Knitting With Hand Dyed Yarns

Hand dyed yarns have no dye lot and rarely match identically from one skein to the other. How do you make a project that requires more than one skein to not have noticeable color stripes or to match a pair of something?

The hand warmers shown in the photo were knit from two balls of yarn that I dyed with the same colors but using a highly suspect technique. I left the yarn in the little balls it came in and injected the dye into the balls with a syringe. The effect was lovely but the balls of yarn (as you can easily see) did not match. Since I wanted each hand to match and not have one blue and one green warmer, I used the tried and true technique of alternating rows.

So, I knit one row with ball #1 and knit the next row with ball #2, the third row with ball #1 and the fourth row with ball #2, etc. By alternating the two skeins of yarn I got two warmers that match! This did slow me down but I think the end result was worth the extra effort.

Knitting a vest or sweater that requires multiple skeins of hand dyed yarn can be done in the same way. Alternate the number of skeins you have; 3 skeins every three rows, 4 skeins every 4 rows. OR you can line your skeins up from darkest to lightest and knit them in progression. Just remember to keep the darkest colors at your hips - it's more slimming.

© 2004 Deborah Pym Harowitz

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