Finally in the Dye Pot on Off the Wall Friday

 Yes, I did it.  I gathered enough courage to make the dive into the wool dye pots.  You wouldn't think it would be such a big deal since I've been dyeing my own cotton fabric for the last 15 years.  But dyeing wool and dyeing cotton are two totally different things.  One thing is the same though, there is no set way of doing it.  Just like when I did the research on cotton, everyone seemed to do it a bit different.  There were a lot of YOU HAVE TO'S and NEVER DO'S but what there wasn't was a standardized procedure on how to dye a piece of wool.

What finally got me going was I wanted a nice royal blue for Santa's vest and I didn't have it in my small stash of wool.  Luckily, I had bought a set of Cushing Dyes complete with swatches on Facebook Rug Hooking Buy/Sell group.  I love this set  - complete with wooden cigar box.

Out of the 94 colors, I chose "Blue" ...I know right? ...brilliant!

I also chose a nearly white piece of wool with a tiny light grey strip running through it.  I kind of arbitrarily chose it, but actually in the end it was a good choice.

The textured wool and the 94 swatches!

After the many wool dyeing tutorials I watch, I took what they all had in common and did that!

1. Soaked the wool with some kind of  humectant..some people use dish soap, some use Synthrapol, some use vinegar.  I had Synthrapol so I just used a splash of that.  I soaked it for about an hour while I gathered my other stuff.

2. Cut a fat quarter of wool.  Measured a 1/4 teaspoon of dye into a cup of filtered water. Gathered all utensils I needed and would forever be designated to wool dyeing. Honestly there is no set measurement for how much dye you use ...mostly people just guess.

3. Filled the dye pot to 3/4 full of filtered water.  Heated the water to just below boiling ...so I kept it around 170 degrees.  I used my new vintage enamel pot since with the white it's easy to see the dye water.  Don't use aluminum pots.

4. Put the fabric and the dye into the water...let simmer for about 15 minutes...put in a big splash of
vinegar in with it, to set the dye...let that simmer for about 15 more minutes making sure the wool didn't get too dark.  Once I was sure it was the right color, I took it out. (everyone does it different but basically it all involves hot water, vinegar and wool for various amounts of time and dye)

5. Rinsed it in warm water cooling gradually to cold.  At this point really no dye was bleeding out of it.

6.  There was still plenty of dye in the pot and I could have dyed more (which I should have but didn't think of ).  Really, I probably only needed 1/8th of a teaspoon of dye for the fat quarter.  

7. I spun the dye in a salad spinner and gave it a finally fluff in the dryer.

For the record, it was much faster and easier than low immersion dyeing of cotton.  But of course I was only doing 1 fat quarter as opposed to me doing 24 fat quarters at a time.   The thing about dyeing for rug hooking is that for the most part you are doing small amounts and can dye up what you need as you need it.   That is totally different than how most quilters do it.   I am VERY happy with the results because it's just the color I needed. 

And speaking of that...on this week's....

Rug Watch

Santa has now gained a vest!  Yes, there is the hand dyed blue vest.  While hooking I realized that I had inadvertently chosen a textured wool which not only gave it a slight little change where the gray was in it, but also gave it a more "nubby" loop perfectly suited for his vest.  The wool is a bit more fragile especially since it's only 1/8th wide but it hooks up lovely! 

I also used yarn for the first time.  I meant to watch some tutorials on that but didn't get that far, so I decided to wing it.  I love it!  It's even more nubby than the textured wool,  It's not hard at hook,  

I've really been enjoying doing this project and I like how Santa is looking a little more filled out!

So What Have You've Been Up to Creatively?

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter