Coffee Dye on Cotton Project--Updated

 Brrrr it is sooo cold here this morning, and getting much colder by tonight and continues til next Wednesday  So miss not having a working woodstove-oh well.

  I have been battling sinus and allergies for over a month now-this morning with cold air in the house,  I am a bit nauseated along with it. Ugh 

   I am about at the half way point with the Galileo book I am reading-learning so much about the time period and the church back then. I will do allot more reading today.

  For a break from that I decided to coffee dye the bit of cotton I was gifted. I always keep a jar of decaf instant coffee around for when I need to make kaluha so I had it in the pantry.  I don't have allot of dye pots in the house, (they are in the garden shed) but I did find a spoon and a large bowl I use for crafts.(Only dye with designated dye and craft supplies-not items used for food)  

  Most of the coffee dye recipes are pretty much the same-found another article here  Suggested if want a darker brown use 3 tablespoons of the instant coffee with boiling water. Let sit in the coffee liquid from an hour to overnight.

    I put this together around 9:30 am this morning so am thinking I will let is set til around noon. There are spots of white that have not absorbed the dye yet. I had thought of washing the cotton in dawn soap first with a good rinse but then decided not to-I am thinking I want to do a needle felted "picture" again so it will be ok if bits of white show up.

   Here is the progress so far

               I soaked the cotton fibers in warm water til the cotton really absorbed the water well.

  Grabbed my craft colander to drain and squeeze out the water

I used 3 tablespoons of the instant coffee to 2 cups boiling water-stirred til dissolved in the bowl and then added the cotton.  About 30 minutes after this photo was taken very little white showing now

  The link has instructions on rinsing and then soaking in a vinegar-water solution to set the dye.

   Will Update this post with the next step.

It is now 1 pm here and I am quite disappointed-the cotton is Not taking up the color. I am thinking I should have washed the cotton first This cotton must have had a chemical on it or a pesticide.

  I am so surprised that this cotton did not take any of the coffee dye. Thinking since this cotton came out of the fields, it must have had chemicals on it. A lot of insects attack cotton so it could be pesticides. So I just rinsed the cotton-all the dye went right down the drain, Then I soaked it in a bit of dawn soap and rinsed.  This may need another good wash. 

  I also looked into mordants-I have mordants here for cotton and another one for wool but these are a bit of a process for this small amount of fiber. I did a search online about mordants for cottons and there is a new one, at least this is a very new one to me, that uses cool water and does not need to be heated, also more environment friendly to use.

  I found it on Etsy:  Aluminum Triformate ATF Mordant  for Natural Cellulose Bast Plant Dye for Yarn Fiber Dyeing Printing Linen Cotton Flax Hemp Mordent   The shop is Walnut Farm Designs     So stay tuned