How to dye wool with Easter Egg Dye

We finished up dyeing our eggs and I looked at all the cups filled with that gorgeous dye and couldn't resist!  So I ran upstairs and grabbed some wool.  It's very easy to dye wool using leftover Easter egg dye -- let me tell you what I did.

First of all, we used the Paas tablets -- the kind that require vinegar to activate.  And we dye eggs using glass cups which worked very nicely since they can be microwaved -- but I'm getting ahead of myself.

After we finished up our eggs, I took some wool and tore it into sections that I thought would be able to fit in each cup and kind of rolled it into a little ball or nest shape.  Then I filled a clean bowl with warm water and soaked each piece of wool -- just for a few minutes so that it was saturated.  Then after squeezing out the excess water I plunked the pieces of wool into the cups filled with the extra dye.

After that I microwaved each cup (one at a time) -- our microwave is old an feeble, so I think I did about 2 minutes per cup.  I did a second round of microwaving -- this time it was only 1-1:30 minutes per cup, then I let them sit for a while.  The dye exhausted in some, but simply wouldn't in others.

After a nice rest of about an hour, I took out each hunk of wool and rinsed it until it ran clear -- the green was a b*tch!  I rinsed it and rinsed it and soaked it in clear water and rinsed it some more.  ugh!  After that I squeezed out the extra water and hung them to dry.  After they were dry I pre-drafted a bit to fluff them up and. . .

Here they are!  The purple dye reacted strangely with the wool -- the pink from the dye flew unto the wool leaving blue dye behind.  I was glad I used the nest/ball method or one half would have been pink and the other blue.  As it turned out the whole thing is verigated!  Nice surprise!

So, no fancy equipment -- no fancy tools.  Next time you dye eggs, give it a try!

Comments

[Carole]

Excellent! I thought of doing this but I wasn't in the kitchen when they finished dyeing eggs and Dale was already dumping the dyes before I could stop him. Figures that he gets all domestic and cleans up when I didn't want him to do it!

[mac]

I love the way the bright lime green turned out!

Coincidentally, purple cake frosting dye also reacts the same way as your purple egg dye. The colors separate out quite easily. While it's hard to get consistent results, the swirled affect is lovely. I dyed some Optim lace weight I spun a while ago with the purple cake frosting dye and consider it the most successful dye job I ever did see.

[Erin]

The bright green and orange are my favorites! What a brilliant idea!! You've given me a plan for next Easter ... :)

[Imbrium]

Pretty! I think we have some egg dye stashed away in a cabinet somewhere...I'll have to pull it down and play with it.

[old school acres]

Oh! It looks like cotton candy.

I am going to try this with one of the wool blankets I want to dye. I will cut it down into smaller pieces. How fun!!

[Tracey]

I love it! You know, we died eggs with PaaS and I was thinking the same thing...unfortunately no wool at had to dye.

[Hannah]

Hey, I did that, too. The last couple of Saturdays I've been...(cough, cough) practicing. ;-) Did some yarn the first week, then roving last weekend. They turned out fabulous. And yes - my purples did the same thing - something about the vinegar takes up blues and reds at different rates. Still, a cool effect, no?

Hannah

[Vicki]

Such pretty colors!

[Christie]

Very cool...and now that easter is over everyone should be able to find dye really cheap now!

[TheBon]

I am pretty sure that the reason the purple separated is that the red dye strikes at a lower temperature than the blue, which is why you get so much separation and variation. I am trying to remember where I read that, I know it originally came from a link via crafster.org

[TheBon]

I can't find the specific link, but I think I misspoke and rather than the temperature, it's the pH that causes the separation. Apparently red #3 dyes with less acid than most other food dyes.

[Carrie]

Super pretty colors! I can't wait to see the yarn spun up.
I did the same thing but I used sock yarn, I'm always pleased with the results from egg dye!

[Angie]

I didn't dye eggs, but bought some
dye at 1/2 off for yarn.

[--Deb]

Pretty!!

[Jo]

Very pretty - I'm interested to see what it looks like spun up.

[Mama Urchin]

I've actually been eyeing the leftover dye at the grocery store to do exactly this.

[abby]

OOOH! I haven't dyed anything in *ages.* I still have all of my wilton stuff, and some kool aid, and some naked white yarn.

*looks at huge pile from today's estate sale*

Decides to dye another day!

Awesome pictures. :)

[Romi]

What *great* colors! Thanks for the tutorial! :)

[marie]

That is Seriously Beautiful! I like the blue pink one..and that bright green is great! I wish I knew how to spin so I could try that!!