The Wilton's Dyeing Project, Part 2

Continuing with my Wilton's saturated colors project results, next are the greens, blues and purples.

As I commented yesterday, the greens and blues gave me some surprises. The first greens that I tested look almost identical:

Leaf Green/Kelly Green/Moss Green

I let these soak in their dye baths 30 minutes after the last nuke and the leftover dye water in all 3 was still green when I removed them. The Leaf Green is a bit lighter and you can pick up a little more of a yellow cast on the white sample. The Kelly Green doesn't show the blue cast I was expecting, although if the blue needed more time to absorb, that would explain it. The Moss Green is the same depth of color as the Kelly green, with a touch more yellow.

The blues surprised me by not breaking. Since they received the same time to sit in their dye baths as all the other colors, they may not be fully saturated in terms of the blue dye - they may be much deeper if left to sit longer.

Teal/Sky Blue/Royal Blue

It was hard to get an accurate reading of these 3 colors because they all seem to not look quite green enough (compared to the real-life samples), if that makes sense.

Delphinium Blue/Aster Mauve/Violet

On this next group, the Delphinium broke so badly you wouldn't think it's supposed to be a pretty violet-blue. I have no idea where this one color went so wrong, since all of the blues were treated alike and the others did not break. The only explanation I have is that it needs to rest in the dyebath for a much longer time than the other colors and maybe that it needs a lot more vinegar.

With the Aster Mauve I was expecting that ugly 80's muddy pink color, but I got a beautiful pinkish-purple the color of thistles. The violet, which also showed no signs of breaking, is a very dark, very rich, true purple. At this saturation, though, it's almost black.

Tomorrow I will finish up with the neutrals and reveal something very interesting (at least to me).

And, just because she hasn't put in an appearance in a while, here are a couple of totally gratuitous pictures of the cuteness that is Criquette:

The Wilton Dyeing Project (Part 1)

With the most beautiful time of year almost upon us, I have been dying to dye some yarn in a colorway that captures my favorite time of year. One of the challenges I am finding with using food-safe dyes is that I have a hard time getting really saturated colors. I want to dye some fall and winter skeins, but didn't know if I could get the deep, vibrant colors I have in my head. And a good, true black is very hard to come by. So I decided to use some of my research background to run a little experiment. It actually turned out to give me lots of information without needing to blow up the kitchen or commit acts of violence on small lab rodents.

My little project took place over the past 2 weekends. It took longer than I anticipated after my kitchen microwave died and I had to make countless trips up and down the stairs to use the one in the basement. But it all came together and I am ready to share my results. And I am all about the multi-tasking, so with that many stairs climbed, I could skip working out and use the time to work out with yarn instead!

To begin, I got 3 base yarns and cut 5' samples from each. They were Cascade 220 (white), and Paton's Classic Wool (natural and grey). I wanted to see what differences the colors made on overdyeing, to see if I would be able to get the results I wanted on white yarn, or if I needed to start with a deeper base.

Here is the naked yarn:

All of my samples were pre-soaked in lukewarm water with 1/4 tsp salt and 2 drops Dawn added. The excess water was squeezed from them before entering the dyebath. All of the dye was mixed using high concentrations of dye:yarn - 1 tsp diluted in 1 cup boiling water. The water was allowed to cool off before adding the yarn. I let the yarn sit in the unheated dyebath for about 30 minutes before nuking in on high for 2 mins, cool for 3 minutes. I added about 1/2 tsp vinegar before the second and third heatings, then let the yarn sit in the heated dyebath until close to room temperature, probably about 20-30 minutes. I then rinsed it well, until the water ran mostly clear.

Here are the results, grouped by color:

Pink, Rose Petal, Rose

These were a bit of a surprise - the pink, which I thought would be lighter than the other two actually ended up more of a wine color. In general, the Rose Petal was a bit more coral and the Rose more of a lipstick pink, other than that, they were pretty similar.

Next are the reds - Creamy Peach, No-Taste Red, and Burgundy. (I am missing the other reds in the Wilton collection. When I get them, I will add them to the samples.) The burgundy is so dark it looks brownish-black almost.

The dyes in the orange family actually "took" the quickest, almost exhausting the dye. The orange is very vibrant, whereas the Terra Cotta and Copper look almost identical. Also, there is almost no variation among the 3 base colors with Terra Cotta - they are virtually identical. Copper is one of the colors notorious for breaking, but this batch didn't show any sign of breakage.

The yellows are probably my favorites of all the colors I tested because they look different than I expected and because they are incredible autumn colors in their super-saturated state.

These colors didn't give me any problems. But the next batch, the blues and greens were a different story. I'll show my findings in Part 2.

Criquette Returns (With FO's!)

Since I haven't seen my little blog in a while, I thought it was time to check in and see if it's still here. And time, once again, to catch up. First, here are some of my projects that I have made in the past several months:

Malabrigo worsted hat for the Malabrigo swap:

A lavender and rice-filled neck pillow for my rav friend, Laura:

My 3rd Montego Bay scarf for the Odd Ducks' Sea and Ocean swap:

Bella's Baseball Scarf from "Twilight" for my darling knitted-goods-loving niece (which was my first, but not last, attempt at cabling):

JJ Scarflette (some early Christmas knitting):

And my very favorite - my first shawl! Knitted from my first (but not last) skein of Wollmeise:

I've been getting more and more involved in hand-dyeing with food-safe dyes. Creating the colorways I have in my head is so exciting! Here are my favorites so far:

Of course, I am staying busy taking good care of the fur-babies. Nothing new with them, they are all still running the show here on the little house on the prairie.

And we have been sneaking down to the lake whenever we can, which isn't nearly enough. So we have finally decided to take the plunge and get our own cabin down there. That way, we can go whenever we want. There's a place we have our eye on, and we may put in an offer this week!

And of course, working my crazy-long hours. I had to hire 2 new therapists to take some of my referrals since I wasn't able to get people in for months. Neither one of them knit, but I won't hold that against them.