Cool Tool: Gasoline vs. Hybrid Calculator

I dare you to type in your current car versus an alternative fuel or hybrid vehicle and see the difference. It can be pretty significant. Like in our case: I drive to work five days a week with an hour commute each way. (Yes, that actually means I burn 2 hours a day sitting in a frigging car instead of doing something useful, unbelievable.) Anyway, our minivan is no spring chicken and our pickup truck was drinking up gas at last years $4.00 a gallon high. Something had to give. A friend of mine turned me onto hybridcars.com. I think you’ll agree it’s a snazzy little cyber-gadget! You type in the info for the vehicle you’re driving now and then compare it to the hybrid or alternative fuel vehicle of your choice. For us it was our Dodge Dakota pickup vs. the two top-selling hybrids at the time, the Honda Civic and Toyota Prius. The Prius took the prize in every way; lowest emissions and highest MPG. It’s been almost a year since we traded our truck for the hybrid and this cool tool played a big part in our decision. Even if you’re not looking to trade-up, it’s worth checking out just to learn more about your personal energy consumption and fuel costs.

Tool Wishlist: KitchenAid Food Processor

While I was struggling with my blender to puree butternut squash & curried pear soup the other day, I was reminded of how much I wish I had a food processor. And not just any food processor but the winner of the Cook’s Illustrated food processor equipment review, of course. The coveted KitchenAid Professional KFP750. According to the test kitchen gurus over at Cook’s Country, it’s hefty 12-cup capacity bowl performed very well chopping, pureeing and making pie/bread dough and comes with a handy mini-bowl attachment that makes short order of chopping herbs, etc. I can imagine dozens of ways that it would speed up food prep in my kitchen. Fresh salsa would be a snap as would pureed veggies for soups and sauces. And I wonder what I could do with chocolate(?) For now it’s on my wishlist, hopefully someday soon I’ll have one of my very own. ;-)

March of the Tools: Vintage Screwpull

This has to be one of my all time favorite kitchen tools. Indeed we’ve had a long love-love relationship with our sleek black ScrewPull corkscrew. We’ve been using this one for over 15 years and it still works great. I was happy to see they are still making this model since it’s such a functional design. Interestingly it’s been snapped up, in the states at least, by Le Creuset (which is a whole other bit of loveliness, but I’ll save that for another post).

I used to have one of those dinky corkscrews with the flappy metal wings that you pull down on each side. In theory, it was supposed to force the cork up and out. Yeah, right. It never worked. Either I’d end up with a hundred tiny chunks of cork floating in my vino or I’d somehow manage to injure myself with the ill-designed contraption. Back in the day, a coworker told me about her corkscrew; how great it worked, how it was so easy to use and that it’d never cracked a cork. So I visited the local kitchen store and picked one up. What a difference a good corkscrew can make. It operates really smoothly and easily. The only time I ever injured myself with it was when my Mom brought over a bottle of wine to share and I, being the semi-wine snob that I am, assumed it was a cork and proceeded to ram my corkscrew down through the top of the screw-on cap (duh!). It emerged unscathed, though my thumb sadly did not. Stupidity aside, this is a solid, sturdy, well-designed tool. If you are even the least bit frustrated with your current wine opening device, I’d urge you to consider a ScrewPull. It’s a handy gadget to have around after a hard week!

March of the Tool: Janome HT2008

I’ve had 3 sewing machines so far in my life. I started out on a used Singer that my dear Nannie got for me at her senior center’s swap shop back in 1993. I didn’t know anything about sewing or using a sewing machine. It was a mid-1970’s model — not the most reliable gadget — but it taught me the basics. That first Christmas with my machine, I toiled away making dozens of handmade gifts. I picked up velvet scraps at the fabric store and made little apple-shaped red velvet pincushions. I made my mother an oversized Christmas tree skirt with cherub dotted fabric and gold rope-piping trim (yes, that was in style back then). I was constantly figuring and scheming, making up my own patterns since I didn’t know how to read a real pattern. Our extra bedroom became a sewing room/study. It was a sweet time. I had no idea what I was doing but I loved every minute of it.

