Dying for a change

Up to this point I haven't dyed yarn.  I decided when we start our venture into alpacas and fiber and all that, that there was so much to do and learn that I wasn't going to get into dying.  Natural colors are my thing.

Well, there is a time and place for everything and I decided to do something.

I read this blog post about dying with Kool Aid.  I didn't use Kool Aid, instead I bought some food coloring (I wanted blue and I couldn't find a good blue Kool Aid color).

I didn't  have an ice cube tray (these days with automatic ice makers I imagine I'm not the only one without them).

So I used some zip lock containers instead.  I filled them with water, put different amounts of color drops in them:

Many of them were looking very dark, so I made a couple more lighter ones. I really want a variation of color in the yarn.

I put them in the freezer to freeze.   

I then took my home spun yarn that I had already spun, washed and was hung dry.  

I put the yarn in a mixture of 2 cups of white vinegar and 5 cups of cool water, and let it sit for 30 minutes (I read this is necessary to prime the yarn to absorb color).  Of note, I read this only works on natural yarn (cotton or animal fibers).

After I soaked the yarn for 30 minutes in the vinegar and water, I think squeezed it out, and put it (still damp) into a glass pan.

I put the frozen dyed water on top:

The blog post I linked to shows that you can do this in the sun, let it sit outside in the sunshine.  Well, we have a shortage of sunshine so I opted for the oven.

I put tin foil over the top of the glass pans, and had the oven on 285*

According to the other blog it should bake for about an hour.  I was still waiting for the ice to finish melting and had to make dinner, so this is where I will end this blog post.

In my next post I'll show how I finished this - and if it turned out or not :)