Black Walnuts: Part 1

Even the dogs wanted to get in on the fun.

Fall in Kentucky is full of color in the trees, crispness in the air, and black walnuts on the ground.  You see them everywhere, laying under trees, along the roadsides, and crushed by tires, turning the pavement black.

Over the last week my husband and I have been collecting these green gems with several projects in mind.  I want fabric dye, he wants wood stain.  Fortunately they are made by exactly the same process!





Tonight, we got started de-hulling.  Black walnuts have a soft outer green hull that surrounds the hard shell that protects the actual edible nut.  Removing this hull is a bit like opening an avocado.

Unhulled nuts

Removing the hull

When the green flesh is exposed to air it oxidizes and turns dark brownish-black.  This is the stuff that will give us color for dye and stain.  It's important to wear gloves unless you really want to turn your hands green!

Oxidation!

We collected all the hulls and whatever black mush we could into a bucket and put the nuts into a separate bucket for dealing with later.  We made it through two five gallon buckets, but there are two more to go.

Lots of hulls for stain and dye

The nuts still need to be washed and shelled

Once they are all done we'll add water and let the hulls soak for at least a week, while the color leeches out into the water.

Then, it's time to dye!

Every now and then you find worms. 

Garden visitor

Found this little black swallowtail caterpillar in the garden as I was trimming back the fennel plants.

Last year the caterpillars were all over my dill, but since it didn't fare well this year I thought I'd miss out on having caterpillars.  So I was thrilled to see this one.  He can share my fennel any day!

I never seem to find recipes to use all the fennel fronds we get out of the garden.  Most things call for the bulb or seeds.  Anyone have a good use for large quantities of fennel fronds?

Rust Dyeing

This week I have been trying out  a new type of dyeing.  I think it's really a bit more like batiking without the resist than dyeing, but either way it's been fun and the results are pretty cool!

Rusted fabric, how neat!.

 I came across the idea of rust dyeing thanks to a friend's facebook post,  I immediately thought, hey, that's cool and I have everything I need.  Unfortunately, as usual, this lead to me getting going and thus I have no how-to pictures.  I'm sure I'll be doing this again soon though, so I'll get pictures then.

All wrapped up.  There's a horseshoe in the middle.

The basic premise of rust dyeing is that you start with a piece of fabric, generally white or cream, but any light color should work.  Silk, wool, and cotton are best.  But I imagine most natural fibers should be fine.  I used two silk scarves since that's what I had on hand.  Soak the fabric to get it soaking wet (a 2:1 water and vinegar solution is ideal), then wrap, tie, etc it to any rusty metal.  The important thing is getting good contact between the metal and the fabric.  If you have a flat grate or something like that, lay the fabric out and place something heavy on top.

I had some old chain and a couple horseshoes around the house.  So I twisted and folded and wraped until as much of the fabric as I could manage was touching the metal.  Then, I gave it a dunking in the water/vinegar solution and set it out on the back deck.  Most instructions I found said to give it a spray, but I was too lazy to find an empty spray bottle yesterday.

It's a bit breezy outside and I didn't want the
silk to fly away overnight, so this is drying in
in the bathroom.  My husband is thrilled.

Then, just leave it alone for at least 24 hours.  Make sure it stays damp, leave it as long as you want.  A longer time = darker colors generally.  When you think it's done, unwrap, rinse in clean, cool water and hang up to dry.  Or, if you aren't happy with the way it looks, wrap it up and let it sit again.

I have one scarf I'm happy with and one that is all wrapped up again.  I read that using tannin water or other dye modifiers can get the rust spots to turn brown and black shades, I hope to try that next time around!

Who we are

Welcome!  We are the ACE sisters. We currently live in two different states, leading three very different lives.  But, we all love to craft, create, and cook.

This blog is a place for us to share our activities and ideas with each other and the world.  We hope you'll find inspiration here and join us in our adventures.