Hitting the brakes.

You know that old tale about the tortoise and the hare?

Well, the last couple of days, it may have looked as though I was about ready to be fitted out with long ears and a cotton tail, but while these accoutrements are undoubtedly alluring and frightfully fashionable to the bunny brigade, as of today, I'm back in good 'ole tortoise territory.

Now that the centre part is done, I'm on to the triangles for the border and there are 80 - yes eight-oh, of these units to piece. To give you a sense of scale, the biggest triangle is 6" long and 2" wide.

Foundation piecing is excruciatingly slow not the fastest method around, but it IS extremely accurate for shapes like these long skinnies. We won't speak about the hell that is yet to come: the pulling out of all those crummy bits of paper. If there were just a few units, I would've probably chosen to go with drawing them individually onto interfacing and then I could've left it in there ... but 80 odd? No thank you.

Okay

slow and steady

slow and steady

Rosiewatch : 4 days [ maybe 6 ]

You too can have the power of BLOG

Blogs are marvelous motivational tools I've discovered. Do you find yourself putting off a particular task? Seriously thinking of cleaning the pantry rather than hitting that sewing machine?

Well folks, with the power of BLOG you can overcome this problem. Just a few minutes a day with BLOG and you can share your intentions with the world!

Promise progress, and the power of BLOG springs into action!

Well okay, maybe not but just because I had said that I would, I made myself sit at the machine after dinner last night and finished the rest of the blocks for the centre [ or center for my american friends ] of the japanese vase quilt - NOTE TO SELF - needs a proper name.

This was where I was at by bedtime:

Looks impressive until you realise that they are only 6" blocks, so what looks like most of a queen sized quilt is, in actual fact, about the size of a picnic cloth ... a small picnic cloth.

No triangles so far.
I'd forgotten to factor in that today was Purl's Princesses [ knitting group ] over at Daylesford, so no sewing until dinnertime. Had a lovely time at Purl's. Robyn and I talked goats and I think the others now know a lot more about goat husbandry than they ever wanted or needed to :]
Anyway I couldn't start on the foundation pieced triangle border after all because I'd forgotten to take my pattern to the copy shop, so I spent tonight joining yesterday's blocks together. I don't know why but this always takes longer than I think it's going to. Pre Blogdom I probably would've stopped about halfway through and picked up the knitting.
So here's the centre section all joined and pressed. There's a bit of distortion from the pins but trust me, it IS square and straight and flat. The colour is way off on my monitor. The progress shot is much closer: purply lilacs rather than pinky burgundy.
Rosie countdown - [probably] - 5 days

Progress

The Maryborough project that's been consuming my attention since February is completed and now I've finally gotten my head around the one for the Johnson Collection.

So it's all systems go...

and it really needs to be as the exhibition opens in four weeks [ and that has to include quilting time for my favourite commercial machine quilter ]

So

remember this lot ?

it now looks like this

I'll do the rest of that outer row tonight and tomorrow I'll start on the triangle border. There's a plain [ unpieced ] border to separate the greek key and the triangles and then another plain outer one after that.I'm not committing myself to the colours of the inner and outer borders yet until I see how it all looks together... but I AM leaning towards black or charcoal ... maybe.

Actual knitting content

There's been plenty of the woolly action going on around here of late but you'd be excused if you took that statement with a grain of salt. After all there's been precious little in the way of documentation.

Why I know not. The photos got taken, they just didn't make it into a post.

So here you go - proof that my yarn manipultion powers have not deserted me, and all done in the last two weeks. Oh and before anyone comments, yes I AM aware that several of these pieces haven't been sewn up yet and/or are lacking ribbon ... and your point was?

Bootee [ yeah singular ] mitten [ ditto] and bonnet in BWMs 4ply [ fingering] baby wool on 3.25mm needles.


Pattern: Patons classic 'Heather' reprinted umpty gazillion times. In this case I was using Patons Royal Babies Book no 649


I could see that I wouldn't get the second bootee out of the one ball so I made the mitten. I do have more of the yarn so I'll get back to them ... one day.


Then instead of making mates for them, I cast on for another bonnet in the same pattern. This time in S*******t [ Big Souless Craft Chain Store ] Basics 4-ply baby wool. It's labelled superfine nylon/superfine acrylic but I would've described it as microfibre. Seriously soft and gorgeous but very very prone to splitting. I added a garter stitch border instead of the 'crochet on afterwards' one called for in the pattern and I think it looks much better. Compare it to the original white one and you'll see what I mean. btw I'm thinking classic white ribbon for both these first two sets. Yes? No?


Anyway, I was on a roll with the pattern so out came the BMW baby wool, this time in flame, and I made the set again. The ribbon was a real find. it comes in both wide for the bonnet and narrow for the bootees and mittens AND it's blue slightly shot with red.


