Where Talent Shines: Artistic Showcase

A&S 50 Challenge, Item #31: Yule 2012 Event Menu

Filed Under : A&S 50,Calligraphy,Gallery by D'vorah

Dec.21,2012

I’ve taken up a new hobby, a new medieval skill. I’m still a very-very-very new beginner, but I thought I’d share with you the first thing I ever did for “publication,” the first thing that has seen the light of day.

This is a menu for a Yule feast, hosted by the Barony of Gyldenholt within the Kingdom of Caid in the Society for Creative Anachronism. I know that I want it to be a part of my A&S 50 Challenge, and I think I’ve decided to define my challenge very broadly so that I can still count everything. So therefore, my challenge is: 50 items. Period.

I should point out that while I did the scribal work (the words, the calligraphy), my new friend Amber Cianco (Or as she’s known in the SCA, Astrid Einarssdottir) did the illumination (the pretty holly leaf border and the large title words).

This is the Uncial hand (used since the 2nd century of the Common Era), done in red Pelikan ink (modern source and recipe) in a rotring ArtPen (modern) on Strathmore Bristol Smooth paper (modern). In other words, it’s not a masterpiece of medieval-ness. Nevertheless, it’s my first piece that I completed, first that was sent to be illuminated by an artist, and first to see the light of day by the public at an event. I’ve gotten compliments on it, and it results in my being handed my first award scroll assignment, so I consider it a success.

Moving Sale – Please get these off my hands! ;)

Filed Under : For Sale,Gallery,Pottery,Soap by D'vorah

Aug.20,2012

Akim and I are moving, and wish to offload as much as possible of things that we still want but do not necessarily need. Alas, my pottery and soaps fall into that category.

Pottery:

Since the majority of pottery requests that have come in have mentioned pieces that were specifically made for others and have been delivered already, I thought I ought to clarify which pieces/sets still remain. The sets may be bought as individual pieces.

Black Plate, ~~$15~~ $12. Though it’s hard to tell in this lighting, there’s a faint swirl of what looks like a sort of celestial blue color, a bit sparkly, that looks vaguely like an Oort cloud or some sort of nebula.

Black Plate, edge view. As you can see, I make stew plates more often than flat plates. Some “plate” foods are juicier than intended, and I like to make sure that the tabletop and your lap will remain safe.

Cup Trio, ~~$10/cup~~ $8/cup. Left: small brown cup. Center: cobalt blue goblet. Right: Cream-nutmeg and orange-brown cup.

Cup trio, different view. This perspective shows the shape of the goblet.

Cup Trio, a third view. These aren’t a set, so they may be bought as individual objects.

Lace Plate, ~~$20~~ $17 view of texture. This is not part of a set, and may be bought as an individual piece.

Lace Plate, edge view.

Oil Lamp, ~~$11~~ $7. This will hold about 2 teaspoons of water and about 2.5 to 3-ish tablespoons of oil, which should burn for a couple of hours. The water will keep the oil from burning down to nothing and causing the lamp to shatter.

Oil Lamp, 2nd view. If you use a modern floating wick, simply place it in the larger opening. When using a medieval wick, put it into the larger opening, but place a plate beneath the lamp to catch the oil as it wicks upward and dribbles downward.

Oil Lamp, view 3. It’s easier to see the relative sizes of the openings in this view. The oil lamp was formed on a pottery wheel, perfectly round, then manipulated by hand into its current shape.

Oil Lamp, Cup Trio, and Lace Plate. These pieces do not comprise a set, so they may be claimed as individual items. However, if you would like to purchase the whole lot, it will be $1 off per item (~~$20~~ $17 for the plate, ~~$10/cup~~ $8/cup, ~~$11~~ $7 for the lamp is ~~$61~~ $48, minus $1 per item for 5 items, total of ~~$56~~ $43).

Oil Lamp, Cup Trio, and Lace Plate, top view.

Green and Brown Feastware. ~~$10 for cup, $12 for bowl, $15 for plate, or $35 for the set.~~ Moving sale, $30 for the set.

Green and Brown Feastware. Bowl.

Green and Brown Feastware. Cup.

Green and Brown Feastware. Cup, top view, better lighting.

Green and Brown Feastware. Stack, from above.

Green and Brown Feastware. Stack, side view.

Red and Purple Feastware. ~~$10 for cup, $12 for bowl, $15 for plate, or $35 for the set.~~ Moving sale, $30 for the set.

Red and Purple Feastware. Bowl and cup closeup.

Red and Purple Feastware. Stack, from above.

Red and Purple Feastware. Cup, detail.

Red and Purple Feastware. Stack, different view.

Raw Umber and Turquoise Feastware. ~~$10 for cup, $12 for bowl, $15 for plate, or $35 for the set.~~ Moving sale, $30 for the set.

