I had so much fun with Sadie Fiery Sunset Fade that I wanted to try my hand at another. This time I’m doing a five-part fade set using Yellow-Green-Blue-Purple as my color scheme which I’ll call Peacock. Since I love knitting sweaters, five seems like an excellent skein count.
For my base for all of them, I will be using Frida. It’s a 100% Merino Wool Superwash with 16 microns of softness. It’s so super-duper soft, and just touching it during the dyeing process is luscious. It will make the most luxurious sweater.
For my dye colors across the entire Peacock fade, I mixed jars of it at once with 1 tsp of citric acid per color. I dyed everything on the same day too, but you’ll have to be patient to see the finished product!
With Jacquard Acid Dyes, I used:
• Yellow – Sun Yellow
• Light Green – Chartreuse (with a touch of Spruce)
• Green – Kelly Green
• Blue – Brilliant Blue
• Purple – Violet
I have been wanting to try out jar dyeing. I know a lot of people do this during the summer with solar dyeing, but it’s certainly not warm weather in Washington right now. But I have a workaround!
I soaked a skein of Frida in water for 30 minutes. I put a bit of the Yellow and the Light Green in jars. In the main dyeing jar, I added about an inch of the Light Green.
I pulled the yarn out of the soaking tub and I didn’t wring it out. Then I squished it into the jar.
In retrospect, I wish I had rung out the yarn. There was so much water in the yarn that the jar was nearly completely filled, and it didn’t leave much room for another color. Next time I try a jar method, I will wring out the yarn and then add the water.
I topped off the jar with yellow dye to the very tippy top. Using my gloved finger, I did poke the yarn down as far as it would go to get a bit more yellow dye dispersion. I capped off the jar and it put over to the side to work on the other yarns.
It sat for about 2 hours before it was time to heat set it. I grabbed a pot and filled it with water and put it in the jar (and the purple jar you’ll learn about next week). I took the lids of the jar because I didn’t want the heat to seal the jar or create other reactions like glass jar ruptures/explosions. I brought the heat up to before simmering and let the jars hang out for 20 minutes. The jars did rattle around a bit in the pan, so I’m glad they weren’t capped.
I let the yarn cool overnight to make sure the dye had plenty of time to exhaust. I plucked it from the jar, rinsed it and hung it up to dry.
I’m happy with how it turned out. There is more white bare yarn than I expected, but that’s okay. Live and learn! And it’s a good start to the Peacock Fade!
Stay tuned for next week where you learn about the mysterious purple jar!
Ready to make your unique colorway? Hop on over to Makers' Mercantile® and pick up your undyed yarn and supplies. We can’t wait to see what you make, so tag us on social media with #makersmercantile!
About Tara
Tara Warburton is the former graphic designer for Makers' Mercantile® and a fine artist. She specializes in watercolor and colored pencil illustrations. She lives with her two cats, who are not helpful when knitting.
