Yarn dying experiment Day #4

I found this great tutorial to dye yarn with food dye which of course is A LOT cheaper! and I love it. I think this will be my Yarn Dying Experiment #2.

http://kathrynivy.com/patterns/extras/dyeing-yarn/

Today I finally was able to put these two babies in a bath. Once is the long skein I rewind to make self striping yarn. The other one is the skein I was able to unfold correctly, just the way it comes from Knitpicks.
Skein #1 Long strand for Self Striping yarn
Squeeze bottles with dye










My helper and the final result.







Skein #2 Shorter strand as it comes from Knitpicks.

I put it in a foil baking dish and painted it there. I used different colors. This is probably going to come out varigated rather than stripy or with very thin stripes.
I used different colors for the second one. This one has saffyre blue, teal, fire red and tourquoise. I put it in a foil baking dish and painted it there. This is probably going to come out varigated rather than stripy or with very thin stripes because the length of each color is shorter.

The red and the green together created a back stripe but that is OK.










Here are both skeins in the sink cooling off:

Here it is the steaming pot I got from Good Will.I am not sure these were a set, but they fit together perfectly and I even found a lid for it. All for about $5.







I learned a lot from this experience. I learned I need bigger squeeze bottles. I got the kind you use to travel to put shampoo in it. You actually need the bigger kind they use to put Mustard in, otherwise you have to refill them and add vinegar each time. I also need a funnel ( I used paper ice cones) and better globes. The ones I had were so uncomfortable that I ended up not using them at all. I need latex gloves.

Also, it's better to do this without the kids. Rachel helped me at first but on my last skein, Ian distracted me and I forgot to add vinegar... I am not sure how is that going to affect the dying. (after the boiling, this skein bled like crazy and the colors ran into each other probably because of the lack of vinegar but also because of the excess dye because I did not use the squeeze bottles, I just pour the dye from the jar because I was tired... I did gave this a bath in luckewarm water with vinegar after the boiling... Not sure if that helped for the dye to stay, but after that I wash it until the water was clear and it looks OK.)

Another very important thing I learned is to lift the skein after you paint it to check for white spots underneath. I have a big white spot in the first skein :-( but I love the way it came out, I love the colors.

Drying outside: