I Scratched my Car

This is Zed Viktor.

And this is what I did to her. Poor Zed.

Well, we can't have that, can we? So I called Daddy and he told me to go to Halfords and get some paint. We did, and we met a lovely woman who mixed up some paint to match Zed's colour and put it in a spray can for me. Then Daddy gave me what was left of the little touch up kit that he'd bought when my old car (Sophie) got keyed.

This takes days. First I gave the door a wash and dried it. 

Unfortunately, the camera I use isn't designed for showing imperfections on a car's surface. The flash is very good at masking these things. So I've tried to pick the photos that show it the most accurately.

There were a couple of little scratches; Daddy gave me some magic cream for these. Put a little bit of cream on a cloth (I used kitchen paper) and rub the scratch with it. Scratch disappears like magic. It works by moving your other paint over the scratch (it's grainy), so if you use it too much you'll ruin your paint job. It won't work if your scratch is deep enough to feel with your fingernail.

Then I applied the primer (undercoat) to the proper scratch.

Then I had to leave it for at least 24 hours to dry. I leave for work at around 8am and this happened at the start of December so, as I don't really want to paint my car in the dark, it was left for several days (I think about three) before I got to the next stage. First I had to sand down the primer.This tiny little sander came with the scratch repair kit that I borrowed from Daddy.

I taped some newspaper around the scratch. Daddy and I had discussed and decided it would be best if I only painted the scratch itself, as the new paint job is likely to be visible (remember I've never done this before). Then I sprayed it. You're supposed to spray about 12-15 inches away from the car, but the wind determined that spraying from that distance would mean painting the drive rather that Zed Viktor, so I opted to go too close. The paint dripped over the tape and paper, but I just mopped up the excess with newspaper. No big deal. I waited a couple of minutes before removing the tape. Long enough to be sure the paint had stopped dripping down the car, not long enough for the paint to dry properly and risk being peeled off when the tape is removed from underneath it.

Then it needed to be left for at least another 24 hours. I think you can add another spray of paint after about 20 minutes (it does say on the can, but I can't be bothered finding it now to check), but if you want to put something else on, or sand it, then you need to wait a day. So by the next photo it is over a week since Zed Viktor's initial injury. I decided that the spray paint didn't look good enough so I did another coat. And I papered it better this time.

The next day was Sunday. I had left the paint for over 24 hours so now I could apply the lacquer (the clear, protective top coat). This comes with a little brush in it. As it turns out, so did the primer. I shall remember that next time I scratch her. First I sand it down, then I paint on the laquer.

I had another thin scratch, too deep to fix with magic cream, too narrow to do with spray paint; I probably would have made it worse. So I painted some lacquer in it, and it looked a little better. I thought after the lacquer had dried that it wouldn't be noticeably improved, but it does look a little better. I didn't get any decent photos of this, but it can be seen in the bottom right corner of the photos above.

The main scratch is still visible, but not especially obvious. It's clearer from some angles than others. I'd say for a first attempt, I've not done too badly. And I'll do even better next time :)

Hindsight be a wonderful thing, especially as my narrow gateway leads me to believe that I will inevitably scratch my car again. Here are my learnings:

• Next time I buy paint for the car, I will get the kind that you paint on with a brush. It would be much easier to stick to the specific scratch that way. It's also cheaper.
• I should have painted another layer (or two) of primer. Next time, I will be sure to find the paint brush for this.
• I will need a new sander - the one I was using wasn't very good. Halfords sell these in the scratch repair section, so I will probably ask the helpful staff which one I want to buy. They're good like that. 
• That magic cream my Dad gave me is EPIC.  

Making Christmas

It's nearly Christmas!! James and I decided to have a Chrsitmassy weekend.

On Friday we made mulled wine. But I wasn't thinking about the blog at this point so no pictures or recipe for you. I did make a video about the mulled wine I made last year, in case you're interested. It's not exactly a tutorial though, more of a sound project. The sounds I edited to the video illustrate the movement that's implied by the juxtaposition of the still images. Or something.

Anywho, we made Christmas this weekend.

