Hi Laura, yes we got the instructions online from one of those excellent U.S.butchery sites. Lizzie's laptop on the side covered in clingfilm, easy. We did it over two days this time, (as there where two pigs) making the sausage meat the second day; flavoured it with packets of mixed up herb/spice from Scoop, utterly delish.

Well, the soap was a real success; traced in two hours and solid by this morning. the brown one is ground coffee, good for really dirty/oniony hands and the other is oatmeal and honey, soothing for sensitive little flowers like me. Will cut it into bars tonight and then it'll have to cure for a month or two.

Isn't it great when things work!

Just started reading the book that Laura sent me, loving it. Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson. Reminds me of Willa Catha and also E. Annie Proux.

Right, off to collect some cow poo for to send off to the vet, part of this new Government animal health initiative, what fun.

soap

Good, another rainy day, so soap making commences.

Looking back at my notes kept on the endpapers of 'Handmade soap' by Tatyana Hill, I see that it is ten years since I started, but four years since I last made soap. (College 'creativity' was enough for me to cope with!)

Some of the comments are amusing in their desperation, the issue is always 'when will the damn thing trace! ' anything from 20 mins for mutton fat to a whole day for olive and sunflower oil.

This batch is made with lard (from when Lizzie and I cut up the pigsin spring) some olive oil, coconut oil, which is ten years old, and beeswax which I found at a motorway caff somewhere around Gretna. It looks promising......

Rain

Goodness, I've been up that ladder for along time! Well that's how it seems to have been recently, the days drifting by in a haze of pottering; fixing fences, entertaining friends, watching Japanese films with Em, who is home for a run and... oh yes, I went to the dentist yesterday (small filling next month.)
Today it is raining, so here is a picture of that. The forecast is for a wet week so it will be inside jobs for a while. I think we might make soap tomorrow so will tell you how we get on. ttfn.

wednesday morning

I've spent the whole morning pottering, lurking inside. The bright, clear, breezy day means just one thing for me, itching eyes and sneeezing.
But I really have to go over to the Hillhead and finish painting the other side of the nissan hut today so I'm hoping that I won't sneeze myself off the ladder.
Haven't wasted the morning though, I made jam from the last of the frozen black-currents (looks like a bumper crop forming for this year) and have done masses of washing.
This is a pic I took last painting day; funny, it seemed so much higher at the time!

more cute stuff

...and while we're on the subject, saw this little fellow coming around the house at about 5am the morning I flew south. They really do snort and snuffle like little pigs. Reminds me of the time last year when I was setting traps for polecats around by the hen house; every morning the trap would contain a sleeping hedgehog probably the same one of course dropping by for his hearty (meaty) breakfast. I wonder if this is the same one?

Came home last night to find the newest member of the family. It doesn't matter how many eggs I bring out it still gives me great pleasure. This is he/she learning to eat.

standard felting kit

yes, you have to read while you roll. re-reading this one, the Isabel Dalhousie books are just so good.

As you can see, I've finally started on the felt 'sketches' for a new panel. Should have planned what I want to do by the time we make the felting area in the politunnel extension and a new, higher, felting table.

What a great week, Glasgow was bathed in sun for Lizzie's and David's graduation. such a happy day with lunch at Sarti and dinner at Crabshakk. even the hour sitting, sipping, on the pavement waiting for our table felt as if it were planned. Six young cousins and Tom's lovely girlfriend and we two lucky oldies.

So, back home and it is back to gray and blustery. Better da morn I hope as I will have to continue painting the Nissan hut and the black gloss does blow about so.