R&R - Day 1

It has been a glorious day...

Sitting out the back over looking the garden ... Three or four different bird species simultaneously fossicking about, chortling and chattering ... Spinning luscious fibre ... My shweetie measuring, oiling, crafting away at his reloading press ... Knitting podcasts ... Tasty snacks ... Movies to watch tonight ...

It has been such a balm to have an entire day of relaxation - no appointments, errands or 'should's.

Touching Base

It is so awesome busting in through the door, finally home on R&R, dropping the bags and ferreting delightedly through the mail...

SUBSCRIPTIONS!!

We realised on the taxi ride from the airport that this time around we have been away for THREE. MONTHS. A long time to go without seeing family, close friends and fuzzy wuzzy doggalogs.

Bogged!

Our lovely block of land is near beautifully running water - so in this waterlogged time of year the low paddocks tend to get a little soggy - which we discovered while driving across one!



As you can see - we got out in the end!
We had driven across this same paddock several times already, and since the ground was so soft we decided to take a slightly different angle so as not to etch an ugly track in the one place we had been driving.

Bad move!
That innocent looking grassy patch for a sneaky veneer over incredibley soft, dark, rich and SLIPPERY mud!



Here I show how deep the ruts were that we became stuck in - right up to the axel almost!
Also - as you can see, neither of us were wearing our gumboots since we were just popping out to town, and had no expectation of becoming shin deep in mud!



The textures were so delicious - the mud was like melted rich dark chocolate and contrasted so beautifully against the textured grass.

Thank goodness for the shovel, our healthy strong bodies and my shweetie excellent skills!
Very unconventionally - we put the car in to reverse (it was already in low range) and both ran to the front to push. Since it's a diesel car it didn't stall with no one in the seat to feather the clutch and with MONSTER effort (we both had headaches afterwards from the strain) we pushed the mongrel out!

The problem had been that the mud was SO bloody slippery that even with no obstacles behind the wheels, we had dug out the mud to a nice smooth surface for the tyres to turn on, the wheels would simply spin on the spot as the tyers couldn't get any purchase!



We met another friend from all of this however, a GIANT earthworm must have been disturbed by all our efforts in the soil and was inching his way across the grass looking for a way back down. We helped him back to an earthy opening he could push in to, lest he be gobbled up by a bird.

D90 excitement!

( Isn't it odd - I apologised for the absence and then disappeared again - then it felt awkward to jump back in again so I procrastinated until I finally realised how absurd that was and here we are..!! )

While away on our last R&R - our trip back to our MAGNIFICENT block in Tassie - I picked up a liddle somethin'-somethin' that I am exceedingly excited about...



.. my very own fancy pants Digital SLR camera!! Wooooot! :D

I am miles away from knowing what on earth I'm doing with it - so thank goodness for 'auto', hey? I bought a kit lens with the D90, it's the 18mm - 105mm and I'm finding it very nice indeed. I love the idea of a very super ridiculously long lens for wildlife shooting (that way I can go "hunting" wildlife on our block too, but a different type of shooting than Sir Shweetie!) and I am desperate to get a delicious macro lens. But the reality is that the DSLR world is a fancy pants from france world with expensive accessories!

For now I'm thrilled to bits with the D90 (yet to be officially named) and I'm sure it will keep me very busy learning how all the bells and whistles work!

p.s. those woolly looking sleeves in the photo are my malabrigo Toasts! Absolutely perfect for the cool Tassie climes :)

Absence Explained

There has been flying, driving, ferrying, walking, fence fixing and all manner of wonderful things.

It has been very difficult to return to our current lifestyle - but it's necessary for the moment, so we are compensating for now with planning, researching, drafting and there's even been a little swatching!

Winkie Squares

I've spent some time lately learning how to crochet; first chains, half double crochet, and I have now learned the classic Granny Square!



When I flew back home recently, I had returned for the day to give support to my family and attend the funeral of a wonderful great aunt of mine - known as Aunty Winkie. I think I will always think of Granny Squares as Winkie Squares as she was as sunshiney, reliable, versatile and free as my first Granny Square. What a wonderful memory to embed into a fibre art :)

Turn a 180

I recently flew back home for a one day family stop over, and while I was there was able to gift the finished Lovely Warm Slightly Fuzzy beanie to my wonderful Papa. He loves it, and is currently over in the snow testing the warmth in some seriously cold climes!



When I first planned this beanie my shweetie recommended the classic fold up brim style, extolling the virtues of added warmth over the ears. So I looked through my favourites and found Jared Flood's Turn a Square and decided the pattern could be easily adapted to include a fold up brim. The yarn I used, Entwine, is a bulky weight, so I followed the 60 stitch cast on others had used for bulky weight - which worked out brilliantly!

