Done to distraction.

Today there is finished knitting, if one can count finishing a batch of wash cloths as a project done, and a major distraction arrived at home.

First up the washcloths, all seven of them. I miscalculated and the final washcloth ended up short about a meter of yarn. Something's I will frog, but the final washcloth is not one of them, so I substituted another cotton I had in stash. It's the one on the lower left corner in case you didn't spot the odd corner out.

The washcloth patterns are (clockwise from top left), NaiNai's favorite, double bump by Missy Angus), washcloth for a perfect bath by Linney Pinney, Open star dishcloth, spa day washcloth (wrong side up), in the middle is dewdrops washcloth by tricksy knitter and the last one knit, down in the lower left corner is the pattern revenge washcloth. This and NaiNai's are my favorites, although dewdrops is right up there in the knit again list. The two I am most disappointed with are the two on the far right, they skewed more than I liked.

This came home Saturday, a brand new pistachio green kitchen aid. I love it, it's quiet, doesn't drip oil when stord in the cupboard, and doesn't cut out when run for more than five minutes. We bought the artisan model, and got a free glass bowl (a special deal), so we have two bowls for it, stainless and glass, one with a cover to seal and store mixes (we did that with popover batter Saturday night for breakfast Sunday). We also bought a scraper mix blade. Then I watched the instructional DVD, badly dubbed but excellent infomercial, in that when watching my first thoughts were that I wanted all the extras they were showing me. There was making of cupcakes, muffins, and bread. Then making all sorts of other things like ice cream with additional ice cream bowl, or mincing, grinding, and juicing using even more attachments.

Sometime in the 1960's a British made kenwood chef mixer came into this house, bought for Bears mum, and it is still here. I was given use of it in the 1990's, I used it to make bread, pavlova, and cake all-the-time and then it finally wore a gear out later that decade. We couldn't find parts for the Kenwood A701 at the time so I had the gear replaced, a friend of a friend took the broken wooden gear and machined a hardened steel replacement. A lovely gesture but the result was a mixer built to last forever that was so loud I wanted to wear earmuffs when using it. I understood the simplicity and wisdom of the gear being made of quieter wood not steel. Then I officially inherited it, I used it, when I want to make things that my wee hand held mixer would not cope with - for the wee hand held mixer would overheat if worked to long and too hard and simply stops working until the motor cools down. Here is the new kitchen aid right next to the old kenwood chef, both metal bodied, both with glass bowls, one clear and one milky purex. We have a blender attachment, and bear plans to order a replacement gear, and seals and see if he can refurbished the kenwood. The old ones sell for very little on Trademe (new Zealand's eBay), and I do mean very little, there is one locally sitting unsold sans beater for $15 thatis newer than ours! I suspect they are simply to heavy to ship, and we can't honestly sell one that drips oil when in storage, and is so loud ... but repaired one of the cubs might take it flatting, they both like to bake, and Bear likes to tinker, or likes the idea of tinkering.

Take care, if you have any advise on repairs for a1960's Kenwood A701a or words of advice for a new kitchen aid user ... Please share, meanwhile I'm off to check the littlest cub who is unwell.

Na Stella

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