DIY dinner napkins dyed with goldenrod and marigolds

DIY dinner napkins dyed with goldenrod and marigolds

You know how there are different love languages?

I never considered myself a gift-giver, but when you combine it with acts of service to form a new sub-category of handmade good-making… that’s it. That’s my expression of love.

The napkins <3

 

Last month, my lovely sister-in-law got married. She and her now-husband are excellent hosts and enjoy throwing dinner parties, so I (obviously) set out to come up with the most time-intensive, thoughtful thing I could: Naturally dyed dinner napkins from flowers found on the family property.

But to make matters even more heartfelt (or maybe more strange), I decided to source the fabric from nothing other than the pile of hand-me-down textiles she had given me a year prior. The specific thing I settled on was a linen/cotton blend shower curtain from her old apartment.

Here’s a peek at the process

Cutting, sewing, mordanting, and steeping in plants harvested on the property

 

Step 1: Cut the fabric

Step 2: Hem the edges (including mitered corners!!)

Step 3: Scour the fabric with washing soda

Step 4: Mordant the fabric with Alum

Step 5: Steep the flowers

Step 6: Dye, dye, dye!

 

For my first time naturally dying something from start to finish, I think they turned out pretty good!

 

This was an insanely valuable experience for me, as I want to dye wool for my upcoming One Year One Outfit project and have spent the summer collecting various dyestuff. I’m imagining a multi-colored knit/crochet top, but I still have to source the fiber!

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