altivo

OK, today is the day. I had the walnuts from Susan, and they were soaking for almost 48 hours. Because she advised me that they are stinky when simmering and usually full of bugs, I decided to follow her example and cook up the dye pot outdoors. That was a good plan, too, as all kinds of wiggly things crawled and flew out of those when they started to heat up. The smell, while not as obnoxious as I'd feared, was not very pleasant. To me it resembled scorched milk, the smell you'd get if you spilled hot chocolate onto the top of the range or something. Gary said he couldn't smell anything, but that's not unusual.

After two hours of simmering, the water was black as ink. We scooped the walnuts out, and poured the rest of the mess through a cheesecloth and sieve. Then I returned it to the heat and when it began to simmer, added my two skeins of pre-wetted wool. Walnut is what we call a substantive dye, which is to say, it attaches itself to protein fibers without the need for a mordant or other assistant. So I just put clean yarn into the pot. I let it "cook" for about 20 minutes, and then rinsed it in gradually cooler water to avoid thermal shock to the fiber.

Here is the finished result (undyed skein of the same yarn shown for contrast):

I'm quite pleased with the color, which will make a good contrast with the goldenrod yellow I dyed last week.

In honor of the end of the summer, I also baked a pie today. This combined Michigan peaches with Illinois blackberries, and is displayed here with one of my handwoven towels: