hanging my tomorrows on the bones of yesterday

I messed up the musk-note balance on one of the perfume experiments by miscounting yesterday, didn’t notice til this morning, and now I need someone to take an entirely-too-masculine scent off my hands, I think.

If you know someone who wants to smell like aquatic notes, a bit of chocolate, and synthetic animal musk notes (smells kinda like sweaty teenager) then let me know? And they get some free oil-based cologne. Either that or I get to try to rebalance it, but I didn’t write down how many sets of the formula I did, so it would mostly be guesswork, and I am not a guesswork kinda person on things that need formulas. 😕

Anyway, I’m gonna go knit some more on this hooded cardigan. Wish me luck and feel free to volunteer your friends for smelling like stuff.

If you ever want to make something that sounds really fancy that requires very little actual prep: chutney. If you like sweet / tart things to go with meats and savories to keep leftovers interesting, it's your friend. And since I’m not great at eating the same thing with no variation, I kind of have to have tricks like this.

You can make chutneys out of:
• jams or cranberry-type jellies, preserves, marmalades, honey, and even pie filling,
• those "fresh" herb pastes like ginger/basil/garlic etc.,
• dried herbs, spice mixes, or actual fresh herbs that you threw in the blender
• and raisins or most kinds of dried fruit (recipes always tell you to use fresh fruit and simmer it in sugar yourself, but who tf has spoons, really?).

The herbs and spices you mix into the jelly and leave in the fridge for a few days, then taste-test the mix for flavor intensity so you put in the right amount of dried fruit, then leave it in the fridge overnight, and that's it. That's all of it. You mix stuff together and wait.

If you use a lot of herbs and spices you may want to go lighter on the dried fruit, but you do you. There’s no real recipes that I use and I haven’t had anything come out bad yet. Orange marmalade with a little ginger and rosemary on chicken is fuckin' amazing? Dried cherries and rosemary in cranberry jelly with dried minced onion? Goes great on turkey or ham or any other medium flavor intensity meats, and it's "holiday appropriate" or whatever. For beef or venison or strong gamey flavors, my mom does chili sauce and grape jelly.Someday soon I'm going to try putting fresh basil through the blender and mixing it equal parts with lemon pie filling and honey and pomegranate juice, but that is untried as of yet, and I don't know that it would keep very well in the fridge, which the rest of these chutneys do, since they're basically spicy jelly.

I’m chilling out in bed since I ran out of spoons today (to the point where I ache and my head hurts from being overtired. Boo.) So while I’m resting I might as well check DW!

I have been hashing out a “Dreamwidth Olds” space for queer people with my friend flameandsong, and if there’s stuff you would like to see or think your LGBTQ+ folx should have a space to talk about, hit me up? My comments and DMs are open. I have some experience with creating inclusive community on Slacks, private Discord servers, and irl, so I want to see if I can replicate that over here so that my DW peeps can feel connected to a community that doesn’t eat itself.

I have also been making pixie pocket belts still, but progress has slowed considerably on those since I decided to do more complex things with the mostly-grown-people’s belts. Pics to prove it happened: https://imgur.com/gallery/XSuOZQS Oh well, it’s all going to get done eventually. Hopefully all the Yule stuff is actually done by Yule this year. That would be nice.

I am writing a class for my pagan crafting group, so you get to read it early! Lucky you! ( Behind the cut! )

Snowflake challenge #6:
In your own space, Create something. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.

If you want to see the sweater I’m making there’s an image over here. I’m nearly done with the Aurealis sweater by Jennifer Steingass. This is where most of my creativity is going at the moment.

Meow. Most of this post will be ( medical whining. )

The cropped cardigan I bodged together the pattern for is working up quite well and I am thinking of doing a short vlog on youtube to catch up with all of the facebook friends who need to see faces and hear voices to feel connected. I am still trying to get more of the gentle exercise that is recommended, so mostly I have been dancing or getting on the stationary bike when my pain levels are not high. Which I should go do now. Hugs, y'all!