Hand Painting without the Painting

Hi!  We are still in the last-week-of-school craziness here, but I managed to do a little dyeing anyway!  I thought I'd show you how I "paint" little portions of the skein without "painting."  My comfort zone in dyeing is still immersion.  I know it's slower but I feel like I can do other things at the same time, I don't make such a mess and the color-saturation is better (I think).  So rather than get out yards of plastic wrap, put all the leaves in my dining room table and paint each section of yarn, I wrap the skein around a cookie rack and immerse the sections that I am dyeing.  Obviously, if I am dyeing longer sections, I don't have to bother with the cookie rack.

Franklin Natural being dyed with Jet Black, Mallard, Raspberry, and Key Lime

This particular self-striping pattern is from Yarns to Dye For by Kathleen Taylor (using my own color choices).  I like her ideas a lot.  It will be striped with a "fair isle" section, what is sometimes called Jacquard, I think.  That's what I used the cookie rack for.

By the way, I found this sock yarn at Webs, http://www.yarn.com/webs-knitting-crochet-yarns-valley-yarns/webs-knitting-yarns-valley-yarns-franklin-cones/

It has crazy lots of yardage and from what I hear from fellow Ravelry dyers, it washes and wears well.  A one-pound cone has enough yarn for four and a half pairs of socks (depending on how much you use for a sock.  I use about 360 yards per pair), and it costs less than twenty dollars.  A yarn-dyers dream come true!

Here is the finished product: