I finally finished the socks I’ve been knitting from the sock blanks I dyed with Kool-Aid. My husband and I are adopting 3 teenaged siblings from Russia, and one
likes pink, and two like red. I had dyed 3 sock blanks: pink for Liza (watermelon cherry), red for Dasha (cherry), and dark red for Max (black cherry). Three sock blanks. Three kids. No problem, right?

And here are the finished socks!

I even got adventurous and did a different color for the heel and toe on the last two pairs! And then my esteemed colleagues in the IT department weighted in…

They all declared they would never wear red socks unless someone put them on their dead bodies… Hm…

My husband said that he would be willing to wear red socks, but that he was “weird.” (He really wants me to make him some socks.)

After much agonizing, I decided to dye Max’s red socks black. I used the Jacquard Acid Dye 639 Jet Black. I followed the directions on the bottle – add the dye to the water, and then add the socks when the water is boiling. I let them boil for about 25 minutes, and then let the water cool before taking them out.

It worked amazingly well. I probably used too much, but it soaked up almost all the dye, and seems to be very colorfast. Poor Max’s socks were still too big. (I had switched from #1 needles to #3 needles thinking that Max’s feet would be much larger than the girls’ feet!) So I threw the socks into the dryer after dyeing.

They came out very soft, a bit fuzzy, and a little bit smaller. I liked the softness, and the fact that throwing them in the dryer didn’t cause them to become doll-sized. The next time I knit with a sock blank, I’ll use #1 or #2 needles (as I did with the girls’ socks), and do a 2×2 ribbing on the top.

I’ve promised to make the kids proper-sized socks when they get to the U.S. I guess in this case it is the thought that counts!