On Saturday, we had to ice the Christmas cakes. I have three. One for myself, one for James and one for my sister, Sadie. I did make one for my mother but she's going to ice her own. To make Royal Icing, we mix Icing Sugar with egg white. Some people put lemon juice in it too, but I've only ever bothered to if I've made it too thick. We decided that we think about 6 ounces of sugar per egg white might be enough. If not, I'd add more sugar.
I stirred the sugar into the white, then beat it with the electric whisk. I had in my head that one egg's worth is quite a lot, but I was quite wrong so we put in another egg white and more sugar and that looked more like how much we probably wanted.
Then I put blobs of icing onto the cakes and we spread them out with big plastic spoons.

 
I made a pretty swirl on top of James's cake with the back of a spoon. After we'd done the tops, we went round the edges (a little more carefully). The icing would have been better a little bit thicker, I think. It was a bit runny round the edges.

Turned out it wasn't quite enough icing. At this point we had to leave the cakes to set with a view to finishing them later on, because I had to go and buy stuff for my car (but more on that next time).

After we'd been to Halfords (and the haberdashers, where I bought a mask that I'll tell you about another time, and been to see my mother who kindly gave us our dinner) we made another batch of icing. We put a couple of tablespoons more sugar in it this time. James iced the edges of Sadie's cake and I re did the top of mine (it wasn't very flat). I made it flat by dragging a long spoon handle across the top.

There was some icing left, but more on that later.

We made mince pies. We emptied a jar of mincemeat into a bowl. The we added candied peel (even though there's already some in there), ginger (even though there's already some of that too), cinnamon and rum.

I have made pastry about twice in the last ten years. Turns out I can't remember how to do it. I'm sure that when I was at school I was quite good at it. I think I didn't put enough water in it at first. I probably should have also remembered not to use the self raising flour.

Anyway, cut two sizes of rounds. Put the big rounds in the greased tin, the mincemeat inside, then wet the edges and put the little rounds on top, squishing them to seal the pies. Then stab them with a fork and put them in the oven.

I can't remember how much pastry we made. I do remember being surprised that it didn't make very many pies. When my mother makes mince pies, she always makes herself a ball of pastry, which she cuts open and eats with butter while it's still hot. I made one each for myself and James because it sounded like a good idea. It was.

While the pies were in the oven, we started on the marzipan Christmas trees. This should be something to do with the marzipan left over from the cakes, but there wasn't any so we bought a new block of it just for these, and that's why there's so many. James got bored with the traditional cone shape and made some very unorthodox trees.

Then the pies were done. I really ought to buy some plain flour. They taste good though. James took this picture; apparently the pie is heroic (something about it looking SO homemade)

Back to the trees. Remember the icing? We put in some green food dye. And then we put a blob of icing on each tree (except not all of them, because James had other plans for the rest of the marzipan).

Then we have to smooth the icing down all the trees so they're completely covered. And we put on some sprinkles to look like bauballs. If you just drop them on they won't stick. Dip your finger tip in water, then in the sprinkles, then push them into the icing. Then they stick.

After that I had some green icing left so I decided to draw a Christmas tree on Sadie's cake, like so. I textured it with a fork, but then I had to redo that after it had set a little. I made a star out of marzipan. Cute, eh? I also put some fudge pieces (tiny ones) on it for tree decorations, but I don't seem to have a picture of that.

On Sunday, we made a chocolate log. I put a glass dish on top of a pan of hot water from the kettle. We put the chocolate in it and stirred until it had all melted. Then we poured it over a chocolate swiss roll and spread it out with a spoon.

I ran over the chocolate with a fork to make it look like a log, then we decorated it with marzipan Christmas Trees and sprinkled some icing sugar on it to look like snow.

James used the leftover chocolate to coat the rest of our marzipan trees. You might notice we've eaten some of the others by this point. That's because they're awesome.

Finally, I don't have a Christmas tree. I also don't really have room for one. So I made one on my cupboard door out of post-it notes. Like this:

I tied ribbon onto some bauballs and taped them onto the cupboard door, so that the tape would be hidden under my post-its.

Then I cut a star out of foam and stuck it onto the cupboard with a loop of tape.

Merry Christmas!!