Natural Dyeing with Red Onion Skins

The other day when I was chopping up red onions for soup, I saved the skins and put them in a pot, covered them with water and heated them on the wood stove for a couple of hours and then strained the skins and kept the dye.

(This picture made the yarn look lighter than it is.)

In the meantime, I soaked a bit of wool yarn in an alum bath.

Next, the wool yarn was added to the dye bath in a pot and heated to very warm and let sit for several more hours.  Finally, the yarn was rinsed out.

I love the color that resulted - a rusty brown.

Using the red onion dyed yarn in the middle, some natural yarn next, and then finally some yarn I dyed with bracken last summer, I made a granny square.  Next I made a square the same size as the granny square, all in the single crochet stitch.  Finally, I attached the two squares using the red onion dyed yarn with the single crochet stitch around adding a loop for hanging.

I am excited to continue learning and experimenting with natural dyeing.