Soap! - Making the Lye, Part I

The ashes have cooled, and I've assembled the rest of my materials, so it's time to make some lye!

For this process, it's very important to have all of the materials to hand before you start, so here's what you need and the way you'll be using them:

Materials:
Bucket or waterproof barrel - the size depends on how much lye you intend to process. For me, this will be on the smaller scale.
Cork or tap
Gravel
Straw - I used pet bedding
Hardwood - burnt to ashes
Soft water - I used collected rainwater from the garden's water barrel.

And here's how to make the lye:

As I mentioned in my last post, I had burnt my birch wood into ash and had left it to cool in the grate. Next I obtained a bucket, I'm using a small 3 gallon size, and I drilled a hole near the base to fit a cork snuggly. Just to be sure of the fit, I half filled the bucket with water but no drips resulted.

This method is just one that can be used. A tap can also be fitted at the bucket base, or multiple holes drilled in the base. This would mean a second bucket is needed and the water would run through straight away. The disadvantage with this is that multiple leachings are needed to extract the lye. The system I want is to be able to leave the ashes soaking for a couple of days before I extract the liquid.


Next, I added gravel to a depth of about two inches in the bucket. On top of this, I added straw to another two inches. Well, it was two inches when I squished it down, but being straw, it didn't want to stay squished. The gravel and straw acts as a filter after the ashes have been soaked, and prevent it from coming out with the water. Due to the caustic nature of the lye, the straw will likely have to be changed out on each batch.





Next, I filled the bucket with water enough to completely submerge the straw, when it wasn't floating. This brought the water level up to the bucket's two gallon mark.

And lastly, the ash. I had more ash that I'd realised from my first lot of birch wood, and I aggitated the surface slightly to make sure it was all moistened. For good measure, I topped up the water some more too, to the 10 litre mark.




All that done, I've left the bucket in the shed to do its thing, covered over with a plastic bag to prevent anything from falling in that doesn't belong there.

In Making the Lye, Part II, I'll cover the liquid extract, testing and preparation for use parts of the lye making process.

The other day in work, I found myself in a dilemma. I'd finished my knitting project that morning on the bus, and now lunchtime had rolled around and I had a pattern and an unwound skein. What on earth was a crafting obsessed girl to do? Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you:

How to Wind a Centre Pull Ball of Yarn using Office Supplies {1}

The yarn I'm winding is these pics is Jitterbug "Raspberry". To be honest, this is the second ball of yarn I've wound this way as, typically enough, the first time round I didn't have the camera with me. Lesson learnt, I hope.

So, to start with, I snipped the threads holding the skein in place, and after separating the start of the skein, I wrapped it around both knees. It's important to maintain tension on the skein while you're winding it, so you'll need to spread your knees enough to maintain that tension.
Note: The skein in going just around my bent knees, it is not going under my legs.



And this is where the office supplies come in. Using a couple of plastic cups, trap the start of the yarn between two cups.








With the yarn trapped, start winding! I starting straight on to build up a little grip, that started winding the yarn at an angle so it would stay tidy. The important thing here is to make sure you wind the ball good and firm, so as long as you're doing that, how you're winding shouldn't matter too much.






And voila, one wound ball. I tried to get a pic of the inside of the cups, which have compressed slightly with the pressure of the wound yarn, but it's not come out very well, so I'll spare you the eye strain. The tail lying to the front on the ball in this pic is from the end of the skein, not the promised centre pull end.




But remember that trapped yarn from the set up? Just gently pop the cups up from the centre of the ball, and there it is!

And this is my finished centre pull ball of yarn. For the last ball I wound, I had wanted to start a pair of socks, and given that I like knitting two socks at the same time, I was also stuck for a weighing scales to seperate the ball into two equal parts. Winding the skein like this meant I could use one centre pull and one outer pull to knit each sock, which, inceidently, were the Kiertoradalla from my previous post.

Happy Knitting!


{1} Yes, I was on break when I was doing this.

Saying It With Cake...

Occasionally I like to rely on my natural talents and thank someone who's done me a favour with baked goods. My baking may never win any awards for finesse or presentation, but it is, so I'm told, consistently tasty.

With my car being off the road for over 2 months now, I've been relying on a cousin for a few lifts. So this evening I made him a fresh cream victorian sponge by way of thank you. I was in no mood to wrestle with greaseproof paper, so I decided to use a more traditional method of preparing my tins. This involved coating both tins with an even layer of soft butter. Then I sprinkled a spoon of flour into the tins and rotated the tins until the butter coating on the base and side were covered with a film of flour, as shown. It's important to make sure there's no gaps in the covering or any uneven butter patches which may affect the batter.
 
And it turned out beautifully! Even edges, no burned fingers trying to peel off red hot paper! Finished off with whipped cream and a little icing sugar, I hope my cousin enjoys it!