Yarn Experiments
This week is all about the speckle dyeing of yarns! And you're going to have the bird's eye view/step by step right with me here on the blog. LOL
I'm putting all of my notes, all of what I did and will also try to add links or actual videos to this post so you can see and we'll all find out how I did.
Mostly I have my favorite fiber, which is cotton. And I do also have some others. I also really love the bamboo yarns, cotton/bamboo mix and wool/bamboo/nylon mixes.
**DISCLAIMER: I am being told by professional dyers that this process is actually destroying the wool... that in order to be properly cared for ALL wool yarns should be kept below a pH of 3 and heat process/acid dyes should be used only. What I can tell you is that I've done this using soda ash (which has a pH of greater than 8) for more than 2 years, I've just used the last of the yarns I dyed when I started and none of the wool is destroyed or rough or broken. It isn't coming apart... and if you'd feel safer using cotton and bamboo and other plant fiber yarns for this process I would not blame you... apparently soda ash destroys wool. I will be trying this process without the soda ash and will report my findings in a new post!**
I get my bare wools from The Yarn and I on Etsy because her prices are awesome, she has tons of podcasts about dyeing and handling yarns and, well, I also like her yarns! I have also purchased bare wools from RaspberryDyeWorks also on Etsy because her prices are also awesome, she's young and already dyeing yarns and because I love some of her colorways a real lot!
I buy my cottons directly from Premier here. The trick is to watch for sales at all of the places where you can stock up. I have 10 skeins of the Premier Home Cotton Glitz that I believe I paid 1/4 price for and actually am out of the plain Premier Home Cotton yarn right now. LOL I never pay full price for them. (At the moment Premier Home Cotton is $11.99 per skein on Premier. Looks like I'm searching for a sale!)
inspirations and links to the original yarn dyers:
AstraeaMeris, ETSY
What I'm looking at here are just the incredible ways that the browns and rusts pull into all of the other colors like they were meant to be there. What I like about the black specks in ColourRedefined is what I love about the rusts in this maker. Everything is so meticulous and beautiful and even the elements of surprise are within her scope of vision. I just love them so much!
ColourRedefined, ETSY
What I'm looking at are the amazing speckles. Just a rainbow in an inch and so often no bleed between them, or minimal. Absolutely incredible. And the black just pops like magic!!! I love how the black adds a layer of dimension as if sinking into the strand and the colors leap out.
LB Art Yarns, ETSY
I just found this maker last night and noticed that she's already done a thing I was thinking for myself with the coral and teal inspirations... I want to play with these colors as well, and may have to order one of hers because she did it first. LOL What I love most here is the base color and then playing with the overdye in sprinkles.
To note here, these are the yarns I've got on hand:
93 Yards Merino/Nylon/Stelina 75/20/5
93 Yards Merino/Nylon 75/25
463 Yards Merino/Nylon 75/25
Overdyed: three mystery skeins that I'm certain were acid dyed before this, so this might be interesting
Overdyed: Lion Brand Sock Ease Marshmallow (unknown, guessing 100 yards) Wool/Nylon 75/25
Overdyed: Premier Home Cotton (unknown, guessing 50-150 yards) Cotton/Polyester 85/15
Overdyed: Premier Home Cotton Glitz (unknown guessing 100 yards) Cotton/Polyester/Metallic 83/15/2
Overdyed: Premier Home Cotton Glitz Cotton/Polyester/Metallic 83/15/2
Overdyed: Bernat Handicrafter (unknown, guessing 100-150 yards) 100% Cotton
Overdyed: A number of unknown yarns that were acid dyed or store bought, just testing sprinkling and what happens.
THE TECHNIQUE:
I'm loose with this still. I'm calling what I do hand dyed, and NOT professionally dyed because I'm still playing and very likely cannot repeat my results.
I'm careful and using high grade professional and retail products. I'm using Soda Ash and cold water dyes, also known as Tie Dyes. I have THIS set of Jacquard Procion dyes and I use a LOT of Tulip Tie Dye kit dyes. There are clear instructions in all of the Tulip kits and that heat isn't required.
NOTE: Tulip dyes actually have a time limit on their effectiveness, read the instructions carefully. :D
Remember to be very careful when dyeing yarn!
Soda ash won't kill you and it's still not something you want to drink or eat, or let your cats and kids eat or drink.
Dye will DYE YOU AND EVERYTHING ELSE. Wear gloves. They're awkward and unglamerous and still... this stuff adds permanent color to fibers and skin and floors and counters, particularly where they're scratched or cut or buffed from age. I try to work on top of cover everywhere I can.
