Thing a Day

I wish I could post a link to a smell... My thing for yesterday was to find, download, and comprehend the instruction manual for my new-to-me breadmaker, and to use it to make a loaf of whole wheat bread... The house smells like fresh baked bread... Mmmmmm. The final product was a little heavier than I'm used to but, it was damn tasty if I do say so myself.

I ran the new toy on the kitchen floor so that it wouldn't be able to walk off the counter during the kneading cycle. The poor dogs were a little alarmed by the THING, entertained by the window in the top of the machine where they could see the food MOVING AROUND, and once the heating element started spreading the smell of yeast through the house, they COULDN'T STOP DROOLING. It was totally "smell-a-vision" for dogs....

Hehehe.

Thing a Day (x4)

Today was a good day to dye. So I dyed some pastel green fabric royal blue with RIT dye in the washing machine. The color is pleasing and mostly even, and predictably, there were little felted wool balls (tribbles) everywhere.

I also decided to attempt dying some roving to spin with kool-aid. I mixed 3 packets of lemon and one packet of orange with the prescribed amount of water for 1 pitcher of kool-aid, and then added 1/2 cut vinegar. I mixed all this in a large crock pot set on high, and added about 4 oz of roving while the mixture was still cool. I put the lid on the whole concoction and left it alone for an hour. After an hour, all the color was absorbed from the water. I pulled the roving out and hung it up to dry in the shower. The color picked up by the roving wasn't very even, but I can't say that it isn't appealing nonetheless. If I'm feeling particularly obsessive about getting even color, I can re-card the roving until it's well blended, though the spinning process itself has a tendency to even out the color a good bit. (Pictures to be had on Monday when I can sync my phone with the office computer to retrieve images.) In a day or two once the roving is dry, I should have enough wool to spin up for a pair of socks.

While I was waiting for those dye projects to percolate, I threw together a split-pea soup and a white linen under-tunic for his Highness. It fits perfectly. (the tunic, not the soup) When I dropped off the under-tunic, I draped a cote pattern for HRH that I will probably trace and cut tonight - just to round out my very productive day!