Dyeing with Koolaid?

 It sounds so eco and easy and fun…but when I tried it with t-shirts, not so much.

My daughter and granddaughter are here for the summer, and we decided to try tie dyeing t-shirts and some yarn with koolaid sprinkles.  First off, I had trouble finding a good variety of colors.  I bought what they had and needed much more than I thought.  So, a trip to the store to search out alternatives like other powdered drink mixes and even jello flavors was our Hail Mary.  Please, don’t follow my instructions because I’m not instructing!  I read a caveat somewhere that you have to use koolaid that is unsweetened, specifically the kind to which you add sugar. Makes sense. And most of our alternative products did not fit this description.  

In the end, my skein of yarn using only koolaid turned out …and the t-shirts faded out in the first wash, except for the jello bits.  That turned into permanent crusty blobs.

Here’s photos from the second attempt, using Rit Dyes.  Fingers crossed the colors stay!

First, flats to paint!

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Can’t rotate this 

T-shirts are dyed a second time (after the koolaid fiasco).  Looking good!

And this is the koolaid dyed skein.