Kool-Aid, turmeric and coffee

A few weeks back I decided to try my hand at dying some wool sock yarn with Kool-Aid, just for kicks basically.

I had some bubble gum pink sock yarn left over from a couple of smaller projects and decided to dye it with a mixture of orange and red Kool-Aid (I was thinking that the pink, orange and red combo would undoubtedly give me a beautiful lush tropical coral-red colour…

So into the pot with the yarn. I added water to cover the yarn and let it soak for a half hour or so. I added a glug of vinegar to the water, which is probably a quarter to a half cup, and then I added the Kool-Aid and turned up the heat. I didn’t bring the water to a simmer but it got quite hot.

It was so neat to see the water turn so clear after sucking up all the dye the Kool-Aid had to offer (note to self: stop drinking Kool-Aid ) This is what I ended up with. A rather interesting colour, and a definite scent of cherries!I decided I really wanted to try and make some yellow sock yarn, seeing as yellow has been my favourite colour lately. Dark purple is creeping up my fave colour charts, too. Anyway, I had a skein of KnitPicks Bare sock yarn kicking around, and happened to have a jar of Wilton’s colouring paste in lemon yellow.

I dissolved a small amount of the food colouring in water before adding it to my vinegar and water dye bath. I ended up with a yellow, just not the yellow I was looking for.

So I decided to earth-tone it up a bit. I made a new dye bath with 2 tablespoons of turmeric powder, and that smelled like a delicious curry, and then I did one more dye bath with some strong coffee.

It is pretty close to what I wanted: I really love mustards and gold. Next time I really want to try beets and onion skins. My mother grew up dying wool that way so hopefully she can give some tips.

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