And I try not to breathe anything I wouldn't eat or drink if I can avoid it, I don't use masks for this process because it's non-toxic and I also don't lean over my work space or yarn while dyeing.
When I splatter dye I have been using heat. I discovered this week that heat is not required for speckles, and in fact, wrapping in plastic and heating wrecks speckles. I soak the yarn in warm water and that's the end of the heat. I do this because the soda ash dissolves better in warm water.
STEP BY STEP-ish
TESTS:
Will sprinkle dyed yarns turn splotchy if sprinkled when damp and rolled into plastic wrap as I usually do?
Normally I just splatter, pour or otherwise decorate my yarn with dye and then roll it in plastic and tuck it in nice and warm until it cools naturally then rinse.
My INSTINCT says that it would be better to leave them open and damp in a closed container until tomorrow when they can be rinsed, so that nothing touches anything else and so that the moisture can't be "squished" and settle.
The Result:
They are more like a tight splatter dye, not at all like the speckles you expect. I was right. When acid dyeing the makers speckle and let set, turn and speckle and let set. Nothing moves, nothing touches and there's no pressure.
Does the dye hold color when sprinkled onto a base color?
The Tulip dyes don't seem to be bothered too much by light or pastel colors under them. They drop a fantastic color right on top. This test is to see if the dry dyes sprinkled on the colored yarn stay "true."
The Result:
Absolutely! I'm sure there's some base change and it's still recognizably rainbow speckles and splotches!
Does cold water yarn absorb all of the color in the basin the way that acid dye does?
In acid dying you can add color to the water and lay the dry yarn into the basin you're using and as it absorbs the color and water it literally takes the color FROM the water. I want to know if this happens with the cold process yarns as well.
No. This dye does NOT slowly absorb until it vanishes into the yarn and absorb at a higher rate for the yarn at the "bottom" that absorbed more.
It is possible that I need less water to force the yarn to drink it up, and I doubt it. One skein appears to have taken in the dye at different ratios as it absorbed, leaving one half bubblegum and the other darker. We will see when rinsed.
Will sprinkling DRY dye from the Tulip bottles directly create speckles?
Can I just drop and sprinkle the dry dyes from the Tulip squirt bottles designed for tie dye and get a decent speckle result or will it be more uneven like the fork tapping?
The Result:
No. It's more like splatter dying in lines and stripes. No defined speckle. I wont be doing this again because it's not effective AND it seems to use a real lot of the dry dye whereas the salt shaker works awesome.
Will there be a good result from letting the yarns sit out and dry on trays after splattering/speckling them?
With the acid dyes they stay in the pan just above the liquid line and speckles set this way. I can't really leave mine in water, it wont speckle so much as just spread... so I left the damp yarn just sitting flat on plastic without covering.
The Result:
This works equally well to placing them in containers. Sadly, it is also as messy to rinse! And because the trays had to sit open and I have a cat who is dreadfully interested, I have chosen to leave the yarns in closed containers even though there's a little bit of spread because the moisture collects and allows the dyes to stay active for longer.
When using acid dyeing techniques the dyers sprinkle and then let the yarn sit until the dye sets, then flip the yarn and do it again. Would something like this work on cold water dyes?
NOTE: two different dyers told me a "secret" is to use salt in with the dyes to spread them out and get more defined speckles. while this IS the secret to speckles, it is available online in a couple of different tutorials so I'm putting it here so that you know. It DOES spread out the dye a little bit and make it more regular in disbursement. ALSO... I used little plastic salt shakers I got on Amazon. They make static like all plastic things and the super fine dye wants to stick while the salt settles. Just saying. LMAO
The Result:
Yes. This is the closest method to the look I want. This is what I will be doing in the future. And the rule of "less is more" is VERY true. Particularly with black. It just really wants to bleed and gray and be generally a pain in the butt. The same is true of the pinks, purples and reds.
MONDAY YARNS:
Today I didn't get any pictures or video because cat. No, really. OMG cat! In everything, he stole a baby skein that was a random bit I'd received from someone else and tangled it so badly I couldn't even save it so I threw it away. Tomorrow we start as soon as the cat goes upstairs to lay down. If he's right back then I'll know it's the smell or something. I have no clue what brings him down when I'm dyeing yarns and not other times.
ALL of the yarns were done by just sprinkling damp yarn NOT rinsed and lightly wrung after soaking with dry dyes and then being rolled in plastic wrap.
ALL dye used is the Jacquard Procion ones (link above.)