Two years later when we moved to Dallas, I decided it was time to upgrade and take some basic sewing classes. So I picked up a wonderfully sturdy used Bernina 930. Fantastic machine, did everything I wanted it to. For some odd reason that machine broke needles on almost every project. It was also incredibly heavy; I really struggled toting it to and from the sewing shop for my weekly lesson. My first pregnancy in 1998 hurled me (yes, there was alot of hurling) into serious sewing and nesting mode. I made bumper pads, baby quilts, flannel receiving blankets, etc. After my daughter was born I slid into my simple-shapes-sewing mode. We moved to Virginia and I focused on sewing projects for our new home, curtains mostly, but a few valances and tablecloths. Once I had my son in 2001, my sewing slowed to a crawl. My days were spent growing my freelance design business, balancing volunteer work, homemaking and two little ones. I’d slipped into necessity-sewing-only mode. That’s basically where I’ve stayed since.

Until last year, that is. Inspired by my wonderful neighbor and soul-sister Bonnie (who by the way is an incredible seamstress) and my very talented friend Debbie (who makes lovely colonial period clothing at nouveauchic), I put my Bernina on ebay and bought myself a brand new machine! For those of you that know me, I’ve got quite a reputation for doing an annoying amount of homework before I buy anything. I looked at Bernina again, both new & used, but couldn’t justify the price. Then I discovered Janome. Quiet, modern, lightweight, easy to use and affordable. I was sold. My Janome Heart Truth sewing machine is wonderful. It has an exclusive Superior Feed System, 3 different 1-step buttonholes and 50 unique stitches. I love how easy it is to use. The LED display and settings are incredibly easy to navigate. Changing out feet is a snap, literally! It doesn’t have a ton of bells & whistles but plenty for me right now. I wanted a machine that I could gel with and stretch my skills, but also one that was simple enough for my daughter to learn on. Sewing is fun again, thanks to this fabulous tool from Janome :-)

March of the tools!

I am so honored to be a part of this year’s March of the Tools project! As soon as I got the response from Heather saying I was included (how lucky am I?), images of tools started swirling around in my head. I realized that some of the tools that came to mind might not technically be tools at all. I mean, is bath soap a tool? I thought it best to start by defining what a tool really is. A tool is anything used as a means for accomplishing a task or purpose. So, if the task you’re trying to accomplish is cleaning your body and your purpose is to cut down on body odor, then indeed bath soap is a tool. Now that we’ve settled that little foundational concept, let’s get down to my first awesome tool recommendation:



Kuler: Best Online Color Palette Tool
This is an incredible free tool for building color themes. Whether you are a graphic or fabric design professional, quilter, art teacher or just looking to redecorate your livingroom; you’ll find this a very handy site. It’s extremely easy to navigate given the dandy little explanations that pop-up when you mouse over things. In the screenshot above you can see the color palette blocks across the middle. Under the color blocks you’ll see this one is named “firefly.” Just to the right of that you’ll see a tiny square color-slider box. (If this is too small for you to read, just go directly to the site and you can check out these features there.) If you click on the slider you can get a host of specific information about the color breakdowns: hsv, rgb, cmyk, lab & hex. In this same window you’ll see “select a rule” where you can view the complimentary colors, monochromatic, or my favorite, shades. Clearly there are a ton of other features to play around with. I urge you to go to Kuler and explore it for yourself. Then come back and comment, I’d love to hear what you think of it. Thanks for sharing my tool-love. Check out my next tool post where I’ll be sharing the love for my new sewing machine ;-)

Note: they just added flash player 10 functionality so you may have to download it to view the updated site. Be sure to quit your browser after you’ve downloaded flash and before you go through the install process. Otherwise it will not install properly though that may only be specific to macs. :-)