The colours are so perfect for Dad, and the geometrical crown pattern adds a nice element of interest. Dad is a keen snowboarder (yes, I'm aware he out-cools me by a long way!) and this year he plans to learn the jump 180 degree turn (okay, by a long long way) - so I've christened this project Turn a 180, and hope it will keep Dad's bonce and ears nice and toasty, whatever awesome moves he gets up to on the slopes!

RDOs

In the knitting world we're familiar with many acronyms;
FO - Finished Object
WIP - Work in Progress
LYS - Local Yarn Shop
...and so on.

In the construction industry the two most important acronyms are;
R&R - Rest and Recuperation
RDO - Rostered Day Off

Some times an RDO isn't actually a day off, we need to come in - but on those days they ARE actually a day off, they are blissful.

This photo is from the last RDO I had off and it shows just the type of day off I love - lounging on the bed with a plethora of yarn and knitting projects around me! How delicious!

Lovely Warm Slightly Fuzzy

This last week past I have been knitting with lovely warm, slightly fuzzy yarn, on a lovely warm slightly fuzzy project for my (you guessed it) lovely warm, slightly fuzzy Papa!

He's the coolest Dad around, and each year heads over East to the snow for a snowboarding adventure. I have knit him a beanie in the past (***) but it was a little short on his forehead, and though he wears it, it is an inside beanie, not a thrashing down the white slopes, keeping Dad's ears warm from the crisp frosty air kind of beanie.

So the race has been ON to finish the beanie before Dad flies out to the snow!

I'm basing the beanie on Jared Flood's excellent Turn A Square pattern, but with a couple of changes.

These shots are from last week and the good news is.. I've finished! FO project photos to come :)

Fuzzy Ferret Feet

I was so inspired and filled with the Frenzy-of-the-Felt following my shweetie's Fuzzy Feet that I cast on almost straight away for a pair of my own!

I'm using the same brand of yarn, but in a different colourway which I'm sure will felt just as wonderfully with those great colour changes.



Unfortunately this poor knit has been way-laid on numerous occasions, and is in fact still in hibernation! First I lost a needle, so couldn't very well knit with just one. Then I did the wrong thing once I picked the knitting back up again after so long so had to rip back a few rows. And alas! It turned out I HADN'T done the wrong thing, so had to reknit it exactly as I'd undone!

But now it's ship shape and ready to go - just as soon as I finish my current deadlined gift knit!

Sorry Fuzzy Feet, but your time will come eventually!

52 in 52 : Mid Year Check In

It's high time I did a damage report - I mean status report - on how I'm trucking along with the 52 in 52.

You may remember (for those who have been taking notes for the test later) that I'm doing a 52 CRAFTS in 52 weeks, and also the 52 BOOKS in 52 weeks - as I did last year.

Well, that is, I'm trying to do them - but as you can see from my whiz-bang spreadsheets below I'm a bit behind!

I can't really explain this lack of finished objects and books - the only thing I can think of is that my work hours are longer now than on previous jobs, although we do get an extra day off each week. So who knows?!



It's so good to touch base like this though and regroup for the second half of the year. The Onslaught, it shall be. It shall be an onslaught of projects and books - fibre and wool scraps will fly across the room in the frenzy of knitting, spinning and general crafting - books will be churned through like the great thumping unstoppable water wheel I always imagined at the BeanStalk Giant's home. Yes, yes it shall be so!

Let's see if I can keep that passion and make it happen! I also notice the difference between times when I'm away on site on my own (February this year) and when Sir Shweetie and I are together - obviously I spend a lot of my free time with Sir Shweetie - and we don't tend to spend much time helping each other finish hand knits or reading aloud! Below is a shot of some of the books on my 'list', a few of which I'm already part way through. (Could that be a reason? Non-monogamous reading?)


Since my job now doesn't involved tedious hours of data entry, plus we're not actually allowed to bring mp3 players on to the construction site - audio books consumption has been lower than last year. But there's still home time, there's still the bus ride to and from work, the flights home and now there's even CROCHET! I can still make it!

Re Dipping

Another post on my newly finished super cozy and soft handspun rainbow beanie. I had lost the camera so couldn't post any shots of the beanie BEING a beanie!



So there you have it - officially a beanie that fits on my head, covers my ears and gets LOTS of laughter and comments from work colleagues when i wear it into work *grin* (This morning was quite breezey and cool so I donned the beanie!)

