Yarn: Knitpicks Bare Merino/Silk lace weight
Dye: Kool-aid Brand unsweetened drink mix. 2 packets of Lemonade (yellow), Orange (orange), Solar Strawberry Starfruit (pink). 1 packet of Grape (purple). 1/2 packet of Lemon-Lime (green) and 2 1/2 packets of Black Cherry (red).
Step 1 - Presoak: I soaked the yarn for about an hour in cold water with a small squirt of Ivory dishsoap.
Step 2 - Lemonade Flavor: I used 2 packets of lemonade in cold water, then added the yarn and filled the bowl so that the yarn was covered. Nuked in the microwave for 2 minutes, let rest for 5 and giving it a VERY gentle stir, repeated this until the water was clear. Removed the yarn from the micro, and let it cool to room temp and prepared the mix for step 3. I wanted the water to be room temp to try to prevent any felting.
As you can see the yellow didn't take evenly, but I wasn't overly concerned since I would be doing a lot of over dyeing.
Step 3 - Orange Flavor: Repeated step 2 except water was room temp instead of cold. This time I didn't submerge all the yarn I kept out about 7 inches. I let this part dangle into another bowl to catch drippings. My original plan was to fold the skein in half and submerge the ends, but I got all excited and forgot, so it was one end hanging out. Still trying to not panic over the uneven dyeing. This time I decided to pour the yarn into a shallow cake pan to try to speed up a bit the cool down time.
Step 4 - Pink Flavor: Repeat of Step 3, not submerging another 4 or so inches of the yarn. This step I forgot to get a picture of, but you will be able to see some of the pink in the next photos. It looks a lot like clown barf still.
Step 5 - Red Flavor: Repeat of Step 4, took out another 4 inches or so.
Step 6 - Purple Flavor: I decided since there was such a small amount of yarn left that I would cut back to 1 packet. Leaving about 4" in the dyebath. I also forgot to take a picture of this step. At this time everything is still bright and I wanted to tone it down a bit.
Step 7 - Green Flavor: I went with a 1/2 a packet for the whole skein. I didn't want to actually add green just something to tone down the colors. When it was finished I wasn't happy with it, but decided to see what it looked like when it was dry.
And once it was dry:
I didn't like it, I wanted them to blend better, and didn't care much for the extreme light colors. I talked to a couple people and decided to do another 1/2 packet of grape. But at the last minute I got paranoid because I didn't want the light parts to turn out purple so went with a 1/2 packet of black cherry.
Once it cooled down I rinsed it really well, then put it into a bowl of water with a squirt of hair conditioner then rinsed complete. Making sure the water runs clear.
The end result can be seen in the previous post. I'm pretty pleased with myself.