Prediction: I am guessing this will be splotches and not speckles when rinsed.
Result: Splotches not speckles. And lots of bleed. BLACK IS EVIL... just saying. LMAO
There are some pictures and there's two videos. When/if I can load the terrible things.
My greatest success came in the sprinkling with salt shakers on damp yarn and letting set in covered containers.
I also tried letting the yarn sit "out" on plastic covered sheet pans to see how they would do.
Aside from the OOPS captured in the last photo above, where I failed to speckle or bleed dye the yarns, I'm very happy with the pan and container methods.
I wont be using pans because keeping the cat out of them is a complete nightmare. LOL Better just to keep them in closed containers.
And there you have it! Some failed attempts that are still gorgeous, some wins and some really fun yarns to use! :D
I'm putting all of my notes, all of what I did and will also try to add links or actual videos to this post so you can see and we'll all find out how I did.
Mostly I have my favorite fiber, which is cotton. And I do also have some others. I also really love the bamboo yarns, cotton/bamboo mix and wool/bamboo/nylon mixes.
**DISCLAIMER: I am being told by professional dyers that this process is actually destroying the wool... that in order to be properly cared for ALL wool yarns should be kept below a pH of 3 and heat process/acid dyes should be used only. What I can tell you is that I've done this using soda ash (which has a pH of greater than 8) for more than 2 years, I've just used the last of the yarns I dyed when I started and none of the wool is destroyed or rough or broken. It isn't coming apart... and if you'd feel safer using cotton and bamboo and other plant fiber yarns for this process I would not blame you... apparently soda ash destroys wool. I will be trying this process without the soda ash and will report my findings in a new post!**
I get my bare wools from The Yarn and I on Etsy because her prices are awesome, she has tons of podcasts about dyeing and handling yarns and, well, I also like her yarns! I have also purchased bare wools from RaspberryDyeWorks also on Etsy because her prices are also awesome, she's young and already dyeing yarns and because I love some of her colorways a real lot!
I buy my cottons directly from Premier here. The trick is to watch for sales at all of the places where you can stock up. I have 10 skeins of the Premier Home Cotton Glitz that I believe I paid 1/4 price for and actually am out of the plain Premier Home Cotton yarn right now. LOL I never pay full price for them. (At the moment Premier Home Cotton is $11.99 per skein on Premier. Looks like I'm searching for a sale!)
inspirations and links to the original yarn dyers:
What I'm looking at here are just the incredible ways that the browns and rusts pull into all of the other colors like they were meant to be there. What I like about the black specks in ColourRedefined is what I love about the rusts in this maker. Everything is so meticulous and beautiful and even the elements of surprise are within her scope of vision. I just love them so much!
Saree
These seem to be my calling this year. Warm soft colors that snuggle rather than punching.
Bold Tweed
And then earthy tones that reach right out and grab you. LOOK at the speckles and bleeds!!!
ColourRedefined, ETSY
What I'm looking at are the amazing speckles. Just a rainbow in an inch and so often no bleed between them, or minimal. Absolutely incredible. And the black just pops like magic!!! I love how the black adds a layer of dimension as if sinking into the strand and the colors leap out.
Kill Joy
I've never bought this one from her, and I wish I could have... OMG... so much color and black and...
Pass Me The Funnies
My favorite in her whole shop... the pale gray and all the color and black... LOVE
I just found this maker last night and noticed that she's already done a thing I was thinking for myself with the coral and teal inspirations... I want to play with these colors as well, and may have to order one of hers because she did it first. LOL What I love most here is the base color and then playing with the overdye in sprinkles.
Self Care
This with the post apocalyptic look again, I want so much to do this with pale
blues/teals and corals and then speckles of rainbow and rust
To note here, these are the yarns I've got on hand:
93 Yards Merino/Nylon/Stelina 75/20/5
93 Yards Merino/Nylon 75/25
463 Yards Merino/Nylon 75/25
Overdyed: three mystery skeins that I'm certain were acid dyed before this, so this might be interesting
Overdyed: Lion Brand Sock Ease Marshmallow (unknown, guessing 100 yards) Wool/Nylon 75/25
Overdyed: Premier Home Cotton (unknown, guessing 50-150 yards) Cotton/Polyester 85/15
Overdyed: Premier Home Cotton Glitz (unknown guessing 100 yards) Cotton/Polyester/Metallic 83/15/2
Overdyed: Premier Home Cotton Glitz Cotton/Polyester/Metallic 83/15/2
Overdyed: Bernat Handicrafter (unknown, guessing 100-150 yards) 100% Cotton
Overdyed: A number of unknown yarns that were acid dyed or store bought, just testing sprinkling and what happens.
