the blue blog archives: gee, your yarn smells terrific

Kool-aid yarn dyeing with the first graders - what could be more fun?! Well, I thought it would be fun at least. They didn't really get into it until they saw how clear the water got after cooking the yarn. That got 'em. And then there was the smell. "Mmmmmm, it smells so good in here," they all kept saying. "But does it taste good?" one girl asked every five minutes. Ha. Ha.

I'd prepared five mini-skeins of some Knit Picks Dye-Your-Own and other white wool leftovers I had and the girls picked out the colors to dye them. We mixed up kool-aid in mason jars and dunked the yarn in, sometimes one whole skein in just one color and sometimes we put half of one skein in one color and half in another. We zapped it in the microwave a couple of times following these directions (no, we didn't put that metal pot in the microwave - it was just to hold the wet yarn before and after) and here's what we got.

The red/yellow one was supposed to be purple and yellow. The "purple" kool-aid simply came out red. I overdyed it at home with some blue in an attempt to make it a little more purpley but ended up with only a kind of cranberry red. Oh well. The others came out quite well though, especially the blue and green. Every time I've done the kool-aid dyeing I have had the best success with orange, blue, and green. The reds often have to be re-dyed to achieve the color you want and the yellow requires a couple of packets of kool-aid to even show up much at all. Still, I'd definitely call our little afternoon of dyeing a success. And this week - our last week! - everyone gets to take home a mini-ball of some of the yarn we dyed as a souvenir.

posted by alison at 9:41 am | in first grade knitting

Comments

Oh, pretty.

I really need to try kool-aid dyeing. Stupid non-availability in the UK. Must find a reseller

Posted by: Kristin at March 5, 2008 10:06 AM

i love that project. i bet you were a hit with the kids. all of your yarn came out bright and gorgeous.

Posted by: lynette at March 5, 2008 10:06 AM

What a great project! I love how you're giving them mini-lessons on so many different aspects of knitting.

Posted by: Rachel at March 5, 2008 10:17 AM

OK, now you've rekindled my interest in this process again. Once the weather gets nice so I can hang things outside to dry, I'm all over this. I was thinking socks would be a good place to start. If they don't look fab, well, they're mostly covered. How great it must be for the kids and the teacher to have you offering some enrichment to the school program.

Posted by: Robby at March 5, 2008 10:44 AM

I love how kool-aid-dyed yarn smells--too bad it doesn't seem to last very long!

Posted by: Melissa at March 5, 2008 11:07 AM

Did you use the grape to get that red?? That is just the red I want--it's so hard to find a nice deep red lace weight (at least where I am looking). So far in prep I bought 10 packets of Black Cherry.

I had really good results using the lemon-lime to get a pretty springy green.

Posted by: Birdy at March 5, 2008 11:11 AM

You deserve a huge amount of credit for doing all this with the kids. You may not think they absorbed much of it, but some of them did, and will undoubtedly remember it forever. A friend's mom taught me to crochet 30 years ago and gave me my very first crochet hook, which started me on the whole fiber arts process. I still have the hook and keep it in my tool bag for picking up dropped stitches and doing edging. I recently had the pleasure of seeing her again, at her daughter's bridal shower, where I gave the bride the wedding shawl I knitted. The mom took one look and exclaimed, "I want to learn how to do that!" To which I smiled broadly and said, "I'll teach you!"

Posted by: Suzanne V. (Yarnhog) at March 5, 2008 11:13 AM

That's very nice of you to say, Suzanne. I hope that the kids got something out of it. At a minimum, they got some snacks, some time to run around with their friends and some knitting stuff. And their moms got a extra kid-free hour for a few afternoons. I know how valuable that can be!!

But if they continue to knit or pick it up again sometime and remember a little bit of what we did, that'd be awesome!

Posted by: ALISON at March 5, 2008 11:32 AM

I love KoolAid dying, but if I want a better idea of my results I usually go for my Wilton cake gels. Slightly more work in mixing colors, but the reds are a lot easier to get this way even if they don't smell as good.

Posted by: Seanna Lea at March 5, 2008 12:23 PM

where were were you when I had Brownies or even Junior Girl Scouts. Oh the fun we could have had!

Posted by: romelda mckee at March 5, 2008 1:32 PM

I've found that Strawberry gives a nice red, and Grape does a fairly decent purple.

Orange IS super strong!!

Isn't Kool-Aid dyeing fun??!!

Posted by: heather t at March 5, 2008 2:16 PM

When I was a child, I had (actually, I still have it) a compilation-of-Christmas-stories book. One of the stories was called "Granny Glittens and Her Amazing Mittens." In this story, Granny Glittens is knitting mittens for all the children in her neighborhood, but on Christmas Eve, she runs out of colored yarn. She dyes white yarn with candy (peppermints, spearmints, licorice, etc.) and all the children love the mittens because they smell good. Much like your dyeing! I agree with the others who have said that these children will remember your experiments with yarn probably all their lives. I've remembered Granny Glittens for about 60 years!

Posted by: Mary K. in Rockport at March 5, 2008 3:40 PM

My clergy collar is smelling like Grape kool-aid because I picked some up at the grocery store to dye some yarn and stuck it in my purse and forgot about it.

Until I pulled my collar out this morning and realized I suddenly smelled grape-y.

Posted by: Emily at March 5, 2008 5:17 PM

I love dying yarn with Koolaid, and I love the way it smells afterwards.

I haven't done any koolaid dying for ages and ages - must go and buy some more and get some yarn to dye... maybe the kids would even like to help me!

Posted by: tajhia at March 5, 2008 6:28 PM

The cranberry and yellow one is my favorite. :) They all turned out beautifully!

Posted by: Chelsea at March 5, 2008 10:07 PM

I love Kool-Aid dying - and it does smell good. If anyone needs Kool Aid in the UK try www.koolaiduk.com - they even have out of date packets on clearance specifically for wool dying.

Posted by: Carie at March 6, 2008 3:27 AM

I love Kool-Aid dying - and it does smell good. If anyone needs Kool Aid in the UK try www.koolaiduk.com - they even have out of date packets on clearance specifically for wool dying.

Posted by: Carie at March 6, 2008 3:27 AM

Do you have the shop Lush in the US? They sell gorgeous smelling soaps, with scents like chocolate cake and strawberries and cream. I had a bar of something or other for christmas a few years back and it smelt so edible... that at one point, I couldn't resist anymore and took a bite, just to see.... it tasted horribly of soap ;-)

Posted by: Cybèle at March 6, 2008 5:17 PM

How funny, Cybele! :D

Posted by: ALISON at March 6, 2008 8:05 PM