The Grand Dyeing Adventure: Part 3

What, you thought this was over? We have hardly brushed the surface! I don't know what seized me with such passion for changing the colours of things, but there we have it; it turns out there's a lot to document here.

So, when we last left our intrepid dyer (me) we had finished the first round of dye on Peach Twist. That's her on the left, before any of this began. A lengthy soak in green dye resulted in...what? Yes, you up the back: that's right, nothing! So, that left us (me) with the conclusion that what we were dyeing was not an animal fibre, but either a plant or man-made fibre. There's probably all sorts of complicated reasons as to why this fibres work differently with dyes, but I don't know what they are. I thought to myself, I thought: bethini my girl, you're going to need something a little more hardc0re for this stuff. A rendezvous later, and I had in my hot little hands some Dylon dye, in a muted forest green.

Perfect. So I got the dye pot out, grabbed a pair of disposable chopsticks for stirring, and set to work. Was Dylon always this fiddly? I don't remember having to dissolve shit separately and add salt and what-have-you. Oh well, let's persevere. Give it plenty of time - a few hours, really.

Dudes, you can totally tell where this is going already. I'm not even going to explain it all to you. It's so freaking ugly. Yep, that's it there on the right. A hideous combo of khaki and peach that I can barely stomach.

Wanna see a close up? Don't be deceived by the soft lighting in this pic, this is a seriously unattractive yarn. Take a moment to cast your eyes back up to the top of this post, and drink in the pleasant loveliness of Peach Twist before I started dickering about with dyes and gloves and mordants and whatever-the-hell-else is up with dyeing.

I just don't know what to do. It's so freaking ugly and I have three balls of it. If I could get my mitts on some hardc0re acid dyes, I'd give that a whirl. Seriously, I'm getting in way over my head here.

You'd think this would put me off dyeing, wouldn't it? I can't wait to do more. My mum has loads of catalogues from suppliers of craft stuff (she works in a childcare centre) and has promised to obtain me some Edicol, a thick, concenctrated food dye. I'm looking forward to getting my fingers dirty with that stuff, oooh yes. I'm thinking about trying to get hold of some white or cream superwash wool, and have a bash at striping, or even just mottling or variegating. I think I know how it's done. I think.

Meanwhile, what colour did I intend Peach Twist to be? Here's a shot of the skein ties I used, resting against the gentle background of some white Cascade 220. It's pretty, isn't it? Kind of like late spring in the heart of the forest or something. And then you see what Peach Twist became and think "well, I seriously screwed up right there".

Still, I don't think it's all my fault. Well, it is, but not like that. I mean, it's out of ignorance: the Peach in the Peach Twist is clearly not dye-taking-up, and if I had ball bands for any of it, I'd probably have been able to estimate how it was going to react to dyeing. But I just plunged straight in to see what would happen. It was a lot of fun, though. And one day, I'll set Peach Twist right.