Raw Umber and Turquoise Feastware. Bowl, detail.

Raw Umber and Turquoise Feastware. Cup, detail.

Raw Umber and Turquoise Feastware. Stack, from above.

Raw Umber and Turquoise Feastware. Stack, side view.

Blue-Brown Bowl, ~~$12~~ $10. Holds about 12 fluid ounces.

Blue-Brown Bowl, view 2. I’m fond of the way the blue overglaze reacted with the reddish-brown underglaze, making those lovely patterns.

Blue-Brown Bowl. Inside view.

Blue-Brown Bowl. One last look.

Brown-Green Colander, ~~$20~~ $18. What, you don’t see the green? Keep looking.

Brown-Green Colander. Now you can see the green. Surprise!

Not pictured: 3 ceramic business card holders, $3 each. They’re cute, but I’m tired of having to upload images. I just want to pack boxes for the big move.

Soaps:

Castile Soap. Though some soap manufacturers insist that their soaps are Castile because they’re made with only vegetable-sourced soaps, true Castile soap is made from only one kind of oil: olive. This is true Castile soap. It will be fully cured and ready to use on 1 September 2012. May be bought by the gram/kilogram, at $12/kilogram. I have roughly 2kg of this batch (about 4 pounds). If you take the entire batch that I have, I’ll only charge $10/kilo.

Soybean Oil Soap. This batch will be cured and usable on 1 October 2012. May be bought by the gram/kilogram at $8/kilogram. I have roughly 4.5kg of this batch. If you take the entire batch that I have, I’ll only charge $7/kilo.

Soap made from oils of soybean, castor, and coconut. The little ‘fluffy’ looking ones on the side are from the same batch, but my wooden mold wasn’t big enough to hold it all, so I put the overflow into little plastic molds. May be bought by the gram/kilogram at $10/kilo. I have roughly 2kg of this batch. If you take the entire batch that I have, I’ll only charge $8/kilo.

Soap made from oils of soybean and coconut. May be bought by the gram/kilogram at $8/kilo. I have roughly 4kg of this batch. (I originally mispriced the batch. It should be $9.50/kilo, but I’m not going to change the price. Consider this to be my moving sale price.)

Tags : For Sale

A&S 50 #30: Batch 8

Filed Under : A&S 50,Gallery,Soap by D'vorah

Aug.19,2012

I only remembered to take one picture while making this batch of soap, but it’s the right one. Here are my bars, drying on the newly emptied book shelf. I’m going to need a new shelf when we get to our new place in California, just for drying soaps.

Again, you can see how un-uniform my cuts are. Someday I want either a mold that makes uniformly sized bars, or a cutter that comes with a spacer so I can get the right bar measurement. Until then, we’ll have to just call this our “rustic” look.

This batch of soap is 70% soybean oil and 30% coconut oil, and its entire reason for existence was to use up most or all of my coconut oil. It comes in glass bottles, you see, and I don’t want to have to schlep it across the country, only to find that it’s broken and that not only are my oils wasted, but that all my belongings are covered in oil. I did manage to use up all but about 1/3 of a jar of the coconut, and I got the soybean oil down to an acceptable level as well.

Also, I dropped one of the bars onto the floor and had to rinse it off. Without my even trying to make it happen, it lathered right in my hand, just from the running water. I’m going to love this soap, I think.

I’m going to call this an overall win.

A&S 50 Challenge #29: Soap

Filed Under : A&S 50,Gallery,Soap by D'vorah

Aug.15,2012

Finally I remembered to photograph a soap from start to… Well, not finish, but definitely from start to middle.

714g lye + 1900g filtered water creates an exothermic reaction and enables the lye to become able to chemically react with the oils. I also added 100g NaCl (non-iodized sea salt) to the water, which will make for harder, longer-lasting bars of soap.

My soaping pot. It holds, I think, 16 quarts, and is stainless steel. Never use aluminum for soap making! It reacts with the lye, causing volcanic action, and will ruin your countertop, stovetop, floor, dress, and shoes. Also note the rubber spatula. Silicone is also good. Avoid wooden spoons: the wood weakens and can splinter, leaving dangerous splinters in your soap.

Measure your oils by the smallest unit possible, and measure by weight, not volume. I prefer metric measurements for the sake of precision. When measuring oils, if your recipe calls for a part of a gram (such as 731.88 grams), round UP. Round DOWN for measuring lye. When using more than one oil in a soap batch, measure each oil into separate containers, then combine them in your soaping pot. That way if you pour in too much by accident, you can pour the excess right back into the container from whence it came.

Pour your lye onto the back of your stirring spatula or spoon. This will reduce potentially dangerous splashing, as well as the amount of air bubbles you introduce into your mix. Air bubbles are usually harmless, but they can attract lye pockets, which are not harmless.

