October 2022 - L'atelier de Pandora

Why drying oranges?

For this winter you can decorate your home with slices of citrus fruit to make in the oven. It’s easy to make, cost effective and gives a very nice sent in your home during the preparation. If you have an oven you should defenitly try it!

You can use these dehydrated slices for:

decorate your Christmas wreaths
make a 100% natural garland
decorate a potpourri in the living room
decorate your Christmas table
decorate gift packages to your loved ones

In this post I would like to tell you how I did it for the first time this year. It was really easy but I must warn you that it can take a long time to dry well. Let’s see how to make some at home…

Preparation

Tools

To make some nice orange slices you will need :

Oranges of course. Count approximately 2 oranges per cooking grill in your oven. So if you only have 2, then dont buy more than, 4 big oranges.
A very sharp knife. It is important that it is sharp otherwise you won’t be able to cut thin slices, and the drying part will take forever.
Towels or
Cooking paper
An oven that can heat at 70 to 80°C

Preheating the oven

Once you have everything in front of you, you can already preheat the oven at 75°C or 80°C. Make sure your oven stays that temperature during all the drying part. If it gets too hot, you will see your slices become brown (and we don’t want that!).

Cutting the oranges

You can start cutting the oranges in beautiful slices of approximately 3 to 4mm maximum. Make sure your knife is really sharp (and be careful not to cut any finger^^). The thinner the slices are, the easiest the drying part is gonna be. If your slices are more than 6mm, don’t use them (you can eat them right now). They will take forever to dry or will burn before they are completely dry.

Wringing the slices

Before putting the slices on the oven rack, you should wring them with a towel or paper. A big part of the juice will come out and you will save some time for the drying part in the oven. Make sure you don’t smash the slices during this procedure.

Drying in the oven

You can now put the slices on the oven rack (on a parchment/backing paper). Dispose them in one single layer, they can touch each other because they will become a bit smaller when drying.

Put them in the oven now, and keep the temperature between 70°C and 80°C.

Every 30min you will turn them upside down, so each part of the orange is dried the same way. It’s important to do so, otherwise your oranges can burn on one side.

The slices will be completely dry in 3 to 4 hours approximately, depending on the thickness of the slices, and your oven of course. Some pieces may dry quickly, in less 2 hours. Make sure that every 30min you remove the ones that are already dried.

If the oven becomes too hot, just remove the racks and let them dry a bit outside, until they completely cool down. Of course you will set your oven to a minimum temperature, or let the door open for a few minutes. Then you can put the slices back in the oven and continue the procedure (but normally this doesn’t happen if you follow the instructions).

Do not try to dry them faster by adding some degrees in the oven, it just doesn’t work.

Each time you will remove some dried slices, you can put them on a cold rack or a plate to let them cool down slowly.

How to store the dried slices

Once every slice is dried, you can let them in your kitchen during a day, to make sure they don’t stay humid or warm. Then, you can store them in a jar, a metal box, or anything that will keep them from getting dry or humid.

Of course you can use them directly for whatever you want : nice decors in your living room, setting a table for celebrations, etc.

If you have tried it please let me know I would be so happy to see it!

I am sometimes asked what material is needed to sew with a sewing machine. We tend to underestimate the equipment needed for this.

Indeed, in addition to a sewing machine, it is important to be well equipped to sew more easily and gain in efficiency.

I have compiled a list of elements that I find important to have in your sewing box, apart of course from elements such as fabric, zippers, sewing bias or other parts specific to each creation.

1. The basics

Pins and a pincushion

You will use them to stick the fabrics together when sewing. it’s important to have pins with a little colored head so you can easily see them if fallen on the floor. Of course the pincushion is needed to organize your pins, you can buy one or make your own.

Sewing clips

They are very useful to hold fabrics together when you don’t want to make a hole in your fabric. It is important to have some if you work with faux leather, waterproof fabrics, etc.

Hand-Sewing Needles

Even using a sewing machine you will probably need a sewing needle to close or finish some projects. Also if you want to add buttons or even perles to your project, you will have to do it buy hand. You can buy different sizes of hand sewing needles, larger for thick fabrics and thinner for fabrics such a cotton, silk, jersey..

Seam Ripper

When you sew the wrong sides together you will use your seam ripper. And believe me, the more beginner you are, the more you will use it !

Normally it is given together with the sewing machine.

Iron and Ironing Board

You might have already one at home. Of course it’s easier to have a very small ironing board to iron the small corners of your project, you can buy a small one or make your own. Its also nice to have a large ironing board that you can put on a table, if you have to iron some curtains or large pieces of fabrics.

2 Pairs of scissors

I always suggest to have 2 type of scissors. One to cut your fabric, and that will never cut something else than fabric. It is important to respect this rule if you want to keep a nice and easy cut! So don’t hesitate to hide them from everyone in the house if they are tempted to use it.

The second pair of scissors will be use to cut anything else: faux leather, zippers, patterns…

Measuring tape and a ruler

Of course you will need to measure your fabric. For that you can use a plastic or metallic ruler. I use a transparent one with measure and 4 sides. It helps me to have straight lines for example at 1cm from the borde pr (see picture).

The measuring tape will help you to measure longer fabrics but also your own body size when creating clothes.

2. For sewing machines

Good bobbins and a box to store them

Here again it is important to buy a great material that is suited for your machine. So when you buy your first sewing machine, buy also the good quality bobbins that goes with the model of your machine. The box will be super useful when you start to have a lot of different colors and you don’t want it to be super messy (the threads will start attaching one to each other..)

Sewing-Machine Needles

When you buy a new machine it usually goes with a pack of two needles for sewing machine. You can write down the references of the needles to keep that in mind to refill when they are too old (the pointy part is not pointy anymore).

You will also have to buy different types of needles in case you want to sew on different type of fabrics :

Stretch fabric needles: designed to sew elastic knits like swimsuit fabric, spandex, and even synthetic suede.
Jeans needles: they’re made to go through thicker layers of fabric (denim, jeans or thick fabrics).
Leather needles: to sew faux leather (don’t use your sewing machine to sew real leather, they are usually not made for it).
Universal needles: sew woven fabrics and thicker knits. The point of the universal needle has a slight ballpoint.

3. To use patterns

Chalky markers

Chalk is the oldest way to write on any fabric in an easy way. It is cheap and you can cut different colors to see it ion any fabric.

Disappearing Ink Pens

These pens are perfect for light fabrics. They are easier to us than chalk and are erased buy washing the clothe or just putting heat on them (ironing or even with a hairdryer).

Pattern paper

You will need to draw or copy the pattern on a very large paper. For that you can use pattern paper. It’s a roll of 10meters and you can buy one that has graphs on it.

French Curve

This tool is not mandatory and you light not need it when beginning the sewing lessons. It is use to adjust a pattern specifically when you want something in between to standard sizes. Using a French curve allows you to draw a perfectly smooth curve.

I hope my list will help you buy the material you need. Don’t under estimate the importance of having these at home, it will save you a great amount of time!

Feel free to print the checklist of everything that’s needed:

If you feel that I should add something to the list, let me know!

I hope to see you seen in one of the sewing workshops !