i’ve been dyeing yarn like crazy the last few weeks (mostly food coloring, some kool-aid), and knitting some hats with some of the results. like these:

all the yarn is either from knittn kitten, which is a “craft thrift store” (so i think the yarn can be considered “recycled” since it’s secondhand) or from frogged sweaters. the last two days i’ve been frogging some sweaters i found at the bins the other night, and i’m pretty excited about a new method i’ve just tried. one sweater was a nice beige, perfect for dyeing, and soft wool, but super fine yarn. so i plied it! first, i dyed two separate strands, each one with 3 colors striping, then i plied them with my drop spindle. here are the awesome results:

i’m so excited to start knitting with it tomorrow when the twist is all set and it’s dry. and tomorrow after work i’ll be frogging my best bins find of all:

if you can’t read it on the tag, that’s 90% wool, 10% angora, perfect weight (bulkier than most sweaters i find, yay!) and white for dyeing. and it even has three cute buttons on one shoulder that i can use for projects. the only thing i don’t like about it is that it’s a child’s size – i want more yarn! it’s so soft!!!!

i have one question for any portland readers out there: do you know of a grocery store in town (preferably southeast) that has a good kool-aid selection? the main reason i’ve been dyeing with food coloring lately is that my local safeway has only shades of red kool-aid, and i think orange and grape and nothing else. i want blue, and green! i loved the blue especially, very different from the food coloring blue.

oh i should mention, i am working on another free blog hat pattern.  it will probably be posted within the next couple weeks.