The pouring is the same as in the previous picture, but note the cloudiness that is starting to happen within the oils. That’s from the chemical reaction between the oils and the lye, which is already beginning.

Stirring may take as little as five or ten minutes, or as much as a couple of hours, depending on what type of oils you’ve used. Soybean oil, which is a substantial portion of this recipe, takes a very long time to saponify (turn into soap); coconut oil takes much less time, and it makes up 30% of this recipe; and castor oil, which is the smallest portion of this recipe at only 15%, takes only a little longer than coconut. I believe I wound up stirring for roughly 15 minutes. However, even if I used an identical recipe next time, the stirring time could still be different, due to humidity, temperature of lye and oils, and factors that either I don’t measure, or that can’t be measured at all. Soap is still a mystery in many ways, despite consistency of materials and methods.

I was going to photograph the oil/lye mixture at various stages: thin trace, full trace, thick trace. I wasn’t going to photograph gelatinous and icky phase. But the phone rang, and I talked for two minutes. Normally I can walk away from stirring a purely olive oil soap, but apparently I can’t walk away from a soap that involves coconut oil.

I couldn’t pour and photograph at the same time, because pouring requires one hand to hold the pot and another to use the stirring spatula to sort of rake it all out and into the mold. But here it is, in the mold, before putting on the plastic wrap and the lid. As you can see, I made just a tiny bit too much and had to spoon the excess into two tiny plastic molds. I probably should have put it into three molds, to be honest.

The soap is in the lined mold, covered in plastic wrap, and lidded. There it will stay, until I’m convinced it’s ready to unmold. The two smaller ones are there to give me an idea of what the inside soap is looking like, but they’ll dry and be unmoldable much faster than the soap that’s in the wooden loaf mold. On the other hand, the loaf will achieve gel phase, thanks to being insulated with all its exothermic reactions happening inside the wood.

For some reason, this image wound up turned sideways. I didn’t photograph it that way, so it has no excuse. You’ll notice that this batch of soap is a creamy ivory color, and not a smooth or unvaried color. There are gradations, and they look a tiny bit translucent overall, with very small areas that appear more opaque. I’m not sure whether this is a function of the castor oil, which I’ve never used before; the coconut oil, which I’ve used but only in very small amounts; the fact that the soap achieved thick, gelatinous icky stage before being molded; or the fact that it’s been so hot and humid this week. Soap is still a mystery! You’ll also notice Her Majesty presiding over the cut bars. She isn’t impressed. It takes a lot to impress her, and soap just won’t do it.

There, now all that’s left is to let these bars of soap sit on my newly emptied book shelf (we’re moving, so the books are packed) until the day before the movers get here, at which point they’ll be ready to pack away, be driven across the country, and be removed and used once they arrive in our new place. Wish them well. Bye, soap bars!

A&S 50 Challenge, Item #28: I’ve made my first soap mold!

Filed Under : A&S 50,Gallery,Soap by D'vorah

Aug.13,2012

I’ve been making soap for a little while now (A&S Challenge items #21 through #27), using a mold loaned to me by Sabrina (of soaping website fame). Given that I’ll be moving soon, I really should give the mold back to her. The one I’ve had for a couple of years now, ahem. So I decided to make my own. There it is with the usual backup dancers that appear in most of my dining table photos (my laptop and my cat’s napping spot, which does move at meal times) and a couple of guest stars (my new soap cutting tool, my utility scissors, and my spray bottle of 99% isopropyl alcohol — don’t ask).

This is my mold, the first wooden object I have ever made. It’s made of the cheapest whiteboard that Home Depot had that day; two brass hinges on each side and one on each end, for a total of six; four brass hasps to hold the sides up when the mold is not collapsed; a brass handle in the middle of the lid.

The mold is not perfect. It’s a tiny bit lopsided, in ways I could actually fix if I wanted. Not only do I not mind having imperfect molds, I actually think it’s kind of cool that no one else will have soaps shaped exactly like mine. I’m pretty cool with that, in fact.

Now, I actually did all this for a reason. I wanted to save money. Did I succeed?

I owned the needle-nose pliers with which I held each tiny screw, the hammer with which I got each one started in the wood, and the screwdriver I used to finish getting each screw into the wood.

Everything else, I had to buy, including the sander and sandpaper with which I finished each of the six pieces of wood. These were my costs:

Wood, about $10.
Brass handle, about $2.
Brass hinges, sold in pairs; three pairs totaled a bit less than $6.
Ryobi sander, $28.
Sandpaper, small packet, $5

Total: $51.

