Monday was dreadfully hot. I converted the rhubarb into glop and did a little cleaning in the sewing room but otherwise hid in the AC.
Tuesday I made and processed 6 jars of pluot jam. It set a bit more quickly than expected, but is absolutely luminous and I’m quite happy with it.
Yesterday I canned the last of the strawberry-blueberry-rhubarb jam, adding some ground cardamom and black pepper for variety. I intended to make some candied lemon peel, but forgot about it on the stove and made carbon instead 😢
I made another strap for P’s bike bag, and gummed up the iron. I suspect this set of canvas is sized with glue. Cleaned up with baking soda and a wet rag while the iron was hot but unplugged.
Lunch, put the kitchen towels and washcloths through the laundry and hung the former out on the line. Spent the rest of the afternoon watching historical sewing YouTube, finishing the patch on monster, and working on the hem of the burgundy floral.
Got the wash off the line before the thunderstorm started, then P got home while I was in the shower. Dinner, crossword, finished Blown Away, snack, sleep. I finished Book of a Thousand Days, which wrapped up pleasantly if slightly saccharine. Started Storm and Fury by Jennifer Armentrout.
Yesterday I finished the plackets on the black shirt and the daisy print. After lunch I pulled apart the freezer and found 2 kilos of sour cherries and a mixed kilo of blueberries, strawberries, and rhubarb. I set them all to thaw and researched recipes while the preserving pan went through the dishwasher, since it had got sludged by the backed-up sink the night before. I made a batch of mixed berry jam with lemon zest, then while it was in the canner tried to find reference to the weird white foam effect plaguing the cherries. They’d been packed in sugar but weren’t marked with a date, so it was probably severe freezer burn.
I poked around Hoopla for more by Shannon Hale and decided to quit on the goose girl series in favor of Book of a Thousand Days. It is excellent so far; a story of a princess bricked up in a tower, told by her resourceful and endlessly delighted ladies’ maid. Set in eastern asia, somewhere with steppes and yaks and mare’s milk.
Dinner, then consulted with P on the cherries. On tasting, decided they weren’t worth saving. Bummer. Crossword, Sherlock, snack (made some salted honey to drizzle on the nut and seed bars, 💯will duplicate on the rest of them), sleep.
Yesterday I picked over and cooked the blackcurrants, sterilized a pile of half-pint jars in the dishwasher, and made and canned 7 and a half jars of jam. Something is wrong with the probe thermometer, since it never managed to read at temperature but the jam is thoroughly jelled; hopefully not over cooked.
I went to make some nut and seed bars, but the pan I planned to use was shedding aluminum oxide dust everywhere so I oiled it, wiped off the dirty oil, oiled it again, then seasoned it in the oven for an hour. Seems to have worked. Nut and seed bars with almonds, pepitas, sunflower seeds, and coconut, partially ground in a food processor for texture, then mixed with enough brown rice syrup to hold together, pressed into a parchment-lined pan, and baked at 325 for twenty minutes. Needs salt, and maybe more syrup next time as they’re a bit crumbly in places but otherwise good.
After the jam and bars were out of their respective heat areas I escaped upstairs to sit under a fan and continue patching up Monster. Watched the rest of season three of Sherlock and started season four. Dinner, trash, crossword, Blown Away, snack, lye-d the disposal side of the sink which was backing up and gross, sleep.
Yesterday I felt way better, and ate all meals on schedule with only token anxiety and plenty of breaks. I made a batch of red rice, cleaned my prep area, washed all the things, filled the canner, and did the laundry. P helped me juggle concurrent tasks for making and canning elderberry jelly; yield was four 4oz jars and one half-jar for us. Less than I’d hoped, but not unexpected given we started with 2c juice. Read more Enna, with some excellent intrigue by Izzy. Dinner, crossword, finished Legends, finished QE, started s3 of Sherlock I guess? Then I remembered why I stopped; they keep fucking around with main characters. Shoddy writing. Great production, though. Tricky.
Snack, sleep. Dreamt of my high school AP chem teacher getting an award and giving a speech. Also of an expo where a neighboring stall was selling scented candles and cute bag clips.
Yesterday I woke up feeling fine, but got out of bed feeling like crap. Wound up skipping breakfast and lunch in favor of slow rehydration and animal crackers. I sent P to the farmers market for blueberries, plums, green beans, carrots, and some canning supplies. While watching episodes of Legends on and off I deep-cleaned the stove, made mujadara, ate, and made elderberry juice for jelly. I went out to the garden with a ball of fabric ties and a hori knife and wreaked some order in the chaos. There’s now more air amongst the orange plum tomatoes, calendula, and carrots, some of the ruder sunflowers are back in line, and I kicked the crap out of the creepers taking over the back fence. That branch of the locust needs to go soon. I read more of Enna; it’s mostly built out of people-not-talking-to-each-other but still entertaining.
I’m maybe okay now, except for a weird eye thing? We’ll see how I feel once out of bed.
Yesterday I pressed and pad-stitched in the interlining for all the plackets. I sewed and felled the back yoke seam on the black shirt, but the top thread was acting up again, this time actually getting jammed in the bobbin case somehow. After getting it unstuck I took a break to unscrew the foot plate, take out the bobbin case and inspect it (it’s perfectly fine, no damage to speak of), vacuum out the lint, and put everything back together. I still had a handful of hiccups on the final seam, but with less of a nest on the underside. My next suspect is that I’ve got the wrong top thread for this needle, which would be annoying.
Over breakfast I attempted to deep-clean two of the cupboard doors, but they are still tacky so I’ve gotta try something else.
We went to open studio and I burnished the insides of all the bakers. Some of them were a little dry for it, but I got it to work eventually.
Home, food, then canning research. Nobody seems to mix elderberries and blackcurrants, so I might just do two separate preserves. I want to do up some plums too for savory applications.
I finished Goose Girl (nice twist) and started the sequel, Enna Burning. Less sing-song, probably because it’s not, or not obviously, based directly on a classic fairy tale. More complexity in the characters and morality, too.
Dinner, crossword, Legends, snack, sleep. P had made kofta, which seemed like it would be fine but I had a weird reaction to the raw beef smell in the sink, so dealing with that. It is good to challenge my environment periodically but certainly not pleasant.
