Are your relatives your ken or kin? Is a key or a cay a small metal instrument specially cut to fit into a lock and move its bolt? Would you bake pottery in a kill or a kiln? Do you knead bread dough or do you kneed it? Is a wildebeest a gnu or a knew?
3,000-carat topaz by quinet, flickr
karat, carat
A karat is a term used to indicate gold purity.
Her face lit up when she opened the box with her gift of a 24-karat gold chain.
A carat is a unit of weight used to measure diamonds and precious gemstones.
The 1-carat diamond engagement ring made her fingers look tiny.
family portrait on a postcard, flickr
ken, kin
Ken is knowledge, understanding, or cognizance; mental perception
The detective’s ken of the murdered man’s family helped him to solve the case.
A person’s kin is their relatives.
Because of the horrible crimes she had committed, all of her kin deserted her.
kernels of corn by sonicboom, flickr
kernel, colonel
A kernel is the softer, usually edible part contained in the shell of a nut or the stone of a fruit. It is also the central or most important part of anything.
The one kernel of truth led to the mystery’s solution.
A colonel is an officer in the U.S. Army, Air Force, or Marine Corps ranking between lieutenant colonel and brigadier general. It corresponds to a captain in the U.S. Navy. Colonel is also an honorary title bestowed by some Southern states to those who have brought honor to the state, prominent businesspersons, visiting celebrities, or the like.
Johnny Cay, wikimedia commons
key, cay
A key is a small metal instrument specially cut to fit into a lock and move its bolt. A key is also a reef or small island.
If she forgot to hang her key on the special hook she had put up for it, it was sure to be lost.
A cay is a small low island.
Those couple on board the yacht stared at the cay in the distance.
kill, kiln
Kill means to deprive of life in any manner, to do away with or extinguish.
Someone needs to find the source of that horrific odor and kill it before our guests arrive.
A kiln is a furnace or oven for burning, baking, or drying something, especially one for firing pottery, calcining limestone, or baking bricks.
There are five things you can do to keep your pottery from exploding in a kiln: air dry your pieces as long as possible, create a hole for steam to escape in hollow forms, don’t build thicker than one inch, fire using a long preheat, and fire slow.
https://www.claygeek.com/ceramics-101/5-ways-to-prevent-explosions-in-your-kiln/
St. Paul’s Cathedral Nave, London, UK, wikipedia
knave, naive, nave
A knave is an unprincipled, untrustworthy, or dishonest person.
A knave used to be a boy or servant, but now it is used to indicate a rascal or a rogue.
If one is naïve, one has or shows a lack of experience, judgment, or information; one is credulous.
She is so naïve that she believes what the deceptive salesman is telling her.
A nave is the central space in a church.
The congregation took their time gathering in the nave.
kneading bread dough, pixabay
knead, kneed, need
To knead is to work dough, clay, etc. into a uniform mixture by pressing, folding, and stretching.
Her young children loved to watch her work when it was time to knead the biscuit dough.
If you have been kneed, then you have been struck, at times forcefully, with the knee.
Aiming for the sky, she kneed her attacker in the groin; he immediately fell to the ground.
A need is a lack of something wanted or deemed necessary.
The family’s need of firewood to last the winter was soon fulfilled by a kind neighbor.
knew, gnu
Knew is the simple past tense of know, which means to perceive or understand.
She knew that her upcoming calculus test would challenge her.
A gnu is either of two stocky, oxlike antelopes of the genus Connochaetes, the silver-gray, white-bearded C. taurinus of the eastern African plain and the black, white-tailed C. gnu of central South Africa: recently near extinction, the South African gnu is now protected.
The gnu is also called the wildebeest.
starry night by by K Λ X I I I, flickr
knight, night
A knight is a man upon whom nonhereditary dignity of knighthood is conferred by a sovereign because of personal merit or for services rendered to the country.On April 24, 1953, Winston Churchill was made a knight by Queen Elizabeth II.
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/churchill-knighted
In chess, a knight is the piece shaped like a horse’s head.
Night is the period of darkness between sunset and sunrise.
The escaped convict traveled only during the dark of night.
reading, the-bookworm.net
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