TNT: On the Road Again

 

There's not much progress to show this week because of all the back and forth to Daughter's house to sit the Grands. I had meant to pack this away after I finished the small snowflake on the right side of the heart last week but then the bigger snowflake underneath it looked interesting so Christmas Quaker is still with us for at least another week. 

When you unexpectedly wake up to this, stitching snowflakes seems like the thing to be doing tbh.

If you told me I'd be on the 4th block of the Patchwork of the Crosses quilt so soon I would not have believed you. I don't spend much time on it every day but I do spend some time on it and I'm surprised at how it's moving along at such a nice pace. 

I don't have much to show for a week with the needlepoint projects but I did work on them both. As for slowly but surely, The Mister finally finished his Halloween PbN last week. I had a good time watching this come together. It looked like absolute slop for most of the time and then like magic it came together. I like it. 

And...early yesterday morning I decided to experiment with Betty once again after giving her a very heavy nighttime feeding. This time I followed along with the lady on the Life Changing Same Day Sourdough YouTube video. It was the very first time I got a dough that acted like dough. No sticky glop. Eureka. 

Twelve hours later I got a rather beat up looking mini loaf of sourdough bread. It's still a HUGE improvement from what has come before. It actually poofed up this time. I'm not sure what's going on inside of it because I'm not cutting it until I get it back up to the Grands today. My little helper deserves to see the first cut. 
 

Betty on the Move

 

When we agreed to do all this overnight baby sitting for the Grands I had forgotten about Betty. She's still getting her twice a day feedings. I could have just put her in the refrigerator until we got back but I didn't want to break the cycle so she got packed up and taken along. Big Grand was fascinated to have a science fair experiment right there in his own kitchen. Betty must have enjoyed her two hour ride in the car because I'd never seen her rise so high. 

I was planning on trying another attempt at baking with her when we got back home the next day so Big Grand and I gave her a big morning feeding before I packed her up. Again she over performed in the car. She almost came over the top of the jar. That would have been a mess.

I used what I could in the recipe, set her back up in her incubator and put the rest of her in the fridge to use for an experiment later in the week. I brought her back down to a more reasonable size. No one needs that much starter. When we get home from our Tuesday-Wednesday overnight trip this week, I'm going to try once again to revive a sample out of the refrigerator. The first try didn't go so well but this Betty is much stronger.

And if you are wondering why I don't have any cutesy kiddie photos to share from our visit it's because we arrived late in the afternoon which in parenting circles is called The Witching Hour. I'm not exaggerating when I say that the two little ones spent the entire time running and screaming. Running and screaming. Then more running and screaming. I spent my time being the referee. The poor Mister was trying to watch the football playoffs while all this chaos was happening but he took it stride, I'm happy to say. Did we have an easy time getting them to bed? Nope. It was a fight to the finish with both of them.

Advice Taken

 

When I complained about my pink Brava hat being too short and not having the yarn to lengthen it or wanting to buy a whole other skein for each color when I only need a bit more, some of you suggested stripes for the remaining skeins. I didn't really have colors that would work well together so I bought one skein of black that will go with most of the remaining colors. 

My main goal was to make warm hats to match the sweaters I wear the most when it gets cold, especially this one. I drag this one out every December to wear to all the outside holiday things and every year I say I'm making a red hat to go with it. This year it's happening and a few black stripes won't hurt. This was one of the first colorwork projects I ever worked on. I saw the pattern in one of those 1980 women's magazines. It's knit in the cheapest dime store yarn I could find at the time. I love it though. It's big, baggy, warm and comfy. All my $$$ fancy yarn sweaters can't beat this old girl. 

I've got that hat started and a cowl I want to wear for next year's holidays.

I want a festive winter themed doodle cowl and I'm using this book. There's no rush so I'm working on both the hat and the cowl whenever I get a spare few minutes in the sewing room. It's never too early to start Christmas knitting, right?

Some Trouble and Hot Wheels

 

We've got the rare night time baby sitting gig this weekend. This afternoon we are heading up to Daughter's to sit the Grands while mom and dad attend his work holiday party. Yes, I said holiday party. They are doing some casino night thing and this is when they booked the venue so there it is. The 4 year old's birthday party was last Sunday at the rink but we didn't take our presents because we knew we would be up there tonight. It looks like we'll be racing his little car collection on the giant track we bought him and playing a few rounds of  BlueyTrouble. Of course there are football playoffs on and SNL is new this week so I told Daughter not to be surprised if the two boys are still up watching TV with us when they get home. Bedtime duty is something we've never done and I'm betting we're not going to be very good at it.

Friday Fluff: Unraveled

 

Since it got really cold again, I picked up the Garter Squish yesterday morning but I didn't like what I saw. I ended up ripping out a good bit of it. All that yellow is gone.

The problem started when I tried to spin and dye yarn that was just for it. It didn't match the original in color or weight so the darn thing flares out and the colors are all wrong. I was tempted to toss the whole project but decided to put it back on the needles then go through the handspun stash to see if I can find better yarn choices to continue with. I found a few.

On the Ladybug, I'm chain plying the Sandy Canyon Merino. It's going to be a very...um, rustic yarn when it's done. Since it probably will never have a life outside one of the already over full handspun bins, I'm sad to say it doesn't really matter. So much fiber, so few uses.

