Dyeing Yarn with Indigo

So uh, I might've found a new hobby.  Related hobby?  Let's go with that.  Remember a while back when I showed you what the owner of the Itsy Bitsy Yarn Store sent me home with?  Well, I decided that I wanted to try out yarn dyeing, but needed my hand held first.

So I bought her indigo dyeing kit (and a book, but that's for another day).  And had a lot of fun this weekend.  The method used in indigo dying is different than other natural dyes, but the info booklet that came with the kit walked you through it beautifully, and it was nice to have good results right off the hop.

Here's a series of pictures of my adventure this weekend:

After scouring the yarn (cleaning it). I was scared I'd have a tangled mess, but the loose knots held the skein together.

Indigo stock, resting for an hour in a warm bath.

Gently pouring the stock solution into the dye bath, trying to reduce bubbles as much as possible.  One of the chemicals added to both the stock and the bath is Thiourea Dioxide, which removes the oxygen from the water (and I think produces hydrogen sulphide, because boy does it reek of rotten eggs).  This is the only way that the indigo dye will bond with the fibre, so you have to make sure there's no added oxygen to the bath.

Dye bath, chilling out on my front step for an hour.

The dye bath itself is a yellow-green colour, but you can see where accidental air bubbles have oxidized the water blue.

Pulling out the yarn after it's first dip.  Hard to see, but it came out a light green shade at first. 

But this is where the magic happens, where exposure to oxygen turns it from green to blue!

Light blueish green...

...to blue!

And here it is after it's first dip.  It looks dark, but if I'd rinsed it and let it dry, it'd be a lot lighter.

Close up of the still-saturated bottom loop after the first dip.  I wanted a deeper blue, so put the yarn back into the bath for another 30 minutes. 

Here it is after it's second dip.  Deeper, and a gorgeous shade, but I wanted to try for something even darker, if possible.

And here's the yarn after it's 3rd dip.  It's hard to tell in these photos, but you could just see the dye sinking deeper into the yarn with ever dip, and I knew it'd stay this deep after rinsing this time.

Here's a comparison, sort of a before and after photo.  The yarn on the right is the same shade that I started off with before dyeing.

I am seriously in love with the results.  Don't know yet what I'm going to knit it into, but I'm sure I'll find something.  The whole process was labour intensive, but so much fun, and I want to experiment more.  There's so many plants around - even in my back yard - that I could use, and I want to try it all! 

Because of course I need more yarn.  And another hobby.  :)

Have you tried your hand at dyeing, and specifically natural dyeing?  Willing to try out indigo dyeing after seeing my stunning results?