Going Nuts

One of the things I do in the fall is collect acorns.  Every year I find myself coming home with a few perfect specimens after every day’s walk.  I add them to this bowl…eventually it is filled and I admire it through the winter.  In the spring, I throw them out.  In the fall, I begin again.

I don’t know exactly what the fascination is with acorns.  I grew up with pecan trees.  I gathered plenty of those in my childhood.  That was the source of my Christmas money every year.  Oaks and acorns came later in my life….

I’m still collecting acorns this year…but my latest fascination is with walnuts.

A few years ago, I attended a Folk Life Festival at a historic site in Tifton, GA.  Among the many delights there was a woman using walnut and indigo dyes to make the most beautiful yarn.  I was captivated.  From her I learned that walnut doesn’t need a mordant; that you collect the walnuts while in the green hulls; that they must ferment first, then be boiled before you can dye with them.

I followed those instructions and dipped a few things, but it was a lot of trouble.

I’ve experimented with brown commercial dyes before (that post is here) but the walnut gives a more pleasing color to me. I love the surprise of the varying richness based on the fabrics I use and the time it soaks.

This year, I gathered some black walnuts in their husks, put them in a bucket of water, covered it, and began the fermenting process.  After a couple of days, I thought, “I wonder what would happen if I dipped a piece of fabric in there as they fermented.”  A friend had brought me a pretty white cotton napkin and I submerged it among the walnuts.  In a few days, I had a nice bit of brown fabric.

I found another napkin, damask this time, and some laces…added those to the bucket for a few days.  Look at how gorgeous these are!  

I had a few pieces of vintage linen that I wanted to see what happened.  So I cut a few pieces of those, added a worn white cotton tea towel, and a skein of white embroidery floss.  I left these just a couple of days…not wanting to completely obscure the checked pattern in the linens.  Oh, my, I’m loving this!

The images above are before and after of dipped fabrics.

And of course you aren’t surprised that I photographed some of the browns with some blues. Earlier confessions of my love for this color combination are here and here. And, if that’s not enough, type “brown” in the search bar…there are more!

Now in the pot are a few more treasures.  I don’t remember exactly what I put in there, but do know that some old pink rickrack is getting new life.  Stay tuned.

And there are a lot of hickory nuts around here, too. Hmmmm….

As I wrote this and revisited the photos from the Folk Life Festival, I guess that’s what encouraged me to play with indigo dyes, too. There’s a whole category in the sidebar for that!