Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Processing Wool for Moths

I was not careful after acquiring a moth-eaten sweater around christmas, and I'm afraid moths might've gotten into some of my stuff. I have so many woolens, that I can't put them all in ziplocks in the freezer, and I don't have my own washer, so although I have washed them all by hand, the solution I've finally come up with is this:
soak as many woolens as possible in hot water in a bucket, without any agitation. after some soaking, place on a plate or in a bowl in a clean microwave until steamy. If you have a thermometer, you could try to make sure the sweater gets up to a certain temp, but I'm not entirely certain what that temp is. 170 maybe?
I slide the heated sweater off the plate into my waiting canning pot. It's a Tamale steamer, so there's an insert with holes in it, perfect for draining wet sweaters.
Once the sweaters are cool (not just cool enough to touch, but room temp. hot wet wool can be ruined easily), squeeze the moisture out of them gently, and hang/lay flat to dry as you would normally.
Now the thing it, what to do with wool pants, shorts, with metal zippers? They can't be microwaved.I'm hoping I've gotten everything important, and I'm going to just wait and see.

Saturday, January 21, 2012

Bikes!

We have lived in Austin for almost a year, without riding our bikes almost at all. (admittedly part of that is that we hardly ever go out in the first place)
Last weekend, we had houseguests that we tried to show around the city, and since they had been driving ten hours a day, they wanted to walk it. And I was amazed at how walkable it was. In my mind it was a lot bigger, but in reality we covered a lot of ground quickly, no parking fees, no driving in circles looking for a spot. (and Mark and I are quick walkers, so when alone, we could probably cover a lot more distance)
Now I want to go out and walk/bike everywhere. Betsy finally got a bike, so we can bike places together. I pulled out our map and found a safe way to get to her house.
Now I need to get some better brakes/handlebars. What I have right now is neither safe nor comfortable.
Deciding/agreeing on what to get, though is tougher than it should be.