Monday, March 09, 2015

...Sunbeam Mixmaster Makeover...

...way back when we first moved into this house...we found a bunch of things they left behind...
...amongst those things was this old mixer...it still worked and it's about the only thing that we kept...
...so for Christmas the boys got me the stand for it...
...and it fit perfectly...
...then I found these beaters on ebay...and we were good to go...stand...mixer...beaters...I already had a bowl...but it's really not very pretty is it?...
...so I printed out a schematic...it's for a model 10 and ours is a model 9...but pretty close...
...I got out some tools...
...and started taking things apart...
...pictures of the process help in the reconstruction...like this little spring...that feeds through the little loop on the bottom...I have lots of technical terms like that since I have no idea what I'm doing...
...the next layer was a grease cover and gasket...
...which revealed the gears...and some very old grease...
...so we got as much of that gunk out as possible...
...then I started at the other end...and removed the little cover...
...which revealed a screw that holds the 'accelerator' on...
...and that revealed a slightly gunked up compartment...with what looks like some old old flour...
...I removed one more screw from the bottom with the little name/model plate...
...and started cleaning everything really well...some little areas were just too tight to get into...so I contrived a toothpick cleaner with my dremel tool...and it worked well for the little corners...
...but when I started chipping away at what I thought was more gunk on the handle...
...I realized that it was actually some sort of glue and that the handle had been broken and repaired at some time...I LOVE that...and I just cleaned it and left it alone...
...with everything all clean...it wss time to start masking things for painting...and I started with the decal which I really REALLY wanted to preserve...

...basically what I did was...

...starting in the middle of the decal with plain old scotch tape...I tucked under a corner so I could easily pull it up after...and then I made sure the tape extended beyond the decal...

...then using the exacto knife I trimmed that off right to the edge of the decal...

...with a second piece of tape I tucked under a corner and did the same thing in the opposite direction...overlapping in the middle...

...and finally I placed a piece of tape vertically over the pointed part of the decal and trimmed around that end...
...then using masking tape I taped over the rivets that I couldn't remove and wanted to leave silver...
...and trimmed around them with the exacto knife...
...I went to the hardware store and got some appliance paint...I thought the biscuit colour was the best match...
...set up a 'painting station' outside...a little snow doesn't keep me from painting...HA!...
...and sprayed all the parts...
...while the paint was drying...I measured the gap between the beaters and the mixer...the ebay discription said that although the beaters would work just fine...they would not eject because of this gap...
...so I went back to the hardware store and got some rubber washers to fill that gap...and some oil and grease for when I put the mixer back together... ...then after a couple of hours...I brought all the pieces right back inside after they were sprayed...it was a little bit chilly out...and I wanted to remove at least the decal masking before the paint got very dry...
...it was pretty easy to pull the tape off of the decal...
...I just grabbed hold of the tucked under corner and pulled...
...the last piece...
...I love it...nice crisp edges...
...NOW...for the single most gratifying part of the whole project...this is the little accelerator knob...kinda drab...
...so I raided the crayon bin for some white crayons...
...and started coloring in the letters...just rubbing the crayon really hard across the letters...to fill in all of the spaces...
...then I just took a paper towel...and rubbed the excess off of the bakelite...
...a pretty BIG difference...
...I did the same for the handle...I LOVE it!
...then it was just time to put everything back together...I had all of my parts clean and neatly arranged...
...and ta-daa...
...the finished re-furbished Mixmaster...

~Wishing you a lovely start to your week!

Saturday, March 07, 2015

...Raw Vegan Cookie Dough Balls...

...we had our regular Friday Night Movie last night...with a little something different for dessert...

...I'm trying to get the boys interested in watching a new Mystery Series with me...Hinterland...very 'noir'...you'll recognize the main character if you watched this version of Bleak House...it aired on PBS shortly after we moved to North Dakota...I thought I'd blogged about it but apparently...not...

...anywhoo...I digress...the point of this post was the cookie balls...

...y'all know that it's almost always 'safe' to eat vegan cookie dough anyway...(and we certainly do)...but when I saw the Raw Vegan Cookie Dough Balls over at Averie Cooks...and knowing how much Scout loves cookie dough...I thought we should try them...
...Averie gives excellent step by step instructions...
...with pictures...
...and we followed the recipe exactly...
...these are so good...I'm thinking I'll make a double batch and take them to book club later this month...

~Have a lovely weekend!

Friday, March 06, 2015

...right back at'chya...

...y'all have seen these scarves before...in their unfinished state...
...this one...
...and this pink one...that I made for her daughter...I was sort of secretive while I was working on them...because I wanted them to be a sweet little surprise...

...I sent these scarves up to my friend Elizabeth...who gave me the yarn...you can visit her sweet blog at Bits of Sunshine...and she let me know that they had arrived...so I can post about them without spoiling the surprise...she said Maddie wants to give one of them to her friend...'so they can match'...so sweet!

~Have a lovely day!

Thursday, March 05, 2015

...another storm...

...there's not a lot going on chez affectioknit...we're just staying indoors...watching the snow fall...again...and stoking the fire...we're supposed to get 8-12 inches of snow...

~Stay warm...and have a lovely day!

Wednesday, March 04, 2015

...W.I.P. Wednesday...

...a quick update on the knitting front...

...these are the socks that I started on the Wyoming trip...and the yarn is some nice stretchy cotton that Elizabeth sent...but notice that there are two skeins...one white and one variegated blue...and I was afraid that I didn't have enough of either one to make a whole pair of socks...

...so...I'm knitting one round of the blue and one round of the white for a sort of variegated stripe effect...then...when I got to the heel of the first sock...I got worried that I might run out of the blue altogether...so I knit the heel in solid white...I'll do the same for the toe...then I thought...well...if I run out of the blue...I could knit the princess sole entirely in white...so I should get both socks to that point before I decide...

...so that's where we are now...I'm almost to the heel on the second sock...and it does look like there will be enough of the blue to knit the foot...I'm still going to do the toe and heel in white though...I think it's cute...

...What are you working on?

~Have a lovely day!

Tuesday, March 03, 2015

...Creamy French Comfort Food...and a new blog friend...the Vegan Hausfrau...

...I spent a little time in the kitchen with Julia over the weekend...

...we made Vegan Bitokes à la Russe...a creamy gravy covered vegan hamburger steak...the most time consuming part was making the burgers...after that it went pretty quickly...

...and all of the particulars are over at The Vegan Version...

...and then I got an email from Annette...aka...the Vegan Hausfrau...praising the humble MtAoFC The Vegan Version...

...and guess what...she's sort of doing the same thing with Claudia Roden...but she has quite a stack of cookbooks...not just one...

...I was so impressed with the Vegan Hausfrau...and I think you will be too...she gives lots of instructions and even videos...so hop on over...check out that Christmas Pie...

~Have a lovely day!

Monday, March 02, 2015

...weekending...

...we spent some time measuring and cutting...
...and did a bit of dogsitting...sweet Chanel (unlike our Jack)...doesn't mind appearing in photographs...
...there is now sheetrock on all four walls...YAY!...
...the snow that we got over a week ago has been rather slow leaving us...
...I finished the month of February on the Sky Scarf...
...I put it on the floor in front of the French doors for some natural light...I like it a lot so far...

Wishing you a lovely start to your week!