LoopTangle

Last weekend I got the urge to dye up some yarn and roving. B gave me some lovely acid dyes more than a year ago (eek, more than 2 years ago?) and I decided to take the plunge! I also wanted to explore the way Wilton’s black icing food coloring “breaks” in interesting multicolored ways, to see if I could get a very dark result reminiscent of Blue Moon’s Raven Clan colorways.  I found a wonderfully scientific post from another curious “Breaking Black” dyer, and got the idea to do a low-acid dyebath first, then refresh with more dye and add a good amount of vinegar.  (Technical notes are at home, I’ll add them in later!)

Here was the result, which is oddly hard to photograph:

Pretty pleased with how dark it turned out!  And I also love the microwave method, I just wish I could cram more yarn into my microwave to do larger batches.

The acid dye was also interesting!  I got separate tools for the dye, and a reusable face mask for mixing the powder, and here’s the result!  (more technical notes later!)

I call it Brushfire.  I wanted to get some dark browns and reds with some bright shots of orange and yellow and sky blue!  I think it turned out pretty great.  Spinning shots to come!

Still no spinning wheel. I’m hoping today is the day.

On Saturday, to keep myself busy and my mind off of “Whyfore NO WHEEL?” I dyed up some of the gray Swalesdale fiber I ordered at the same time as the wheel. *ahem* Focusing on not being bitter.

It’s a simple but time consuming process.

Here we have the dry roving on the left, and the 20 minute room-temperature soak on the right.

Gloves really are essential, even with food safe dyes.  For roughly 3oz of fiber, I mixed up about 1/2 tsp of Wilton’s icing dye in a cup of hot water.  The amount of water isn’t really important, you need enough to cover the fiber, but not so much that it moves around and starts to felt.  Pour the dye solution into a pot of room-temperature water (the same temperature, roughly, as the soaking fiber.)

This is where it gets interesting.  Get the dyepot up to 160F and keep it there for about 10 minutes.  This should help the dye get into the fiber really thoroughly.

Then!  Add 1/4c vinegar to the dyepot.  I like to pour it into a glass of lukewarm or hot water to dilute it a bit so it spreads out into the dyebath better. The color will change almost immediately as the dye starts to stick to the fiber.

Juice it up to 180F and keep it there for about 30 to really tell that fiber who’s boss.  I was very successful with the amount of water I had keeping the fiber from twisting when the water could have been at a rolling boil.

Let the fiber cool naturally.  You can drain off some of the (now mostly clear) dyebath to speed it up a tad, but anything drastic will make your gorgeous new colored fiber go all felty-felty.  Once it’s close to room temperature (you can handle it comfortably with your bare hands) run a sink full of similarly-temperatured water and dunk it to rinse.  This gets the vinegar out, even if there’s no more dye.

I did this two more times to get 8oz of dyed fiber.  Small batches seem safer to keep the felt demons at bay.

I call the colorway, “Waiting.”

Speaking of which, I need a name for the wheel.  “Godot” springs to mind…  ha ha.  And since she’s a ladybug, I thought about going literal with, “Lady Bug.”  But yeah, literal.  Maybe, “Spinderella…”  Oooo ooo or, “Charlotte!”  Any ideas?