Hunting for orange

Glibly a few weeks ago I said I was off to order orange and yellow yarn for my granny squares. It didn't occur to me for a second that would be a challenge. 

The base yarn for the blanket was some Wendy Mode from Kemps bought a long old time ago. It struck me as a perfect blanket yarn 50/50 wool acrylic so easy to wash and great value at £1.39 a 50g ball. I got a cream, a white, a navy and a red. A classic palette but a little too restrained for my first granny square extravaganza. So then there was the souvenir yarn from Easter camping, van green and purple. Good strong clear colours that I knew would blend in nicely. That stuff is Jarol Heritage 55% wool, 25% acrylic and 20% nylon. Then I may have pillaged a light blue and a black Patons Diploma Gold DK from a set meant for this little cardigan. Plenty of colours to play with but definitely calling out for a bright yellow and orange to add a little warmth and balance.

I thought it would be an easy mission as I just wanted a basic DK wool/acrylic blend. After lots of hunting it seems strong yellows and oranges are not much favoured. Modern Knitting did me proud with a great washable 100% wool for the yellow - King Cole merino blend - and at £2.75 per 50g that sounds pretty good value to me for 100% wool. I made more of a leap with the orange having not found anything that looked quite right and I'm not too happy with what I've got. As you can see above it's really more of a terracotta, a sort of washed out baked bean shade - called either tangerine or honey depending on which text on the site I trust - hmmm some creative licence taken in that naming whichever - you'd have to be having a very bad day as either a tangerine or a pot of honey if you were this colour! It's also a 100% acrylic which I wasn't too sure about but if it were the right colour its texture is perfectly fine. Ironically least loved colour, no wool content and it's my priciest yarn at £3 for 50g! So I might put that one at the bottom of the pile and see if it either grows on me or if I manage to find a nicer orange in the meantime. Any recommendations of a good real orange (ideally in a nice wool/acrylic blend) happily received!