Dyeing wool

They look fab, Im going out to buy some food dye today. Wonder how many longies/shorties one little boy needs...hmmmm....

hannah, they are gorgeous!!

They look fab, Im going out to buy some food dye today. Wonder how many longies/shorties one little boy needs...hmmmm....

So, so many, if the ladies on here are to be believed

hannah, they are gorgeous!!

Thank you! I really must sort out the other wool for the longies today, although they've already been bumped down the queue by the Kanoko Pants (being knitted in a lovely soft Rowan Aran that I got on sale - yum!)

Me again...if you buy some greyish/beige wool how easy is it to dye over?

Those recent skeins were all dyed over off-white wool, but the skein below was over a mid-grey. My friend and I accosted some of her stash and dyed over turquoise wool, it was amazing how lovely the colours came out. I have also dyed some oatmeal wool and that muted the colours in a really lovely way. It dyes just the same but you'll just get slightly less in-yer-face colours. I'm planning some dyeing soon which I hope to do on grey wool on purpose to tone the colours down a bit.



Can't wait to see what you dye up! xxx

Thanks! Ive found some off natural coloured wools that arent expensive to trial run on just so if I make a hash of it Im not wrecking expensive wool.

Oh, I love that colourway I tried with Dr. Oetker colours also. Does your yarn always turn out as planned? I seem to have trouble with the intensity. Never know how much colour I have to use.

Thanks! Ive found some off natural coloured wools that arent expensive to trial run on just so if I make a hash of it Im not wrecking expensive wool.

Good idea. My first few skeins were just bits and bobs I had in my stash, so I didn't feel pressured to get it 'right' in some way.

Oh, I love that colourway I tried with Dr. Oetker colours also. Does your yarn always turn out as planned? I seem to have trouble with the intensity. Never know how much colour I have to use.

They definitely don't always turn out as planned. That colourway was pretty close, but I did sections which were too short in the yellow - I think longer stretches would have knitted up better. I have recently dyed the same skein 3 times, and (apart form the last time) every time it dried I just didn't like it at all. It's fine now though, but the project I'm using it for has just been undone for the second time! I really need to pay more attention to the pattern!

When it comes to intensity, I let the yarn sit in the dye for a bit, lift it up and have a look at it, and add more dye if necessary. It always looked darker after it's been microwaved (as all the dye in the liquid has been taken up) so I try to take that into account. A couple of times I've overdyed a skein to increase the intensity of one of the colours in it. Have you got any pictures of yarn you've dyed?

xxx

This was the first yarn I dyed:



and this the second:



I really want to dye more, but will have to think of other projects than longies or boardies