Rocket Radish Rose

I see red

2011-11-14T14:35:00.005+08:00

A couple of my favourite reds for the lead-up to the silly season.

We planted this kangaroo paw this year and it's flowering for the first time in spectacular tall stalks with furry-looking flowers on the ends. They open up one by one, and each afternoon a striped honeyeater visits, clinging on to the stalk and poking its beak down the newly opened flowers. The stalks have started to bend right over from its weight but none have broken....yet.

I can see why this was chosen as the floral emblem of Western Australia, as it looks stunning with very little effort.

And today I finished one of my red cable socks.

At this rate the pair will be done in time for winter next year.. I had a bit of a crisis after I turned the heel, because I tried it on and it felt too small. So then I put it aside and tried not to think about how I should've probably done a tension square first. Luckily I couldn't bring myself to unravel it, so I kept going and now it fits fine, and I love it!

Knitting update

2011-05-02T09:08:00.001+08:00

I had some organic cotton yarn for summer knitting tucked in my stash for about a year, and I finally found a use for it - knitted washcloths. They're small enough to finish before I get bored and they're a fun way to try out new patterns. Here's my 'ears of wheat' washcloth, with a moss stitch one underneath.

I've been making stacks of them!

Birthday Boy

2011-05-01T16:13:00.001+08:00

Craig turned 33 on Thursday, so we had a few celebrations. We went to Adriana and Juan's place last night for pictionary and nachos, followed by chocolate cake with racing car candles.

Lula in the wild

2011-04-10T17:33:00.000+08:00

This is Craig's latest creation. She is made out of corrugated iron sheeting and the plan is to stand her up in front of the fence with a light behind her. Water will run down a sheet of perspex behind her.

Custom made designs are availble to members of the family for $150 plus p & h. Please supply design blueprints upon ordering. Payment can be made by PayPal or credit card.

Pebbles, stones and sawdust

2011-03-21T16:29:00.001+08:00

Here it is Mum, not bad hey?

The bushiest creeper has since died though, after they cut the gum tree down. It was right on the other side of the fence, so this whole area was covered in sawdust afterwards.

I spent half the morning vacuuming up bits of sawdust which were wedged between the pebbles -

not much fun but it looks much better now!

Jeremy, the thirsty ant

Washington - How To Tame Lions

2011-03-02T20:31:00.000+08:00

Fraggle Rock knitting song!

2011-02-27T11:33:00.000+08:00

Fraggle Rock AND knitting! I would never have thought they went together until I saw this!

The funniest thing is at the end when one Doozer says "I'll shout if I want to, and do you know WHY?" and hthe other one says "Why?", I thought he replied "Because I AINT knitting, I want to KILL!" when actually he says "Because I HATE knitting, I want to BUILD!"

Garden spirits

2011-02-26T14:48:00.002+08:00

We went to a barbecue at Craig's supervisor's house in the Perth hills last night. They had a beautiful garden, and my eye was caught by a variety of garden spirits hidden in their little nooks. Tiny stone birds pecked crumbs on the table, little tin mice hid among the flowerpots, and a frill-necked lizard watched us from a tree branch.

My collection is only small but they add a bit of whimsy to the garden which lifts my spirits. I took some of their portraits this morning.

Eva, who greets us serenely when we get home,

Luna, who watches over us at night,

Bella beatle, climbing up to get some sun,

and last but not least, Knee the Gnome.

Peppermint stripes

2011-02-26T12:00:00.000+08:00

I found this peppermint cotton yarn in the market for 50c a ball and it inspired me to start knitting again.

I like this colour combination but I'm not sure what to make with it. Any ideas anyone?

It can't be too big a project as I only have two balls of the mint, one of cream and one of grey. And they're all different types of yarn as you can tell by the variable width of the stripes. The grey is wool, and the other two are cotton. Another knitting no-no I'm sure, but if necessary I can find some grey cotton to match instead.

So send any ideas this way!

knitted rope necklace

2010-10-18T10:08:00.001+08:00

I'd seen some of these around on etsy and knitting blogs and liked the way they drape so I thought I'd give it a try.

