Dyeing for FLoF!

Note: this posting was started early March 2020, but not completed until May 2020 so it may be a little temporally challenged!

As well as working on my cowl to wear at FLoF I have also been dyeing yarn for my booth.  This will be the first time I have tried selling my own "Hand Dyed in Happy Valley" sock yarn.  So far I am only doing sock yarn because you don't need to match dyelots for a pair of socks in the same way you would for a larger project.

Mostly I am dyeing in my slow cookers with gel icing colours but use the microwave method for my confetti yarns.  The first time I did confetti yarn I used cake sprinkles which gave really good colour but the combination of heat, moisture and the cornstarch in the sprinkles led to a long drawn out washing process to get all the little goopy lumps off from the yarn.  This time I am trying sanding sugar.  I went out and bought all the colours that my local Michaels had in sachets, mixed them all together and then sprinkled them onto my acid soaked yarn and put in the microwave.  In hindsight I don't think I should have added in the red sugar as it gave the whole skein a pinky halo, which is not unattractive but not what I was after.  Next time I blend up a mix I shall skip the red.  However this did wash out much better than the goopy bits of sprinkles.

When I use the slow cooker I either put the whole skein in the acid bath and then add the colour into  different zones to get a more subtle colour mixing or I loop my acid soaked skein into 2 or more empty jelly jars stood in a couple of inches of cold water. pour the diluted dyes into the jars and then turn the slow cooker onto high and leave the whole thing for several hours.

The nice thing about using the food dyes is you can play happily without worrying about any toxic effects of the dyes, though I do recommend using gloves or you will end up with odd coloured skin and nails for a few days!

Anyway let me introduce you to Tequila Sunrise, Cheeky Vimto, Parakeet and Strawberry Tutti Frutti who made their debut at FLoF!

FLoF was probably the last fibre festival before lockdown, squeezing in under the radar on March 14th 2020. It was touch and go whether it would happen, but it did, the footfall was much, much reduced (Penn State students should have been coming back from Spring Break that weekend but were told to stay home as classes went online only) and the mood was very pensive. However the vendors commented that they covered their costs and those that did attend enjoyed it.

I didn't quite finish knitting my cowl in time, but it is done now and I am waiting for a good day to block it.