Sandalwood and Amber

 

Yesterday someone asked me about how I choose the colors for the soap. Not very well apparently. I try to match up the colors to the name of the fragrance even though most of them smell nothing like they are labeled. This one does though. It's a trip back in time for us 60's ladies. 

You might remember these. I had the Woods and the Herbs compacts and I loved them. Today's soap smells just like the Sandalwood and Amber from the Woods compact. 

I used some brown and gold mica in the batter but they washed out a bit. There's not much contrast there. The interesting thing about this loaf is that the wooden mold's bottom plate had shifted and I didn't notice it until I went to cut it. The bars are a bit lop sided but they do have a pretty gold sparkle on top. 

Here's what cosmetic mica looks like. I usually buy a selection of color samples whenever I order oils and butters. Every one of them is a gamble because you never know what the color is going to do when the lye hits it. 

I like using natural clay for color too but you can't have much fun moving those colors around to make designs like you can with the mica because they turn to mud. 

I'm two loaves ahead of these posts so I can show you the finished project each day but when we get to Clementine and Lavender on Thursday, I have a real color disaster to share. I'll let you guess which one of these was very naughty.

As for Tiny Needle Tuesday, the only thing that got worked on this week was Funky Flower. I finished the blue flower and am headed up the last few inches of border. I still can't believe I'm going to finish this one. I have a closet full of half finished stitching projects and I was pretty sure Funky Flower was going to join them.

Rosemary Lemon

 

It takes me all morning to get to this stage of the soap making process. There's a lot of weighing, watching and waiting going on. 

You can make mistakes with some DIY projects and have everything come out all right but you can't with this one. I have to take my time and check, and re-check my ingredients over and over. 

Safety is important. You want to make sure you're making soap and not a good smelling skin remover in bar form. Then there's the cost. Soap making used to be a cheap hobby. I could get a box of ingredients like this one for about $50. That same box is now about $150 so you don't want to waste anything if you don't have to. 

Being  cautious and taking your time is important. I remember the time I did this. I was carrying the box I used to put the newly poured soap in and tripped over the dog. What a mess that was. Now I use a cooler and never move it after I pour. 

I'm happy to say that Rosemary Lemon survived all the pitfalls of soap making yesterday. It smells lovely and looks nice too. So far so good with these new herbal scents. If anything is going to make it all go south, it's the fragrances. Fingers crossed my luck holds out. 

Soap Week 2026

 

The transformation is complete. The downstairs craft room is covered in plastic so I can make a big mess. 

If I don't get some soap made now there won't be any in the fall to give away. It's a very long process. 

I've been on the hunt for herbal fragrances and I've got a bunch of new ones including one that claims to be an Herbal Essence knock off. It's not but it does smell nice. They all do. I'm excited about turning them into soap along with the three other new fragrances I posted about a while back. 

First up was Greet Tea. It smells nothing like green tea but it does smell nice. It looks nice too.

Not much else is going to get done around here for the next week or so. I even have to use the sewing table upstairs to hold the newly cut soap until the bottoms are hard enough to go up on the drying shelves without leaving ridges. 

Speaking of drying shelves, the black soap I made last month will be ready to test on Monday. It darkened up quite a bit. I'm happy to say that the fragrance faded a bit. It's not fragrance free but it's close. I might do this one again and make it unscented for myself since that's what I prefer. Of course, that'll be after testing. I'm still wary of that amount of activated charcoal. 

Too Much of a Good Thing

 

Betty has been really enjoying the hot weather and since the freezer was running low, I decided it was time to make bread on Sunday.

I wanted to try the levain method of sourdough again but for some reason instead of making my usual half recipe, I mixed up the whole thing. Over night it became a monster. 

I didn't want to waste all Betty's beautiful work so I went ahead and made bread with it. A lot of bread. 

I made two big loaves and one that's my usual smaller size which is the right size for me and The Mister. 

After slicing them up, I put parchment paper in between the slices and sealed them in an airtight bag keeping the loaves together. Then I put them in a freezer bag. Now I need to come up with lots of meal plans with recipes for things to put on bread. It's a good thing the basil is going strong. I see a lot of bruschetta in our future.  

But I wasn't done yet. I had English Muffins to be made. Look at the rise on these things. I could barely get them out of the rings. It's a good thing I'd Pammed them.

I'm getting a bit better at not burning them up but it's still touch and go. I've never seen anything brown as quickly as these things do. 

And there were crackers. Lots and lots of crackers. Not a bit of Betty went to waste.

Friday Fluff: Seeing Rainbows

 

With the TdF only a few weeks away now, I decided to get started early. I'm starting with this Polwarth fiber.

My plan is to spin each color separately and make a 2 ply yarn. I have a vague notion to use it for a rainbow pi shawl but it's only a very vague notion at this moment in time. 

WWBDD

 

The poor sewing room has been neglected for months. First it was my back and then it was all the yard work to be done. There's just not enough time for everything. The heat's given me back some extra time and I've been doing a lot of this lately. 

I've got 160 of these little squares. I need 300 to make a crib sized quilt-not that it's going in a crib. I just want to use the crib sized batting for it since I'm not a fan of wrestling big quilts through the Juki anymore. 

I've also been doing this. 

I'm finally getting around to using up the first quilt kit I ever bought. Here is my hand showing it off in 2011 when it arrived. Please take the time to appreciate how young my hand looked then. It doesn't look like that now. It's quite scary.

Like my hand the kit has aged badly. The instructions are yellowed and spotted. The layer cake and the yardage look fine though. 

You might have seen this already but here is an op ed on aging that Bob Dylan wrote recently. It pretty much sums up the experience. Some people say WWJD when they need some perspective on an issue but I've always asked WWBDD. I want advice from the grumpy folks. They tend to be the truth tellers. 

Wednesday WIPs: Hundertwassers Werk

 

Let's talk about these socks. I'm not happy that they look like they are from two different skeins. They are not. Lefty is very stripey. Righty is what I expect from Miss Bab's sock yarn. Little pops of color on a gentle gradient background.  This is the second year in a row that I've taken issue with the dye jobs. Last year it was pooling. I think this is the last of her MDSW colorways that I'm going to buy. There's plenty of other sock yarn out there to explore. 

Like this one that just arrived. I know I don't need anymore sock yarn but I needed this one. 

Have you ever seen so much chaos in a colorway? Me either. It's insane. I had to have it as a palette cleanser from that disappointing yarn that's doing me wrong. 

This yarn collection was inspired by the works of Austrian painter Friedenreich Hundertwasser. If I didn't already have enough sock yarn to open my own yarn shop, I'd buy the whole collection.