More fun with dying

With Easter being just over, I had the brilliant(?) idea that a perfect way to control dying larger lots of yarn would be to use Easter egg dye.  Get it from the same company, and each color is going to be about the same from package to package.  So I gave it a shot.  Certainly dying same-tone yarn will be about the same, as long as approximately the same amount of yarn is to be dyed.  Variegating the yarn was harder to control, but fun!  The picture below is 120 yards of Lion Brand Fishermans Wool in the beginning of a Baby Surprise Jacket, and an attempt to duplicate the dying.  The pink/purple section is not the same, but I think it's probably closer than exact dye lots of Noro!  (Noro not being my favorite color combos!)

I'm in Colorado as I do this experiment.  After dying the yarn, I put it on the clothes drying rack out on the deck about 8 o'clock .  I came back 1 hour later to check on the state of drying, and discovered it frozen stiff!  Who knew wet things would freeze at 32 degrees!   ;-)

This has been so much fun, I think I'm going to try some tonal dying next.  And I realized, if you want a bright yellow, use Easter egg tabs!  The yellow I got here is vivid, and I had a lot of trouble getting a vivid yellow with KoolAid and other food-safe dyes.  Next I think I'll take a couple of the pink tabs and try graduating the depth of color from deep at the ends of the hank to less intense at the middle of the hank.  Should be fun .. or at least my idea of fun!  Many of my friends (and my husband, probably) don't understand my fascination with playing with fiber.  Oh well, they're the ones missing out!