I may still crochet the black around the ear flaps to match the bind off at front and back - but for now it's definitely fulfilling its purpose :)

Maiden Voyage on HMAS Crochet

On R&R I finally took the plunge, opened the Happy Hooker, picked up my hook and crocheted!



I am thoroughly enjoying it so far - it's so very different from knitting, and I don't think it will steal me away from knitting (my first fibre craft love) since it a wonderful craft in its own right, but different. The structure is so fun to put together and I'm learning a few new stitches as I go.

Dip My Head in Rainbow Juice!

Finished Object! Hurrah!!


Well dip my head in rainbow juice and call me a hippy! I am thrilled with this lovely, soft, warm beanie - knit up from a combination of rainbow handspun striped with Katia black.



I simply started at the pointy red elfin knob and worked down to the necessary circumference (isn't it the easiest thing, knitting garments for yourself - you can try them on as you go!). Then I cast off over the front and back leaving live stitches for the ear flaps. The back and forth knitting on the ear flaps was a little more fiddley as I had to carry the yarn along like in fair isle work. But that makes for very snuggley warm ear flaps!



The ear flaps are finished off with some icord and then a little tassle at each tip - I'm becoming quite fond of tassles!

Unfortunately, the weather up here has turned decided warm and muggy the last few days - it seems that our quota of one cold week for winter is up! But when the cool weather returns, my rainbow juice hat and I will be ready!

What I'm Reading

I have just finished speed reading the novella cousin to the Twilight series (groan if you must, I find the books so engaging, but yes a little vomitous - but when did vomit get in the way of good clean fun?!) which has reminded me how much I really do love to read the printed word - actual hold-in-your-hands books. LUFF!

So while we were waiting at the airport to head back up north I found myself lured to the bookshop. I felt like a kid in a lolly shop! I was almost in a frenzy glancing from book to book and settled on a few but didn't want to just buy for the sake of buying. So I was very good and went to sit back down with my shweetie to wait for our boarding call. I looked up the online price of one book that had particularly taken my fancy, and with a small amount of encouragement from the Shweetie I dashed back across the lounge (dodging the hawkers) and picked up this little number right there and then (I am enjoying it immensely);



Jackie French's A Year in the Valley fills my heart and mind with thoughts of what our life will be like once we're nestled in our own wee farm house living off the land :)

Fuzzy Delicous Coat Go Yum Yum

I have a new coat!

It is absolutely my new favourite thing and I want to wear it ALL of the time.
Down at home this was an option, but now we're back up North it's really not so practical!

F I

We've had a brief interlude of R&R but now it's back to the Fly In part of our FIFO lifestyle. There's a prize at the end of the tunnel though. It's important to remember that the sacrifices now set us up for wonderful rewards in the future together :)

Lace Knitting Makes Me Feel Nice

This lace knitting does anyway :)

I think it's the combination of big, smooth, rhythmically clicking needles in my hands, the yarn so organic and real, and the pattern seems to flow through my fingers wonderfully.



I'm very much enjoying the process - chilled out and relaxed, as-I-get-to-it sort of project. Very nourishing, very forgiving and very nice.

p.s. Had some reassuring news from a lovely nurse and Dr today about a bump in my bosom that had me a little concerned yesterday - phew :) I have celebrated the relief with choc-milk :D

Thick fluffy stripes

I have been knitting up a lacey blanket (more on that later) but found I wasn't getting enough knitting love mainly as the lace was difficult to knit in the bus on the way in to work since it's completely dark here at 5am and these roads have few street lights to knit by.

Clearly a nice simple, stockinette in the round project was required...

I had brought back the black yarn from R&R to use with the rainbow handspun for the super-fun-pointy-topped-ear-flap-with-tassles-beanie, and it didn't take long to get stuck in!



I'm now up to the stage of binding off the beanie edging and knitting the ear flaps down. The yarn looks like it will make the distance and still have some left for the tassles - hurrah!! :)

These yarns are working so well together - the textured vibrant handspun and the soft fluffy ultra thick Katia yarn I picked up when we were holidaying in Canberra - don't you love knitting with souvenir yarn?!

Ten!

Very soon our little man who lives away will be coming to visit us, and he will be big bad DOUBLE DIGITS - ten!

Since he's turning ten while he's at his mum's, but will be with us shortly after, we've decided to throw him a belated birthday bash. We have never had him with us for a birthday or Christmas and decided even if it were belated, we will have a party, I say!!

Since he lives with his mum and only visits us in holidays he doesn't have any friends his own age here, but we will have all the family and extended step-family in attendance to make the day.

We're brainstorming at the moment - cakes, parks or beach, games etc... What do you remember as being awesome from your tenth birthday? Or any birthday for that matter!