Lace Nibbles

Do designers have Swiss cheese on the brain this fall?  Not at all!  This season's designs are accented with an unobtrusive design enhancement known as lace nibbles.  These tiny little dots really add a touch of the natural decay which fall represents without giving a sense of impending death.  They put a little bit of glamour in the gloom while adding enough realistic gloom to what can easily become an overly glamorous.  Better yet, they're incredibly simple to create!

How to Lace Your Own Leaves

Adding lace nibbles to your own decor is extremely simple.


You'll need:

• caterpillars, or similar leaf-eating creatures
• several buckets of pollen from plants hated by whatever species of caterpillars you have
• a windy day

Here's what to do:

1. Standing upwind, release hand fulls of the pollen into the wind and onto the leaves you're wanting to lace.  Be sure that the pollen coats the leaves well while leaving some spots with little or no dust.  These areas are where your holes will be.  If the wind causes the pollen to coat the entire leaf evenly, you can wash some away with bird tears or cricket saliva.  
2. Release the caterpillars onto the leaves.  They will eat the spots that are not covered with the dust.  If the entire leaf is has a generally thick coat of dust, and if the caterpillars are particularly greedy, you'll probably find some attempts at eating spots that are not as thickly coated with the material.

Photo Credit: Christina Pinckard

(http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=33813&picture=caterpillar-on-leaf)

Make it Look Realistic

It's easy to go overboard with a project like lace nibbling.  Throwing pollen and watching caterpillars eat can be a fun thing to do.  If you're not careful, you may lace an entire tree with nibbles.  In order to make it look realistic, don't riddle a single leaf with thousands of holes.  Keep the number of holes lower to make the lacing appear absolutely natural.

Photo Credit: George Hodan

http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=27830&picture=last-yellow-leaf

Learn More

For more information on caterpillars, leaves, and the other components of this project, try visiting the following links.  (NOTE: Fair Home Living does not endorse any content on these sites.  We just hope that some of the information there will be helpful in expanding the knowledge of our readers.)

How to make a Habitat for a Caterpillars: 8 Steps (with Pictures)
http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Habitat-for-a-Caterpillar

Photo Credit: Ryszard Aziewicz

(http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=29777&picture=autumn-leaves)