Dyeing with Kool-Aid: maybe this stuff shouldn't be ingested...

I don't have anything pressing to work on right now (yes I do, but I can't actually work on it right now. Shh, it's a secret.) so I'm going to dye some wool for my not-mother. You know, the one who quilts and whose blog is linked on the left side.

I'm sharing some of the Knitpicks Wool of the Andes with her, because she's the best, basically. I offered it to her bare or dyed, and she asked me to dye it. Which is great, because I love dyeing wool.

I use Kool-Aid to dye roving. Yeah, Kool-Aid.

In a good-sized pot, bring water and about a cup of vinegar (who measures stuff?) just to a boil, then take it off the heat and add a packet of Kool-Aid. This is strawberry.

Add the wool and push it down. If you want all over color, you better weigh it down with something. I don't and would rather have some variation in my wool so I let it float to the top and just flip it over a couple times while it sits. Some people think you should let it sit for extended periods of time, but I've noticed that the wool soaks all the color out of the water after about 15 minutes and it doesn't rinse out.

Precariously dump out your pot of water. If the water runs clear you did it right. Although this is pretty hard to mess up.

Hang it over the sink because there's not really a better place to do it. Except maybe your shower.

One done!

I followed the same steps for a purple batch.

This one looks a little sketchy. The dye job is pretty uneven. If I don't like it the first time I'll do it again with another packet.

Yeah we're gonna do this again. I'm adding a couple drops of blue food coloring this time because it came out way too pink for my liking.

It's much better but my camera is shitty. I promise it's purple.

Finished dyed roving.