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I bought some Briggs Little Regal yarn in Gold to experiment with cold pour over-dye. It’s a pretty affordable, moderately scratchy Canadian wool from New Brunswick that is often found in local LYS. I figured it would be a worth a try at $5.99 for 250 m and surprisingly it softened up considerably once out of the dye pot and the colours came out so much more vibrant than I imagined. I’m not sure what I’ll make with it but it will surely pair nicely with the skein of Brown Heather I picked up on the same trip.

Today is my birthday and I’ve been surprised by my awesome husband with an incredibly lucky find of Bernat Handicrafter Cotton in the more elusive colours of their Fruit Line. He cleaned out their entire stock. As with all of their new or seasonal solids, they apparently can’t be bothered to show the new colours on their website or distribute them with any sort of consistency so this score was a lucky find and just in time. I think I now have all of their fruit colours (and plenty of them!) and will add them to my stash page shortly. So far I have Lemon (sunshine yellow), Mango (orangey yellow), Tangerine, Strawberry (bright fuscia but unfortunately scented so I will need to air these out), Blueberry (pretty vibrant periwinkle blue), Black Currant (grapey purple) and Kiwi (almost an apple green). I figured out these were the colours in the line because the pattern pamphlets Bernat published had the colours listed for a knitted fruit cozy patternsite, which is also not surprisingly, not posted to their web. Quite a glorious birthday haul if I do say so myself!

Since I’ve started making more accessories and things outside of the amigurumi realm, I’ve branched out into different fibers. While I still feel that unmercerized cotton is the best option for amigurumi, I’ve developed a fondness for wool, especially chunky single plys in bright transitioning or splotchy colours. Of course the cost of most luxury yarns, handspun or hand painted is more than I am willing to pay, but a true DIY girl at heart, I couldn’t help but want to figure out how to do it myself on a budget.

I read up and found that protein fibers (animal hair like wool, alpaca, mohair etc) can be dyed effectively with food safe colouring using Koolaid powder, food colouring or icing colouring, if there is an acid present to bond the dye to the fiber. That option was way more attractive than chemical dyes because I have a tiny kitchen and wouldn’t be able to store a dye pot and utensils, nor would I want to have to buy a dye pot and separate yarn dyeing gear. Armed with the gobs of information found here I set out to dye two balls of Stitch Nation Full O’ Sheep yarn I got on clearance with a mixture of KoolAid and regular liquid food colouring with lemon juice to bind the dye. I used the hand painted method outlined here for the colour changes and heat set the dye by putting the yarn in a steam basket over a pot of simmering water for 30 minutes instead of using the microwave since my microwave is tiny. Once it was steamed, I rinsed it but the water ran completely clear, which meant all the colour was absorbed into the yarn. I hung the hank outside in the sun to dry for a few hours and then it was pretty much good to go. Clean up was a breeze and I didn’t stain or destroy anything, which means this is pretty klutz proof.

I’m really happy with how it turned out, bright and fluffy and not felted at all. I will definitely be messing around with other colours as soon as my order of Wilton’s Icing Colours and Little lamb yarn gets here. It really worked out to be a good deal even though I used KoolAid which is pricier than food colouring. The yellow was food colouring and the other colours were KoolAid and as you can see, straight food colouring did as good of a job so I’ll be sticking to that in the future. Price breakdown:

Yarn: $8 (2 balls of 155 yards each)
KoolAid: $5
Food Colouring: $2

$15 for 310 yards of rainbow yarn I had fun making is an awesome deal compared to $9.99 for 95 yards of Crystal Palace Mochi Plus yarn (what I was thinking of buying even though the colourway wasn’t really exactly what I wanted) which would have added up to $30 for the same amount of yarn. Plus it makes the thing I make with this yarn, a little more mine, which I love.