Getting Ready to Dye

I dyed all the yarn for my afghan with Koolaid! Koolaid dyeing is fun and safe. All you need is wool yarn, some containers and a microwave.

1. First, the yarn. You need wool yarn. I live in a rural area and my closest store is a Ben Franklin. They have two brands of wool. I buy different colors. The picture with this post shows you four colors that I like to work with. The white yarn gives bright pure colors. The grey heather yarn gives much darker more muted colors. The natural and tannish color give less bright colors.
2. I turn the balls into hanks by winding them around a chair and then I tie them with a piece of string. I wind 2-4 hanks from each ball. I dye two of these hanks at a time in my shallow dye containers. I use 2-3 packages of Koolaid for these two hanks. SO, you will need 4-6 packets of koolaid to dye one of these balls of yarn.
3. I buy lots of Koolaid and keep all the colors stockpiled. There is really only one green, that is lemon-lime. This summer, I found Berry Blue and now I have a really good standard blue. I use grape, cherry, black cherry, orange and lemonade as base colors. You can mix almost any color with these. The grape has lots of black in it and is very good for toning down colors.
4. You'll need containers. It is best if they have a cover. When I dye multicolored, I use a shallow container that I bought at IKEA. It is about 9" x 12" and fits perfectly in my microwave. I also use 1 lb dannon yogurt containers I eat lots of yogurt and have a stack of these containers! Mostly, I use these for dyeing single colors. Gather you goods and in the next post, we'll get dyeing!