I made this on one big circular needle, just knitting round and round until it curled up on itself enough that you don't see the edges. The trickiest part was switching from the white cotton to the grey wool, but as I didn't want the join to be too neat (and I wouldn't have been able to make it neat anyway) I just picked up and worked with both yarns for a few stitches at each join. Then I had to cut the ends and weave them in, which is not my favourite thing, but it made a staggered effect which I'm still deciding on whether I like or not.

Sweet peas & poppies

2010-09-26T12:01:00.009+08:00

I've never tried growing sweet peas before so this year I put some in with the veges, and they've just started to bloom in the most beautiful soft colours.

I'm having trouble uploading pics on here so there's more to come on flickr.

Ranunculs

Sparaxis, poppies and anemones

Winter projects

2010-09-25T15:46:00.010+08:00

Over the winter I've made a few bits and pieces that I haven't gotten around to putting up here yet. But today is grand final day and my significant other is very much otherwise occupied, so what better time to put a few photos up?

These lacy cable socks aren't as hard as they look- there's no cabling at all, it's just an 8-row repeating lace pattern. I found it in a book called "Knitting 24/7" by Veronik Avery which has some great contemporary projects that you can knit without thinking too much.

Berni and I tried 'knitting in transit' on the train for the first time and I took these along with a photocopy of the lace diagram - I'm not quite ready to memorise lace patterns yet, but at least I didn't get train-sick.

Here's my phone pouch..

... and an ipod pod

Our first lemon harvest!

2010-06-12T19:50:00.009+08:00

These are from the smallest of the three citrus trees we planted soon after we moved in. It's the only one to bear fruit so far, and the poor little tree was so weighed down with them that I felt sorry for it and picked most of the fruit before they were completely ripe.

They've ripened up now and taste delicious in Jamie Oliver's lemon curdy pud! It's much quicker to make than lemon meringue pie, and tastes great. Even better with some cinnamon sprinkled over the top before you put it in the oven. My new favourite winter dessert.

Winter days

2010-06-12T18:26:00.008+08:00

It's getting colder and I'm getting back into knitting again.

This little beanie and booties are for my niece.

I found the pattern for the booties here, and made up the beanie pattern myself. Which explains why it looks slightly lopsided. The cables make it nice and stretchy so I'm hoping it will still fit.

The yarn is a lovely soft alpaca/wool blend, finer than I'd ever used before. I thought I would get impatient knitting with smaller needles (4mm) but because these are such small projects it didn't take long at all.

I had to re-learn crochet to do the trim around the booties, and it doesn't look quite like the picture, but I'm pretty happy with the final result, especially for a first try.

Next up: socks!

Keep on walkin'

2009-08-22T14:08:00.007+08:00

I know it's been a long long time but I thought I'd say a little hello just in case anyone still checks this blog!

Not much new to report on the vege garden, just the usual winter crop of spinach and silverbeet, and the herbs are all doing well - parsley, thyme, oregano all thriving, and little basil seedlings still poking through where we pulled out last year's plants.

Strawberries are taking over where we planted just one seedling last year, but I don't mind! Hopefully we'll get more fruit this spring.

We also put in a passionfruit vine which is happily twining up the chicken-wire, and some tomatoes of course.

Front garden is coming along too now, we've made another bed with pinks and reds, and a few roses I bought for a bargain $2.oo each! They were just twigs with roots, and half-dead I think, but this morning I saw that one has sprouted little shoots.

And I planted two Albany Woollybushes in the backyard. They're natives that I've seen around here, very pretty with soft pine-like needles, like a little fir tree.

Albert's growing up, he fills up the whole photo frame now!

A rose by any other name

2009-05-18T10:17:00.002+08:00

If only we had smell-a-vision.

I wasn't going to plant roses because they're so conventional, but one rainy day I found myself in the rose section of the nursery, and I caved.

I walked around sniffing every rose before choosing this one. It's a Hybrid Tea Bush Rose - Mr Lincoln.

It was only a bud when I bought it, but the other day it opened and I wasn't disappointed. It has the best fragrance!

It's doing really well in the sand, I can see why people fill their gardens with roses here.

