Merlot and Black Cherry Yarn

I did another batch of yarn dying on the stove this weekend.

I used some of my old Procion dye, already mixed to the preferred colors : Red Wine and Black Cherry.


I watched this video by Rebecca at Chem Knits where she demos dyeing a gradient on a loosely wound ball of yarn.  She is using a different type of dye and cotton yarn, vs. Procion and wool yarn, but the general technique is the same for kettle dying a loosely wound ball of yarn.  The chemistry is a little different when using Procion dye on wool.

For a 100 gram ball of yarn, here are my proportions (though I probably would even need this much vinegar and salt):

1-1/2 T salt
1/3 cup white vinegar to the pot of hot water.

Separately, I also mixed up some dye stock with about 1-1/2 tsp Procion dye dissolved in hot water.  I like to shake it up in a bottle with a cap that closes tightly and reliably.

When the water was near to boiling, I added some (not nearly all) of the dye stock, then added the loosely wound ball of yarn.  It had not been pre-soaked ahead of time, so it took a little more effort to get it submerged.

This is how they looked in the dye pot as they were starting to take up the color.

To the Red Wine ball, I added a splash of black cherry over to top and down the middle -- just for a little more variation in color.

To the Black Cherry batch, I added a splash of the Red Wine dye stock -- afain, just afor a little more variation in color.

I am loving how these turned out!  Kind of like these beautiful Malabrigo Yarns.
I will definitely be doing more of this technique in more colors.  Maybe green and blue to start with ...



The only problem is that the balls are so loosely wound that they tend to fall apart during the process.  Then it takes extra time to unravel everything.  I should figure out a way to keep it all together during the process -- maybe an onion bag that would allow the dye to penetrate, but still hod the general structure of the ball together during the process?