We actually started this several days ago, but only finished it on Friday. In our Story of the World readings, we learned more about the Phoenicians, who were famous for their purple dye. They made them from the mucous secretions of a sea snail.
Mmmm… Instead we used an expired bag of frozen blueberries. We boiled it for an hour.
At least that’s how long you’re supposed to boil the blueberries! Mama spaced it while she was updating the blog and ended up with the house stinking like burnt blueberries! Anyone want blueberry crisp?
Luckily I had more blueberries so we tried again, although we had to use our fresh, organic blueberries. At least this time we had more success. For our SOTW activity, we were to dye pasta shapes, so we dunked some in. This wheel shape pasta was the most “fun” shape I could find.
This dye looked super potent and I was a little apprehensive as we tried not to spill or splatter it!
Mistake #2: I let the pasta sit in the dye too long and they turned out almost-black. I wanted to show Satori something dyed actually purple, so I found some white yarn and we dyed that too. Perfect to make a beaded necklace!
A day after drying…
Satori beading her necklace.
Finished product! David was very lucky and got a necklace too.
The Phonenicians were famous for this royal purple dye and it fetched its weight in silver. It took 12,000 of these mollusks to extract just 1.5 grams of dye! Needless to say, it was very expensive and only elite or royalty could afford it.