Fairy surprise

2009-03-25T10:20:00.005+09:00

Look who arrived in the mail today!

Thank-you to whoever sent her, she is lovely! Here she is prettying up my new desk - just the girly touch it needs to make it mine.

And my other news is that I've got a new job, starting Monday, so it's back to full-time work again for me! Who knows, maybe I'll blog more often now that I won't have as much time to, that's the way it seems to work with me. Got to have that pressure otherwise I'll find a million other things to do with my time.

I'll be the new children's librarian, so will do storytime sessions (Albert's giving me lots of practice throwing my voice) and craft activities (Mum and K, I'm sure you have lots of ideas there), plus selecting books for kids and young adults, yay!

I'll also be the one people come running to when there's a problem with the online library system, so G I might be needing to avail myself of your technical expertise there. And Papa and Liz you can keep me up to date with all the latest internet technologies and new gadgets.

Aren't families wonderful? Thanks for all doing such diverse and useful things, they really come in handy to a bit of a bookworm like me.

2008-11-18T18:48:00.003+09:00

Unbeknownst to me Craig has been checking the papers since we got back from Brisbane, and yesterday he said to me, 'Do you want a puppy?'. And he showed me an ad for pure bred beagle puppies for sale a couple of suburbs away.

Now the subject of getting a dog had come up in conversation occasionally over the past few months, but I hadn't really thought about it too much. And although we agreed that any dog with the right kind of personality would be great, it was a beagle that we both secretly wanted. Of course we had to have a look.

So we drove down to Spearwood yesterday afternoon and asked to see the male, who happened to be the only one from a litter of six. And here he is, the newest member of the family! He's a pure bred beagle, with Dumbo ears and the saddest eyes, and we're going to call him Albert. Or Bertie the beagle for short.

2008-10-31T22:14:00.003+09:00

Happy Halloween!

I haven't seen any trick-or-treaters yet tonight but I've put these lanterns up and I have supplies of chocolate ready just in case. I know you're supposed to use pumpkins but I just love these pigs - thanks b! Pigs, pumpkins, they are both p words anyway.

I miss you all out there. Hope you're having a fun halloween, and drop by flickr sometime for some photos from the proper side of the country.

Chocolate cabled beanie

2008-09-04T10:54:00.004+08:00

I was so pleased with the green beanie that I bought some more merino/silk blend yarn and a smaller round needle and started on this one. The cables look complicated but really they are easy, you only have to do them every third row and just alternate between front cables and back ones.

So the cable pattern is just:

1st row: p2, k12, p2

2nd row: p2, k12, p2

3rd row: p2, "cable 6 front (k3 and 3)"- which means slip the next 3 stitches onto a cable needle (or safety pin or skewer or whatever is handy) and hold at front of work, k3 from the left hand needle, then knit the 3 stitches from the cable needle. Easy! Then cable 6 front (k3 and 3) again, then p2.

4th row: p2, k12, p2

5th row: p2, k12, p2

6th row: p2, k12, p2

7th row: p2, k3, "cable 6 back (k3 and 3)" - which means slip the next 3 stitches onto a cable needle and hold at back of work, k3 from left hand needle, then knit the 3 stitches from the cable needle. Then k3, p2.

8th row: p2, k12, p2.

That's it! Then you just go back to the first row and do it all again.

I did 5 sets of cables, with purled stitches in between, and decreased stitches in the purled sections to make it gradually taper in. Then I decreased each 3 stitch cable down to 2 stitches, and I think I'll knit a few more rows like this before bringing it right in at the top. Which I am not looking forward to because it's so fiddly but how hard can it be?

Green beanie

2008-08-21T10:54:00.005+08:00

I knit a beanie!

It's got cables and ribbing and decreased stitches at the crown, and I knit it ín the round as well!

It was the first time I've used round needles and I had no idea it was so easy. Plus it's much easier to avoid dropped stitches and there's no chance of you losing one needle down the crack in the couch in the middle of your project (a definite bonus). And you can stop for a break anywhere you like, instead of waiting till you get to the end of a row. I love it.

