Sock Blank

I'm participating in a sock swap. We create a package for our partner and the only thing we need to include is enough yarn to make a decent pair of sock--all other things are optional and for fun.

After much thought about whether I would find some nice yarn in my stash or purchase some new yarn, I decided I would send new yarn, and I would dye it myself. I wanted a certain look. Big blocks of color with a transition to another color--only 2 or at most 3 colors. To achieve this look I decided what I needed was a sock blank.

Having never used one before, I only had the info I had heard about them. I ordered one up from Knit Picks (as well as some other goodies for myself), and I went out and picked up some Kool Aid.

Here are my results:


I used:
2 Lemon Lime
2 Ice Blue Raspberry Lemonade
1 Black cherry

A splash of the black cherry was put into the lemon lime and the ice blue to mute those colors a bit. Normally I would use grape, but I was surprised to find that I didn't have any--must have used it all the last time I dyed. But I was pleased with how the black cherry worked.



I mixed the colors, the poured the green in to a small pot with some just boiling water. I held the sock blank and dunked it almost all the way into the pot, pulling it out slowly and putting the hot yarn into a Pyrex dish that I had next to the pot of boiling color.

When all the dye was absorbed, I pulled all the yarn out. I then put the blue into the boiling pot. I put the other end of the blank into the boiling pot and repeated the process. When I was done I found that the blue was a bit paler than I had expected, and I still had a good amount of black cherry left. So I put the black cherry in the boiling pot and dunked some of the blue end back in the pot.

I was pleased with the how the color turned out. As I was rinsing I found that some of the end to knit from had come unravelled. Taking a closer look I found that the dye had not completely penetrated the yarn.

I think this look might have interesting results though, so I chose not to overdye.
I hope my partner likes the yarn as much as I do.