dying wool variagated colours - help!

[Perogi]

Can someone please explain in detail for me how to dye a ball of yarn with 2+ colours of Kool-Aid? Do you unravel the ball in a casserole dish and just kind of put the colour on in strips? Doesn't it bleed all over itself?? I've never dyed wool at all and imagine that first I will try a solid colour but I would love to be able to do 2 colours.
For a solid colour, can I dye the soaker after it is made?

[CraftyMommaOf2]

Don't know about verigation (sp Pamelamama?)...I'd like to know too. I have had much better success dyeing the yarn before it's knit into a soaker. Much better coverage and much less splotching. I was going to try using little flip top squirt bottles to do verigated colors. Don't know if it'll work, but I'll give it a shot :LOL I'm sure one of the dyeing guru mamas will let ya know

[ma2maya]

Check out this site http://gfwsheep.com/rov.inst/rov.inst.html
Though the process is probably different for preparing the wool for dyeing b/c she uses acid dyes, the actual application process(scroll down 'bout halfway the page) is the same.

Good Luck and Happy Imagining!
Kathy

[oshunmama]

Excellent website Kathy!!

To die yarn various colours, I use a warping mill. This is not your standard househould accoutrement(I'm a spinner), but there you go. You wind the yarn on the large mill then spray the die on, paint it on, or however you want to get it on there. You can really get detailed with your yarn this way. The warping mill idea could be adapted by using something else, though, I am sure! A pic of the mill:
http://www.schachtspindle.com/wa_warping_tools.htm

[tboroson]

For kool-aid, you need to let it soak in the bath for a while. What you'll want to do is unwind it from it's ball into a long hank, seperate that hank off into, well, think of it as lobes, and put each lobe into a seperate bowl of kool-aid solution. Picture, four bowls of kool-aid sitting in a square tight up to each other on your counter, your hank of yarn dangling in a circle from one bowl to the next.

[poisonedapple]

knitty dying I found this link at the knitty on dying with kool-aid, multiple color instructions near the bottom half. I bookmarked it the other day for when I finally make my decision on what to dye my wool... Love the link kathy gave too! Great information!

[lestouffer]

When I koolaid dyed some yarn, I used the smae method that tboroson described. But I did them one by one in a saucepan on the stove, rinsing between colors. That is...unwound it around something to make a "hank" and then stuck each end and made some "lobes" (not a bad term). I helped keep the others out by binding them all in a rubber band. Good luck, that was he same methos I used when dyeing with fiber reactive dyes too. I think next time I will use some squirt bottle method or something.....