Today I did more research. I learned how to harvest, process, and dry black walnuts, options for cracking them, and several different options for removing the husks. It should be noted here that the husks stain anything they come in contact with - so if you step on them, your shoes and possibly your socks and feet will be stained. If you open them with your hands, your hands will turn yellowish green to brown to nearly black. If your gloves have holes in them, or are fabric in a portion, you will get stained. Your clothes will get stained, the area around your workspace will get stained, the space underneath your walnut drying area will get stained. But in every one of the places I looked up how to harvest black walnuts, they all throw the husk away.
My next educational exploration was to look up how to use the black walnut husks to create a dye. It turns out it's pretty simple. Throw some husks into a big pot with enough water to cover them, and boil it for as long as it takes to get to the color and consistency you want. Further boiling down can actually produce ink! I found videos of people using black walnut dye (made from husks) to dye clothing, blankets, fabrics, animal traps, tools, and using it to stain wood products (tables, chairs, desks, other projects, etc.), as well as leathercrafting.
But what struck me as odd is that there was no crossover. The people who collected black walnuts for food discarded the husks as waste. The people who collected the black walnuts for dye or ink would often times boil the whole nut, and would always throw away the walnut itself as a waste product. So I have to wonder, if both uses use one part but not the other, wouldn't it make sense to utilize both parts of the black walnuts? Split the husk from the nut, process the nuts for food, and use the husks for create dye and ink for other projects (or for sale). I can't possibly be the first person to have this thought, but in hours of research, watching dozens of videos, reading through blogs and DIY guides and Pinterest, I didn't find a single mention of both uses at the same time. Is it just the amount of work that goes into it? I mean, it's food and natural camouflage tone dye. It seems to me that homesteaders would have jumped on this long ago.
After my exploration into black walnut uses, I finished processing the Blue Hubbard squash seeds. They look pretty nice for having been tossed out on the front step for half the winter. I did taste a few (the tasty bit inside the seed shell) and they were really delicious. Much tastier than the dry one I tried from the old #2 pumpkin harvest from two years ago. Perhaps it's because they're fresh, or maybe Blue Hubbard just tastes better for seed eating. Either way, I had to cut myself off on seeds to assure I'd have enough to grow more!
So tomorrow morning we have an appointment to talk to our loan guy over the phone. I'm hoping Tony has sent him the amended contract so he has a chance to look it over before he calls. I think this is both reasonable, and doable, especially considering they took our offer, which was pretty low, and they're still willing to pay for needed repairs prior to closing.
Anyway, we're making progress. Tony has tomorrow off, so if we can get this contract and mortgage thing figured out in the morning, we could sign the papers and start calling contractors to set up an inspection right away.