Green Soapy Day

Good morning! It is a rather dreary-looking day out thus far and we are supposed to get rain at some point during the day. We shall see what happens; I don’t hold my breath for anything—especially something as fickle as the weather.

Yesterday was quite the day. It started with a little laundry and little dishes and then moved on to making soap. I have to say that while I like not having to take the extra time to line molds, yesterday being the first day I didn’t have to, it really threw off my groove. What I’ve always done is get the molds out, get out the paper, a pencil, quilting ruler, long bladed knife, and masking tape. Then I measure the paper, fold it, cut it with the knife, cut some of the sheets of paper in half, tape a whole piece to a half piece, fold, measure, fold some more, fold and tape an end, measure for the other end, fold and tape that end, put the paper trough I’ve created in the mold, cut the corners about half an inch so they’ll fold down and then tape the ends and edges to the mold. That’s for a single batch. For double batches, I use two whole sheets and one half and do everything else the same. Generally, this whole process takes 20 to 30 minutes, depending on how many batches of soap I am making. Yesterday, all I had to do is take the molds out of a box and we were ready to go. It was strange. Very strange.

I thought I would have time to do some knitting while waiting for oils and lye solutions to reach the same magic temperature but other than the first time, there wasn’t much of a wait, and the first time there were people in the dining room/kitchen and that further threw off my groove. So, while I did watch some episodes of Breaking Bad while I was soaping, I did not get any knitting done. By the time I had some time to actually get some done, I just didn’t feel like it. It was awful.

When I was done with soap stuff, I cleaned up the mess and put everything away and it was during that process that the boys got home. I helped Seth a little with homework. He had two math problems to do. He also had a writing project to finish and I don’t think that happened. He also had a reading log and I know that didn’t get done. There is only so much time in a day.

Then it was time to get dinner going. We had creamy broccoli soup and green ketchup cake (or is that catchup cake?). I know it isn’t quite St. Patrick’s Day and we passed Dr. Seuss’s birthday but I guess I was in a green mood. The soup was good; the cake was okay. The cake is something like red velvet cake which I don’t care for although I do like cream cheese frosting.

At the end of eating, I was talking with the elders about when and where we would be meeting this evening and Paul said, “You won’t have a car.” I know he’d told me that he had an appointment to get the catalytic converter replaced on the green car but I guess I figured it would be done in time to get to church. I kind of need to be to church tonight—we have a boatload of things to accomplish. I was not terribly pleased and I’m sure it must have been obvious.

Up for today is more soaping. If the soap in the molds is ready to come out, it will come out and I’ll make more. If it is not ready to come out, I’ll just leave it on the table to look pretty and smell good until tomorrow or later in the day. If it is ready to come out, I’ve already decided what to make today. If it isn’t ready, I’ll already have decided what to make tomorrow.

Currently the boys have been gone for a few minutes and Amena has been for an hour and a bit more than 40 minutes. Paul is upstairs most likely reading. 

Joanna is most likely going to miss at least her first class because she’s still in bed. I am sitting here typing away contemplating allergies and other reasons people cough.

Have a terrific day!