Joyful Stars

Any animal fiber (wool, silk, your own hair, skin, and fingernails too LOL)  can be dyed with Kool-aid.  What’s nice about this technique is that it’s totally harmless and a perfect project to do with a little one (Emerson is nearly 3).

Tonight my daughter and I dyed wool fluff for some bird boxes.

We bought 2 suet boxes, which we will fill with cut lengths of colorful wool yarn and dyed wool fluff.  Miss Sue worked with Emerson today to cut the yarn, and tonight, she and I dyed the fluff.

The dying is really cool actually.  You just take the fiber and wet it with cold water.  Then you fill a pot with water, and you add the kool-aid packet.  Add the wool and swish it around.  If you are going to use your hands, use gloves LOL or you’ll end up with dyed hands too.

just beginning to heat up

Bring the water up until JUST about to boil.  Turn off the heat, and let it cool.  As it cools, the water turns clear (or milky white) as the dye is pulled into the wool.

Then once it is cool…just rinse and dry.  She took her bath, while we waited for the fluff to cool.

Rinsing with cool water

On Thursday, Miss Sue and Emerson will assemble the boxes and hang them.  With luck, during the summer, we’ll see some of our wool in birds nests around our yard!  How FUN!  And since we used natural fibers (wool yarn and fluff), this stuff will just degrade along with the nests after the birds are done with them.  And the kool-aid dye is harmless to our feathered friends.

dyed wool fluff