HOW TO: Dye your pajama pants yellow at 1:31AM because you CANNOT BE TAMED!
Good evening/morning! I find myself unable sleep, which of course means that now the time for me to decide to "DYE ALL THE THINGS!" I will now take you virtually through said adventure because, well, I can. Hooray for technology!
1. Pretty much any kind of vinegar.
2. Your stupidly white pajama pants. (Why anyone would design and mass produce white pajama pants is beyond me.)
P.S. I tried to include for reference what these pajamas are actually made of, but they were in fact a hand-me-down, and it appears that tag had been ripped off long ago due to the fact that tags are annoying. It does feel like a cotton muslin-y thing, and cotton (in case you were unaware) is extremely receptive to dye.
3. Some container to soak said pajama pants.
4. Like 1-2 tablespoons of turmeric powder, which can be found in the spice section of basically any grocery store.
5. A larger container with which to actually complete the dying process.
Place your weirdly white pajama pants into the small pre-soaking container. Pour vinegar onto the fabric until it is soaked through, but not so that it is basking in an unnecessarily expansive lake of vinegar. You just need the fabric to absorb it, as this will make the fabric more receptive to the dye.* Let soak something like 15-20 minutes or until you finish editing a post on pouring vinegar.
*This is where I should put the scientific reason behind this, but I actually have no idea how this works. You should definitely Google it and let me know.
In the name of Science! I have actually decided to be moderately precise about this step. I have included exactly two tablespoons and sixteen cups of water into the dye bath for proper documentation on how the color will turn out. (Two tablespoons is actually quite a lot, so if you're normally lazy like me, do note that I have many times sprinkled random amounts of turmeric and water into various dye baths, and still turns out looking darn spankin'. If you don't particularly care what shade of yellow you're going to get, just mix things willy-nilly until the water is whatever shade of yellowy goodness best floats your boat.)
Stir at least once and bring the dye bath to a boil to guarantee the powder and water mix nicely. This will allow the color to adhere to the fabric without it having occasional little grainy dots. (I personally think the grainy dots are pretty sweet, but have been informed that they look unprofessional and such. While I see their point, I say bah humbug.)
Now bring the dye bath to the "low" (simmer) setting you theoretically have on your stove. The heat will help the dye adhere to the fabric* without the whole thing turning into some Seamus-Finnegan-during-Potions-class fiasco.
*I actually know the reason this time. It opens up the pores in the fibers of the fabric, which allows more dye to seep in.
Make sure to poke down the fabric with a spoon or something every once in a while so that the dye actually gets everywhere. This is important unless you want an uneven tie-dye sort of look, which can be just as beautiful but may not be your intended outcome.
Let sit for... however long you want. Just keep checking on the fabric until it achieves the color you're going for, and you're golden. (Heh. Pun intended.) Remember that while wet, the fabric will appear a few shades darker than it will eventually turn out because of... science, I guess.* Also please note that depending on the fabric, your garment probably won't absorb any more color after around 1-2 hours.
If you've discovered that the shade is just not going to float your boat, it is not too late to add more dye, or to remove the fabric and immediately rinse out with warm water. Turmeric is a very quick-acting, strong dye, and as soon as your fabric touches the dye you are unlikely to remove it entirely, but quick acting can likely bring it to a nice pastel shade. Maybe. Good luck, Captain.
*Another great thing to look up.
Okay, so for reference I left these babies in the dye bath for exactly 28 minutes because I realized holy cow it's 3AM.
Remove your creation from the dye bath and rinse it with cold water until the water coming out of the bottom runs clear. Wring it out and keep doing this like a million times (okay, four) until you're confident that you're not going to get everything all yellow when it's set out to dry.
Find somewhere you can leave your garment to dry without getting in trouble for accidental cases of Dreaded Yellow Contamination. (I chose this previously yellow bath towel, but hanging it to dry outside is also a safe bet if you're not doing this at 3:16 in the morning.)
Let dry. If it's now 3:16 in the morning for you too, clean up and go to sleep.
Congratulations, you have successfully done the thing! You have learned the secret of
You should probably stick those bad boys in the washing machine if you want to avoid your bedsheets smelling like curry for the rest of forever. Unless, you know, you're into that.
discoholicmusic
yousharknotpass
origamiaround
andulkaphoto
janainaart