***NOTE: the Jelly Bean colorway that was store bought bled purple and pink EVERYWHERE...
so just a note to the wise... not all store-bought sock yarns are colorfast.
All three of the ones dyed by home dyers, however were colorfast and gorgeous!
Points to handmade yarns and their makers, then, for care and good work!
THE TECHNIQUE:
I'm loose with this still. I'm calling what I do hand dyed, and NOT professionally dyed because I'm still playing and very likely cannot repeat my results.
I'm careful and using high grade professional and retail products. I'm using Soda Ash and cold water dyes, also known as Tie Dyes. I have THIS set of Jacquard Procion dyes and I use a LOT of Tulip Tie Dye kit dyes. There are clear instructions in all of the Tulip kits and that heat isn't required.
NOTE: Tulip dyes actually have a time limit on their effectiveness, read the instructions carefully. :D
Remember to be very careful when dyeing yarn!
Soda ash won't kill you and it's still not something you want to drink or eat, or let your cats and kids eat or drink.
Dye will DYE YOU AND EVERYTHING ELSE. Wear gloves. They're awkward and unglamerous and still... this stuff adds permanent color to fibers and skin and floors and counters, particularly where they're scratched or cut or buffed from age. I try to work on top of cover everywhere I can.
my hands are gonna look FUN for awhile. LMAO
Do as I say, not as I do, this is the lesson here.
When I splatter dye I have been using heat. I discovered this week that heat is not required for speckles, and in fact, wrapping in plastic and heating wrecks speckles. I soak the yarn in warm water and that's the end of the heat. I do this because the soda ash dissolves better in warm water.
STEP BY STEP-ish
soaking yarn in a huge popcorn container. LOL highly technical here
- I use warm water and soda ash to soak the yarn. 1/3 cup of soda ash to the big bowl of water because the instructions on my package say 1/3 cup to 3 gallons of water for hand dyeing AND because I'm using heat which sets the color harder. I soak the yarn for about 1/2 an hour, sometimes a little longer if I have other things I'm doing
- FOR ONE TEST I DID NOT SOAK THE YARN FIRST... after soaking the rest of the yarn I took out four cups of the water/soda ash mix and heated it in the microwave for 1 minute then added the dry yarn to the water and microwaved again for 30 seconds and continued this until the yarn had absorbed all of the color, or didn't.
- Wring most of the water out, but do not rinse. Submerge in dye liquid OR lay out on plastic wrap and start speckle/splatter dye process
- Let the dye set completely. I found that regardless of the instructions, Tulip wants about 4-6 hours and the Jacquard Procion CAN sit for 24 but it doesn't need to when you sprinkle dye this way. I let mine sit about 5 hours.
- Rinse gently with lukewarm water and slowly bring it down to cool water only until no color releases (it shouldn't be much but cold water dye always releases some.) I then rinse one last time using Soak rinse or gentle dish soap. I like my Soak rinse and it can be gotten here from FlyYarns on Etsy.
- Hang somewhere warm and safe to dry. NOTE: do yourself a favor and put an old towel under the skeins if you're having to dry indoors... I KNOW we rinsed it, and this is cold water dye, so just don't let it drip on things that you don't want to have dyed and life will be good. I've heard horror stories of people bundling up yarn in towels to spin dry it. Just don't. Let it take time and dry.
my insanely technical supplies... set up for speckle with salt/dye in shakers
tulip dyes and label from inside the kit
wrap my stained baking sheets in plastic that came in the tie dye kit and tape it to the back
TESTS:
Will sprinkle dyed yarns turn splotchy if sprinkled when damp and rolled into plastic wrap as I usually do?
Normally I just splatter, pour or otherwise decorate my yarn with dye and then roll it in plastic and tuck it in nice and warm until it cools naturally then rinse.
My INSTINCT says that it would be better to leave them open and damp in a closed container until tomorrow when they can be rinsed, so that nothing touches anything else and so that the moisture can't be "squished" and settle.
The Result:
They are more like a tight splatter dye, not at all like the speckles you expect. I was right. When acid dyeing the makers speckle and let set, turn and speckle and let set. Nothing moves, nothing touches and there's no pressure.
Does the dye hold color when sprinkled onto a base color?
The Tulip dyes don't seem to be bothered too much by light or pastel colors under them. They drop a fantastic color right on top. This test is to see if the dry dyes sprinkled on the colored yarn stay "true."
