Gatorade
Gatorade comes in a wide variety of colors. I've gone through diet Gatorade phases, and my favorite flavors are lemon lime (which my dad used after basketball games while I was a kid) and grape. This time, I shopped the aisles for the brightest colors I could find. I selected "Green Apple" and "Grape" for this dyeing experiment. I dip dyed the yarn into both colors to create a special gradient.
In this experiment, I used KnitPicks Bare Stroll Fingering Weight Yarn, a 75% superwash merino 25% nylon blend. This is one of my favorite yarns to dye with, and you can see in the video just how quickly it absorbed the dye from the Gatorade.
Hawaiian Punch
When I opened the bottle of Hawaiian Punch, I felt transported back to my child hood. The smell reminded me of birthday parties and class celebrations. I haven't tasted it in years (and I didn't in this video) but I remembered how this red beverage stained anything it touched. What would it do to yarn?
I'm not sure I've ever consumed Fanta, but the commercials were super catchy. I wanted to add something orange to the mix, and I thought it would be fun to test out a carbonated beverage.
To add another twist to this experiment, I decided to try some resist dyeing. I tied off the 100% wool bare Wool of the Andes worsted weight yarn tightly with some crochet cotton to leave some white patches. I then dyed the entire skein of yarn in the 2 L soda.
Coke Zero
On each of the soda series videos I released, I kept getting requests for more and more beverages. People really wanted to see what would happen if you dyed yarn with Coke (or its equivalent.) Coke contains "caramel color", which is derived from dairy to create that beautiful brown. Will it bind to yarn like red #3 and yellow #5? There is only one way to find out, and that was to put some 100% wool yarn (bare Wool of the Andes worsted weight) in Coke Zero Sugar and turn up the heat.
Thank you so much for all of your support. Not only did we reach our goal, but we smashed the goal. I will now produce at least 35 Dyepot Weekly episodes, and they start in one week! Since we hit some bonus episodes, I might even release more than one video a week at first so I can start sharing the sponsored videos sooner. What do you think? If you haven't backed the Dyepot Weekly Kickstarter yet, please check it out. You still have a week to pick out a fun and exciting reward, many of which include amazing hand dyed yarn! I'm so excited to go on this journey with you!
None of the selections in this video were sponsored. All opinions are my own. I recently became a KnitPicks Affiliate because I love their yarns and have been using them for years. All KnitPicks links in this post are affiliate links.
I can see your reflection in the Coke bottle and I love that you talk with your hands even when you’re not on camera.
ReplyDeleteI just can't help it! Haha. :)
DeleteAlso, have you ever put dye in a spray bottle? I think it would be interesting to try with the drinks, especially with how fast the dye absorbs in the fiber. You could try both stream and spray.
ReplyDeleteI love your videos. I've binge watched most of them in the last four days. :) yesterday I used grape crush soda to dip dye sock yarn that is 50% superwash merino, 25% rayon made from bamboo and 25% nylon. I'm not sure if I did something wrong, but it came out a light magenta color. It's still very pretty, but not what I was expecting.
ReplyDeleteI also wanted to ask if you have someplace with general directions (like how much vinegar to add to soak water and how much water to add to kool aid for the hand painting).
Thank you sooooooo much for all your efforts and hard work to put together the blog and video series. It is appreciated in this house!