Leather work is uniquely satisfying. Over the past few months, I have continued to make bags, pouches, and bracelets. Since it is summer, and because I love a challenge, I decided to try my hand at making a pair of leather sandals. I came across an excellent tutorial at RachelSeesSnailShoes.com
I have gotten all of my leather and supplies from Tandy Leather. They have a number of locations, and I highly recommend buying your leather in person. Each piece is really different.
I have made three pairs of sandals for myself, and one for my daughter. I used sole leather (11-12oz) for the bottoms, 7-9oz veg tan leather for the uppers, and either 3-4 oz veg tan or scraps of leather from other projects for the straps.
Making these is intensely rewarding and the pair with the braided toe are the shoes I have been living in all summer. I can walk in them for hours (as you can tell, they soles are dirty) and they are incredibly comfortable. If you want to see more pics of my leather goods, you can check them out on flickr.
A few months ago, I got a subscription to creativebug.com. Some of my most favorite fabric and pattern designers had tutorials and classes and I was learning to paint with watercolors. I have had fun exploring the others forms of craft and art on the site. Last month, I found myself returning frequently to watch the classes of Elke Bergeron. I have always loved leather and her style perfectly matched my own.
I had some leather scraps and before investing in a bunch of new tools and supplies, decided to play around with what I had. I made a few pouches and tassels and really enjoyed the process. I also made some wrap bracelets.
I wanted to make more things, but I knew that I wanted to be able to buy leather in person. Each piece is so unique, and there is no comparison to feeling and inspecting it in person. I lucked out, in that the leather supply store that was recommend in the online classes has two locations near me. I went to the one in Rhode Island and picked up a bag of veg-tanned scraps, a veg-tanned belly, and two sides that were on sale.
Within about four days, I had used up much of the leather I bought, making bags and straps and bracelets. I find this kind of work incredibly satisfying and can’t wait to do more once I have more time. All of the things I made were from the online classes, which was one of the best subscriptions I think I have ever purchased.
I have spent most of the past two years adjusting to our new life. Kids away at school. Me away at work. I have done little sewing, and what has been completed during that time was utilitarian.
Partly this was because in the summer of 2015 we moved all of my sewing things from our dining room down to the basement, and there they sat for the better part of a year in boxes piled on top of each other. Partly, I was drained creatively from working hard to create new courses.
After wrapping up the semester in December, I started sewing again. I finished two major projects that I had started back in 2012.
I knew they had been sitting for a while, but I had NO idea just how long. I went on to Flickr and looked at some of my favorite pictures and got inspired. It felt really good to get behind the machine again and I am really trying to focus on excellent technique and craftsmanship.
I got a years subscription to Creativebug and I am really loving a lot of the tutorials and classes. I am a visual learner and seeing people make things is my preferred method of instruction. There will be lots more making in the future.
For the last several years, we’ve made confections and candies during the holiday season. This year, we’re a little late, waiting until Christmas Eve to get started, but better late than never! We have some parties to go to, so we’ll be bringing treats.
This year we’re making peanut brittle, candy decoration with pretzels, homemade snickers and two types of cookies (thumb print and snickerdoodle). We got the idea for homemade snickers because I’d bought a giant snicker bar to wrap and put under the tree, but one of our dogs sniffed it out and ate about half of it. He seems ok, but it gave me the idea to look for a homemade recipe. I found this pretty easy one. While I was making the homemade snickers, Jamie was doing candy decorations with the kids.
Fluff for the nougat, caramels and evaporated milk for the caramel.
Cooking the nougat
Building the snicker bar in layers
Chilled and cut into squares
They’re delicious and oh so sweet (almost too sweet!)
Pretzel and candy decorations
So creative!
Thumbprint cookies
Snickerdoodles
Butter, baking soda, vanilla and peanuts (plus sugar and light corn syrup). The basic ingredients for peanut brittle.
The brittle must be cooked to 300° F (hard crack stage).