When I reached the top I had to switch to double-pointed needles and as I had none yet but was desperate to finish it I improvised with bamboo skewers from the kitchen, which I broke into smaller and smaller lengths as I got closer to the crown. It worked, but I don't think I'll be doing that again - especially when they started to splinter and split the yarn... oops.

And though craig was asleep when I finished, he managed a sleepy thank-you and slept with it on (it's still freezing here). He even let me take this photo, AND has worn it in public, so I reckon I can call it a success.

The Herd

2008-08-03T22:56:00.001+08:00

Gabby and Nidge surprised us with tickets to The Herd a couple of weeks back, and we all hit the dance floor. It must have been impressive because we got our photo taken for FasterLouder.com.au

A bit of a laugh!

Random funny

2008-07-06T20:12:00.005+08:00

Aibohphobia:
The irrational fear of palindromes (words that read the same forwards and backwards).

Dude 1: Hey, what's your name?
Dude 2: Bob.
Dude 1: AAAAAAAAAAH! *Runs and hides behind sofa*
Bob: Wow.
Dude 1: AAAAAAAAAAH! *Runs away and falls down stairs*

Found this when I googled the palindrome: A man a plan a canal - Panama!

More things like this on http://www.urbandictionary.com/

Yellow bus found

2008-07-04T11:43:00.010+08:00

Berni and Dave finally made it over to Perth last weekend, looking very happy and full of stories, so we had a big catch-up session on Saturday night and drank too much beer. It was heaps of fun, and lovely to see my bestest buddy again!

The bus has changed a bit since I last saw it, and is now very comfortably set up with bedroom, kitchen and even a library (well, a bookshelf) - all they had to do was park it across the street and that was home for the weekend! They couldn't even be persuaded to sleep inside the house, in spite of the 4 degree night and our new bathroom with four whole walls and a door (although we still don't have ceilings).

I took them around Fremantle the next day and we must have visited every single bookshop there while Dave got hungrier and hungrier for something greasy and hangover-worthy. We ended up getting sushi which didn't exactly fit the bill but was delicious anyway, especially the 'abocado' roll.

After a few more bookshops we stopped at the supermarket on the way home and Dave finally got his grease fix in a kilo of bacon. Yum. Uh-oh, there goes my reputation as a vegetarian.

The big yellow bus has headed south to Busselton for a bit but I'm looking forward to seeing it again soon. For more bus tales, check out their blog.

Lacy day scarf

2008-06-19T14:51:00.001+08:00

It's getting cold here so I've taken up knitting again, and rather than sticking to boring old garter stitch I thought I'd try lace knitting.

I found this gorgeous yarn in 'vintage hues' down at the local Kmart and bought 5 rolls; isn't it beautiful? The lace pattern would probably stand out more in solid-coloured yarn but it turned out to be a good choice because it disguises all the mistakes I made as I was learning how to slip stitches, knit two together, yarn forward and pass slipped stitch over!

Just don't look too closely at the part that's draped over my shoulder - that's where I started from, and after unravelling it three times I just forged ahead and let the mistakes add to the 'uniqueness' of the piece. I figured it out in the end, with the help of KnittingHelp.com, a very handy knitting website with free videos of every stitch you could possibly need to know.

I'm so impressed with the result I'm going to knit a lace wrap next, although it's 121 stitches wide and I started last night, so it could be next winter before I get to wear it!

New blog-a-log

2008-06-13T08:40:00.000+08:00

Hello and welcome to my new blog, where I'm hoping to post more often than my last one.

First off, here are some pics of my humble vegie patch.

I staked the peas today, they were growing along the ground and trying to climb up each other, so now they look much happier.

When we got back from Margaret River we found that some more of the fence had fallen down, and the neighbour's dog had taken the opportunity to escape through our place down to the park. So this weekend's job will be to get a new fence.
At least the tomatoes didn't mind, they just bent forward and kept growing!

The second crop of radishes is coming along too, and the pak choy is ready to eat.

The only disappointment so far is the oregano - that's it in the purple pots. The seeds germinated but haven't done much else. They seem to be stuck at a millimetre high, not growing but not dying either. Any suggestions anyone?