Saturday, August 18, 2007

Hand-dyed yarn!

I apologise in advance, this post is quite picture-heavy!

I meant to post this a couple weeks ago but never quite got round to it. Just after the beginning of August I did some hand-dyeing with food colouring. I used Club House food colours in red, blue, yellow and green. I did mix some of the colours (yellow and green made a beautiful bright green, which looks like Granny Smith apple skin green). I did a couple small skeins (maybe about 15g) in blue, yellow and green, and then one bigger one with red added.

I'm really pleased with how the dyeing turned out. The first little skein I did was the size of a dinner plate, with one third yellow, one third blue, and one third bright green. I wet the dye in a bowl with some vinegar added to the water, then put it on the plate. I painted the yarn with a paintbrush and drizzled some of the water mixture over it (but just a little). Then I zapped the entire plate for 2 minutes in the microwave, left it for 2, then zapped it for another 2 minutes. Then I rinsed it in really hot water and left it to dry. I started to knit it up and I really like how it looks. I'm thinking of felting it because I like how the colours look.

Need a pic? I actually remembered to take one :)



I also did a full mini-skein of green in water and vinegar (zapped the bowl with water, dye, vinegar and yarn all in there together), and another one in a clear mug with dye, vinegar and water. The second one I just left overnight (I forgot to zap it) and in the morning the dyebath was exhausted and the water was clear.

Here's another pic:


This was the zapped green and the 'clear mug left overnight' green:


And my final effort, with a couple of pics of the process:


And the last one:

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