The brittle was exceptionally fluffy this year.
The homemade snickers was delicious, but honestly I thought it was a little too sweet — definitely sweeter than a regular snickers. I might leave the some of the sugar out of the nougat layer next time.
I varied the peanut brittle a little bit this year. It calls for vanilla, butter and baking soda at the very end. I’ve usually added them all at the same time and then spread the brittle out in the pan with a spoon. This time, I added the vanilla and butter, waited for that to be mixed in, then added the baking soda and dumped it into the pans without spreading with a spoon. It stayed higher and the internal bubbles were a lot bigger — it’s definitely different (kind of like aero bars in Britain). I’m not sure if I like it better at the moment.
We also took the opportunity to make some treats for tomorrow’s breakfast — blueberry muffins (from berries we picked and froze last summer) and raspberry pain au chocolat pastries (with our raspberry jam). We cheated on the latter with store-bought puff pastry. Oh what a time to be alive!
Rolling the puff pastry.
Filling the puff pastry with nutella and raspberry jam.
All set for Christmas morning breakfast treats.
Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!
While we thought we were done for the year, we had a surprise lamb born just before Thanksgiving. The little girl, we’re calling her Melody, was born to Monarch. Monarch’s mother is Frances. Frances has always been our best ewe. After a stillborn lamb last year, this is Monarch’s first live birth. So far, she’s been very protective and an excellent mother.
We hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and look forward to moving into the Christmas season.
Our garden is going bonkers right now. Sometimes it feels like it overwhelms us as we can’t keep up with everything it produces. We’re getting a ton of tomatoes, corn, peppers, brassicas and eggplants right now. Our winter squash is looking fantastic and the flowers are amazing.
After about a month of keeping the baby ducks closed up and bringing them food and water everyday, we’ve finally opened them up to the pond with the three adult ducks we already had. This is going to be a big help because we won’t have to bring them water multiple times a day, though we’ll still bring them food once or twice a day.
Here’s a video compilation of their first time on the water. The ones zooming about under the water were so fascinating. They clearly loved it.
Our first ever home-incubated batch of ducklings hatched this week. We got 24 eggs from our friends Kim and Andy. I was able to fit 23 into my Brinsea. The eggs go for 28 days, with lockdown (no more turning) after the 25th day. These eggs started hatching exactly on time, and they all came out quickly, over the course of less than 24 hours.
We’re very excited about this breed, too. They are Ancona, a wonderful dual-purpose (eggs + meat) duck.
They’ll be inside for a little while, but we’ll get them on the pond as soon as we can, probably with a protected water run like we’ve done in the past.
Owing to the our generous friends Andy and Kim, we’ve finally got ducks back on the pond (Ancona). It’s been a trying several years, with weather and predator issues hurting our efforts to reestablish our flock. It has been at least two summers since we’ve had waterfowl on the pond with regularity.
I got a couple of dozen fertilized eggs to hatch in my Brinsea and they were thinning a bit so I also got three adults, a drake and two hens. I’ll update progress on the eggs, but I just started them today and they take 28 days (7 days longer than chicken eggs). This puts their hatch date around June 26. I’ve never hatched duck eggs, so I’m interested in the new challenge.
The ducks took quickly to the pond. I’ve got a fenced “water run” for them until they figure out how to get in and out of their new home. That should keep them happy and safe from predators.
It’s that time of year again. The weather is getting nicer, Spring sports have started and we’re beginning to prep the garden for initial planting. Except for a few Spring cold snaps, we’ve had an incredible run of nice weather.
The garden starts out pretty rough, having been left to it’s own since the Fall and over Winter. The first step is to remove all the old plants and rake the garden in preparation to be tilled.
I then bring over last year’s barn muck as compost.
Then I use the 5-foot tiller on the back of my tractor to work everything in and cultivate the soil.
We’ve been doing this for a number of years and the soil is getting so nice. It will definitely be ready for planting this weekend.
Happy gardening everyone!
