Playing in the dye pot.....

Once upon a time, in another place and time, I used to make whole editions of a particular bear. In the days when I was juggling 2 other full time jobs, it was easier to do some of the bears as a sort of production line.



So, back then I used to buy mohair in 1 and 2 yard pieces so I could do quite a number of bears all at once.

This was one of those pieces that was bought that way.

I had used it for a lot of one particular bear, but that style has gone out of fashion now, and I had a piece that was about 1/3 of a yard (but not even a full width).

I should explain here too that this year I have made a concerted effort to only buy mohair that I actually NEED for an order or a project that is currently being made. I've challenged myself to work out of my "stash" when creating new one of a kind pieces.

The problem with this piece of fur was that while it was a nice pile length, I just didn't have cream with lavendar tips in mind for the next bear!




Ok, enter (stage left?) a package of RIT dye -- Dark Brown, and off we go to the washing machine.

Step one - wash the piece of mohair in warm water with a little laundry soap -- its really important when doing dyes that the fabric to be colored be WET when you start

Step two - fill washer with water, mix the dye (don't forget the extra salt) and add the dye to the water

Step three - put fabric into washer and watch -- After the first 10 minutes of the cycle, I pulled out the piece and took a look --- nope, not dark enough -- back into the dye -- finally after about half an hour the color was as dark as it was going to get, so I let the washer finish the cycle including a double rinse

Step four - toss the mohair into the dryer on low heat with a dryer sheet and run a full hot load with lots of bleach through the washer (just because I wanted the mohair this color does not mean the DH wants all his underwear that color!)

Amazing things happen to a long pile mohair when subjected to this treatment. For one thing, this fabric originally had a sort of compressed, swirly finish to it. After all that agitating and rolling, its quite fluffy!

Today I'm going to do a "test head" out of part of this to see if I like the new pattern I just designed.

This should be fun!!