I’ve dabbled in dyeing with Kool-Aid before. Knitty has a fantastic article about how to do it that I use as a reference each time I try to do this.

Recently, I washed a bunch of knits together and something bled. The article that I think was the offender has been washed many times without issue, so it’s still a bit of a mystery. Apparently, I’m not destined to keep any item made from Hazel Knits Artisan Sock in Saffron as its true color, because one I had this same issue a few years back and had to overdye that item as well. I replaced the yarn and turned the yarn into a Whispers top (click link to see original color) and this one picked up some dye as well.

Both items that were affected had some pinkish stains. Kinton was one of these and I’m sad to have messed up that beautiful blue-green. I thought Pink Lemonade might be a good fit for dyeing. I went to the store and bought thirteen packets, planning on just doing the Kinton top first. Welllllll… when I put the top into the water it absorbed the dye very quickly and not so evenly. I left it on the stove (watched by Matt) and ran out for twenty more packets of Pink Lemonade and ten of Black Cherry just in case. I got home and decided to throw all of those together and in a bigger pot. Then I carefully dipped the top in and this time could see it was going to be a more consistent color. Feeling confident and seeing that Whispers also needed some dye, I decided to just throw it in as well since there seemed to be plenty of dye in this batch.

I’m pretty comfortable with the results. Kinton is more heavily black cherry/maroon. It’s not a color I typically choose for my wardrobe, but I might try it out for awhile and see. If it’s not my jam I have a friend that would probably love it. Whispers I really like the color of. The yellow base made such a fun bright citrus when layered with more red. I’ve only got this shot because this new color seems too difficult for my camera to capture accurately, but it has some fun depth. The dye on Whispers is definitely less even, but I’m ok with that. If it bothers me later, I’ll just give it another Kool-Aid bath.

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