Betty 101

 

Twenty days ago I started my sourdough journey and I've been getting a lot of questions and messages about it so I'm taking the time today to post about what I've learned so far. 

The first thing I've learned is not to listen to all the influencers online. Most of the advice they give is about mature starters. That's not what Betty is. She's an infant. A newborn, in fact.  I gave her a 1:1:1 feeding once a day in the beginning.  At Day 3 she had her bacteria bloom. She puffed up and smelled terrible. She did this for two days and it's a very good sign.  Then she got twice a day feedings for 10 more days before starting her 1:2:2 peak feedings for 4 more days. Peak feedings were when I fed her every time she rose as high as she could and then started to flatten out on top. A rising starter will dome on top. You want to catch it before she falls back down again. That ensures your starter contains maximum yeast before you discard and start over in order to strengthen it. It seemed to work well for Betty.

The feeding ratios sound confusing but they are not. 1:1:1 just means the same amount of water and flour is added to the same amount of your starter. 1:2:2 just means you add twice the amount of flour and water to your starter after you do your discard. Discarding is important because it keeps your starter under control and gives it a fresh base to grow from. The flour you see here is a mix of 1/2 bread flour, 1/4 whole wheat and 1/4 rye. If you want a strong starter you've got to feed it well in the beginning. I saw a big difference when I added the organic rye. You can switch over to all bread flour after the 30 day mark, or so I'm told. I will have to test this out too. 

Having multiple jars is very important. Don't listen to the scrapings folks who keep their starter in the same crusty jar for years. That's for mature starters. You need to keep your baby clean because it doesn't have the strength yet to fight off the nasties. Every time I do a feeding Betty gets a clean jar. I've also ditched those cute little fabric caps that come with the jars and use the lids without screwing them on. It seems that the cloth can attract and harbor mold which is enemy #1 to your baby. Like the leftover soap batter I'm always left with after a pour, you want to make sure what you clean out of your jars doesn't go down your drain. Trust me on this.

I've been storing all that discard in the fridge to experiment with. Some people use this in recipes but you shouldn't eat it until your starter matures though. I keep it as a back up in case I kill Betty and for experiments.

Some of those experiments have been to test out some theories I've seen.  I've tried different temperatures and feeding ratios. These two discard Bettys were left on the cold 65 degree counter overnight. The one on the right was fed a 1:5:5 ratio and the other a fed a 1:3:3. See the difference? Barely any but they both showed a lot of growth. It goes to show you that it's still possible to grow a starter in a cool kitchen. Warm temps only speed up the process so it's only necessary if you are planning on a fixed baking time and need your starter at its peak rise. That discard in the refrigerator continues to grow for days after I put it in there. It's kind of spooky.

Betty, now at 20 days old, is in her warmer getting her 1:2:2  feeding now twice a a day because she is finally showing signs of maturity. She's growing regularly and most importantly, when I stick a spatula in to discard, she's full of spidery looking webs and making a whoosh sounding deflation noise. Those are good signs that the yeast are happy and active but we're not there yet. That poor little thing on the right is a discard experiment that's not going well. It seems Baby Betty's early remnants are not strong enough to support any feedings so that first jar I put in the fridge can go in the trash now. 

On Saturday I tried my second bake with her and it was an improvement over the Elmer's glue consistency I had with my first attempt but not as good as it should be. She doubled just fine after her bulk fermentation but was still too sticky and hard to work with. It had very little rise during its overnight chill in the refrigerator which was disappointing.

I had a little rise in the oven but not much. I have to say this could have been user error. I don't think I had the lid of the new baker on right so the steam it needed probably escaped. 

After all the torture I put that poor dough through to shape it, I was surprised to see any air in it at all. We ate it with great trepidation. It's kind of creepy after you've seen all the things going on with the fermentation process but we're still alive to tell the tale. It wasn't the greatest bread tbh but it did make some very good toast. I'll try another loaf at her 30 day mark. 

Disclaimer: I'm certainly not an expert on any of this. It may all still be for naught but lessons have been learned with the first and most important one being patience. Every time I was ready to give up, Betty surprised me and turned a corner. I'm also 99.9% convinced at this point that all those giddy sourdough influencers with their big marshmallowy piles of dough are using store bought starters. 

Like this one. I'm not above giving it a try too but that will be an experiment for another day.

Wednesday WIPs: Apologies in Order

 

I've got socks getting their heels turned. Static seems to be winning the race over the Regia at the moment. They are my travel socks and every morning The Mister stops to get coffee before our walk and Pup and I wait in the car while I work on them. All that nice daylight through the car windows makes picking up stitches so much easier.

The Mister's Riddari looks like this now. I really owe this pattern an apology. That colorwork yoke is not nearly as bad as I made it out to be. I just did the first decrease round and it's sailing along. Truth be told there are very few rounds that require that nasty 3 color tangle. I only have one more to face and that's after a lot more decreases.

One Holt mitten is finished and the other one started. The Glennis cowl is slow going. Those slip stitches are a big yawn to work on. That Chroma yarn is no picnic either. It's fuzzy and splitty.

And..have you seen the latest issue of the Knit Picks catalog? It reads more like a knitting magazine. It even has free patterns. You know how I feel about all the knots I find in their yarn but I have to say they've really upped their catalog game.