (just like yesterday) and walked away for a few hours.
After the dye exhausted, I cooled (very important) the yarn to room temperature, rinsed well, and then put the yarn in a lingerie bag and put it in the washing machine on high spin (no rinsing) for a cycle to get most of the water out. Then I hung it to dry, removed the extra ties (yes, I left out some steps, but if you ask, I'll tell you all of them), and hung it to dry. Later I retwisted it into a skein and took this last picture.
This is a pretty good representation of the final colors (taken outside, no flash, cloudy day, on a white towel for contrast). There are definitely lighter and darker areas throughout, particularly where the yarn was pink before I put the orange on. (Click on the pictures to make them bigger.)
Now, this is safe to do at home, with adult supervision of course. No toxic chemicals were used. I have to tell you, though, that Kool-Aid (as well as food coloring/Wilton's icing dyes) only work on natural fibers of the animal variety. So you can dye fibers like wool, alpaca, angora, cashmere, and silk with this method, but not cotton, linen, hemp, or bamboo. The plant fibers will stain but it won't be colorfast, and so will bleed on your hands while you work with it and then fade every time it's washed. There are dyes that work with those fibers, but those are not food-safe dyes and so definitely not a family-friendly project, unless you and your kids have matching respirators to wear, etc. I think you might need nuclear material to successfully dye acrylic, so I'll leave that to the experts and just buy the small amount of acrylic yarn that I do use precolored.
I tried to upload all the photos to a Facebook album earlier but I was having trouble. I will try again later, and there will be more pictures of the in between steps that my FB friends can see.
1 comment:
Okay that's seriously cool.
I don't want to think about what Koolaid and other assorted colored things I consumed during my childhood probably did to my insides. But COOL!
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