The Result:
Absolutely! I'm sure there's some base change and it's still recognizably rainbow speckles and splotches!
Does cold water yarn absorb all of the color in the basin the way that acid dye does?
In acid dying you can add color to the water and lay the dry yarn into the basin you're using and as it absorbs the color and water it literally takes the color FROM the water. I want to know if this happens with the cold process yarns as well.
- After soaking the other yarns in soda ash water I removed 4-5 cups from the bucket and put them in a microwave safe storage bowl. I microwaved this for 1 and 1/2 minutes in 30 second bursts.
- I laid in my cotton and wool yarns (no sparkle because I was worried about the effect of these in the microwave) in the warm dyed water.
- I microwaved this mixture in 30 second bursts a few times over 10 minutes to see if the yarns absorbed the color from the basin the way that acid dyes will do in yarn on a constant heat source.
No. This dye does NOT slowly absorb until it vanishes into the yarn and absorb at a higher rate for the yarn at the "bottom" that absorbed more.
It is possible that I need less water to force the yarn to drink it up, and I doubt it. One skein appears to have taken in the dye at different ratios as it absorbed, leaving one half bubblegum and the other darker. We will see when rinsed.
Will sprinkling DRY dye from the Tulip bottles directly create speckles?
Can I just drop and sprinkle the dry dyes from the Tulip squirt bottles designed for tie dye and get a decent speckle result or will it be more uneven like the fork tapping?
The Result:
No. It's more like splatter dying in lines and stripes. No defined speckle. I wont be doing this again because it's not effective AND it seems to use a real lot of the dry dye whereas the salt shaker works awesome.
Will there be a good result from letting the yarns sit out and dry on trays after splattering/speckling them?
With the acid dyes they stay in the pan just above the liquid line and speckles set this way. I can't really leave mine in water, it wont speckle so much as just spread... so I left the damp yarn just sitting flat on plastic without covering.
The Result:
This works equally well to placing them in containers. Sadly, it is also as messy to rinse! And because the trays had to sit open and I have a cat who is dreadfully interested, I have chosen to leave the yarns in closed containers even though there's a little bit of spread because the moisture collects and allows the dyes to stay active for longer.
***WINNER WINNER CHICKEN DINNER!!!***
Will sprinkling with salt shakers on damp yarn and sealing in containers give good results?When using acid dyeing techniques the dyers sprinkle and then let the yarn sit until the dye sets, then flip the yarn and do it again. Would something like this work on cold water dyes?
NOTE: two different dyers told me a "secret" is to use salt in with the dyes to spread them out and get more defined speckles. while this IS the secret to speckles, it is available online in a couple of different tutorials so I'm putting it here so that you know. It DOES spread out the dye a little bit and make it more regular in disbursement. ALSO... I used little plastic salt shakers I got on Amazon. They make static like all plastic things and the super fine dye wants to stick while the salt settles. Just saying. LMAO
The Result:
Yes. This is the closest method to the look I want. This is what I will be doing in the future. And the rule of "less is more" is VERY true. Particularly with black. It just really wants to bleed and gray and be generally a pain in the butt. The same is true of the pinks, purples and reds.
MONDAY YARNS:
Today I didn't get any pictures or video because cat. No, really. OMG cat! In everything, he stole a baby skein that was a random bit I'd received from someone else and tangled it so badly I couldn't even save it so I threw it away. Tomorrow we start as soon as the cat goes upstairs to lay down. If he's right back then I'll know it's the smell or something. I have no clue what brings him down when I'm dyeing yarns and not other times.
ALL of the yarns were done by just sprinkling damp yarn NOT rinsed and lightly wrung after soaking with dry dyes and then being rolled in plastic wrap.
ALL dye used is the Jacquard Procion ones (link above.)
Prediction: I am guessing this will be splotches and not speckles when rinsed.
Result: Splotches not speckles. And lots of bleed. BLACK IS EVIL... just saying. LMAO
dry... ready to go
dry... ready to be caked
wet, going to the closet to dry
wet, going to the closet to dry
wet, going to the closet to dry
wet, going to the closet to dry
wet, going to the closet to dry
TUESDAY YARNS:There are some pictures and there's two videos. When/if I can load the terrible things.
My greatest success came in the sprinkling with salt shakers on damp yarn and letting set in covered containers.
I also tried letting the yarn sit "out" on plastic covered sheet pans to see how they would do.
I wont be using pans because keeping the cat out of them is a complete nightmare. LOL Better just to keep them in closed containers.
And there you have it! Some failed attempts that are still gorgeous, some wins and some really fun yarns to use! :D
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