Yes, I could have bought a ready-made mold for about $50 from some places, so I didn’t save money in the short term. But now I have both a skill set and a new sander which I can use for years, and can make my own molds for just the cost of the wood and the brass (or some other kind of) hardware. About $21, considering the fact that the sandpaper came in packets of 5 and I only used 3. So by the time I’ve made even ONE more mold, which I intend to do very soon, I will have saved half the cost of that one mold. That is, I’ll still have to pay for the raw materials, but not for the sander, nor for someone else’s labor.

And at the end of it, I’ll be able to say, “I made this.”

A&S 50 Challenge

Filed Under : A&S 50 by D'vorah

Jun.14,2012

The Society for Creative Anachronism began… Well, let’s let them tell the story, shall we? From the SCA official website:

The SCA started in 1966, when a few friends who were history buffs and science fiction/fantasy fans hosted a big outdoor party in Berkeley, California. The invitation stated that a Tournament would be held on the first of May, summoning “all knights to defend in single combat the title of ‘fairest’ for their ladies.”

Well, now that handful of friends are now a worldful of friends and family. We are great-grandparents and great-grandchildren! Yes, there are people who grew up in this society, not just one generation now, but two, and sometimes three or four, as people brought in their history-loving parents or grandparents, their children and grandchildren who wanted to learn and play.

We’re not only knights, either. We’re royalty, nobility, and the great unwashed masses of world-population and -creating peasants in this, our reboot of the Middle Ages. We are fighters, but we are also lovers. We are fair maidens, and we are fair youths. We are priests, vagabonds, merchants. We work with wood, metal, glass, fibers, food, pen and parchment, beads, leather, feathers. We do, in short, almost everything that anyone ever did in the actual Middle Ages.

And every last one of us has been challenged to a duel.

No, not a duel of swords. We are challenged to a duel of intellect and experience. Each of us is entreated, requested, and encouraged to create 50 things before the end of AS 50 (Anno Societatis 50). Yes, that’s really it.

Oh, all right, if you must have details, here they are.

Satisfied? Good.

I’m taking up the challenge. I haven’t worked out the details of my own challenge, though. I’d thought to make 50 sets of ceramic feastware, but then I damaged my wrists and elbows making the first 20. My last 30 objects will have to be something other than pottery, but I also will have to find a way to incorporate those first 20, because I’m just too proud of them not to count them in the total. Fifty objects my persona could have had? Fifty she could have made? Fifty objects, period? I don’t even know. But I know I’m going to count them, and I know I’m going to create 30 more things of some kind or other. I have some ideas. I’ll try a few, and we’ll see what happens.

Not all of us feel the need to accept the challenge, but the fact remains, we have been dared. The gauntlet is thrown. Dare you pick it up? Dare you refuse?

Update: I’ve decided to count the first 20 pottery pieces towards my A&S 50 Challenge as “objects I’ve made.” Why complicate things? I’ve made 7 soap batches as well, though I forgot to photograph most of them, so those batches are items #21 through #27.

Bento #18

Filed Under : Bento,Gallery by D'vorah

Aug.17,2011

This might have been the easiest bento I ever composed for Akim. Stupid-easy, but it’s all things that Akim likes, and it’s sort of cute the way the pita fit in the box.

Stupid-easy bento. Mini-pita, a few spoonsful of hummos, some grape tomatoes, and I think there may have been some cucumber slices below the tomatoes. Pudding and fruit for breakfast or dessert. That's it.

Tags : bento

Bento #17

Filed Under : Bento,Gallery by D'vorah

I’m sure you can tell that I don’t photograph every bento I make, nor do I even photograph only the best ones. That wouldn’t help anyone but my own ego. My goal was to make people see that bento doesn’t have to always be the best or the fanciest. It just has to be a little bit of everything — protein, starch, veggie, fruit, maybe a little treat — and there has to be some effort, not even a lot, at visual appeal.

You recognize mini-apples, eggs, cherry tomatoes, grape tomatoes, and green seedless grapes. You probably also recognize the little dipping sauce cup, and you know that there's rice under all of this that you can see. But do you recognize the little beige and golden-brown balls at the top?

The little egg-like balls at the top of the bento in the above picture are from this yellow bag. They're peanuts, wrapped in something kind of crunchy, flavored with various things -- wasabi, seaweed, sesame, and other things I can't identify. They're yummy. Akim loves them.

What, you expected something different? Come on, you know there's going to be some kind of fruit and a Jell-O pudding pack.

I finally got that green bento box carrier. Guest appearances by my stand mixer and my food processor, who are singing backup in this number.

Tags : bento

Bento #16

Filed Under : Bento,Gallery by D'vorah

This is just a very simplistic way of illustrating the fact that just because you’re working with the same ingredients doesn’t mean you have to produce the same exact meal. By the time I’d given Akim this meal, Akim’s desk was The Place To Be around lunchtime in the office. Bento are a real tourist attraction, it seems.