I learned something cool!

Did you double-check? he asked. Just because you read it online….

The great Google Deep Dive later, site after site after site said the same thing. Some called it ferrous oxide, some called it rust, one spelled it out: ‘ferrous oxide (rust)’.

I had wondered for some time why old barns were such an iconic red and how, no matter where you are in the country, they all got to be about the same shade (with fading on the older ones, sure.) Having read “No Idle Hands: a social history of American knitting” I knew that red in Colonial times was the least colorfast of colors. This is still mostly true.

And that in George Washington’s day, women riding properly sidesaddle into Valley Forge with rescue supplies nearly got shot because their red petticoats were showing and someone had to yell at an overeager soldier that no you idiot the Redcoats (British) aren’t coming, it’s our wives and girlfriends! Who had apparently freshened up the dye job on those underclothes to look pretty.

But I digress.

So: your barns held your entire next year’s food supply and it needed to be protected. The wood planks the barns were made of needed to be free of decay, they needed not to let fungus or moss grow on them in the rain, and they needed to last year after year and hold up against the weather. Things needed to stay dry inside.

Linseed oil from crushed seeds from their flax plants mixed with rust created a kind of varnish and the rust turned the oil red while killing off the stuff that would damage the wood.

Sometimes limestone was added, sometimes milk (which makes one wonder about the smell on hot days but never mind) but the basic recipe was those two things. The effect was not only useful, it was pretty, and it made it really clear from a distance what that building was and where to find it.

My friends at Cottage Yarns today found just the right colorway for a slightly faded barn with specks of brown in Rio’s Jupiter dye to finish the look. I bought it, Kathryn’s husband went to go wind it up for me–and then I saw the Cereza. A single skein. It was brighter but not too bright. It was that perfect shade of red, with a steadier hand on the dyeing–not monochrome, but a bit heathered rather than a mixture of colors coming together. Bought it too.

I spent a lot of time today under every kind of lighting I could get while the sun was still shining.

And then I went with the Cereza.

The moment it actually went into the afghan it settled right in there like it had been looking for this all of its life.