... but wait! There's more:



last night I cast on for another bonnet from the same book - except I'm making it as a beanie. I modified the pattern to make it an 8 row repeat instead of 6 - which means instead of six repeats for 36 rows, I'm using 4 repeats of 8 [32] plus two rows stocking[ette] as set up and two extra rows of ribbing. The yarn is Patons 3ply Feathersoft of unknown vintage on 3mm and 3.25mm needles.


Can you tell I'm really enjoying the fine needles and the small projects?


AND all the yarn was from the stash - the flame WAS bought this year but it was from the playroom of backroom specialness at BMW and as we all know that doesn't count. Plus it's been marinating in the cupboard for a few months now so I think it qualifies as stash reduction.


Finally, these simple little beanies were made a while ago and I just forgot to photograph them. Jeanette [ sadly Blogless ] told me last Saturday that her other knitting club had been asked to provide beanies for a bub that wasn't doing to well at the Daylesford Hospital. It's a small country one and usually the high risk deliveries get sent to Melbourne. This little one caught them unprepared and they were wrapping its wee head in torn up nappies [diapers] to keep it warm. Jeanette knew I kept a stash of hats for donation and so I dropped these two off on Monday. The lady I gave them to really threw me. After thanking me she asked what she owed me. Excuse me? Doesn't that rather defeat the purpose?

De Spring iz sprung, de grass iz riz...

Happy first day of Spring to all of you in the southern hemisphere.
Mother Nature turned on a beautiful day to celebrate too:

ETA: She obviously felt the need to remind me not to be cocky; that I live in Castlemaine, so she turned on a 1 degree overnight low... and just for the record, yesterday's low had a minus in front of it.
In other happenings, I'm :

Getting to know - my new 3G phone. No more reliable old CDMA so now I have one that takes photos and video and all that stuff that the kids have had for ages and I haven't missed. Can't say I'm exactly loving it yet.

Gardening - pulling weeds. Lot and lots of weeds.
Reading- Magic and Mystery in Tibet by Alexandra David-Neel
Knitting- more things for little people. Bootees, bonnets, beanies and mittens This post is turning out a bit picture heavy so maybe I'll save the bubby knitting for later but trust me , it's very cute.
Quilting- the Maryborough project is finally finished [ my brain is still processing - Blog soon - promise ] so I've finally made a start on the quilt for the Johnston Collection It needs to be finished this month so I'll have to get my skates on. Doesn't help that I'm not at all enthusiastic about it. maybe once I get into it.
About 60 local craftspeople have been dragooned into making non-christmassy christmas decorations which have to be inspired by articles in the collection. The fussy yellow bedroom that our quilt group has been assigned basically leaves me stone cold but there were some nice pieces in there if you ignored the overall effect. Naturally I gravitated towards this japanese vase and I'm using the triangle border and the greek key pattern under it [ which unfortunately doesn't show in this photo except as a band of green so you'll have to trust me that it's there... in black and green. ]
Anyhoo, here's the start I've made. Whoop-de-bloody-doo.

In other much more important news, the Rosie kid-watch is counting down - 8 more days to go. I'm starting to get very nervous about my ability to help deliver little things with four legs and hooves... and names... I need names... beginning with R like their mum ... so far it's Ruby if we get a doe, Rhett [ Butler. Butt-ler, geddit?] for a boy but what if it's two girls or two boys? Can't be Roberta or Robert because I've already got Robbyn ... I've already looked up the baby names lists on the net and I have to say that most of the R names either don't appeal, or they're too long, or they already belong to family members who may not want to be immortalised as a goat's moniker...Renata? Riley? Actually, I think Riley would be a GREAT name for a goat of either sex but I doubt that Stephen and Christina would see it my way. Suggestions please.

Oakley sez: No way could she get away with doing this to Sophie or Caramel. Still, I think red IS my colour... and the style IS quite fetching.

Friday Fotos

As promised, the Fryerstown Cemetery. This is the one that I was told was amongst the most haunted in Oz. If that's so they were staying out of the sun.

The temperature DID drop about ten degrees as I came through the gate [ cue eerie music ]

but that had more to do with the fact that I was passing from bright sunlight into the shade of tall gums than with the presence of anything supernatural.

It's certainly beautiful and dates from the 1850s or 60s and judging from the obviously recent interrments, is still in use.The more affluent denizens are, not surprisingly for the time, all in the Anglican section.

Many of the graves in the Methodist and Presbyterian sections are unmarked. Again, not surprising, given how many impoverished welsh and cornish miners ended their days here.

I thought this one in the anglican section was particularly sad. The family lost one son at 19 in 1902, then the mother and father passed away never knowing that their two other sons were both killed in France during the Great War... one of them only a month before the war ended. It doesn't seem fair somehow to come through all that carnage only to lose one's life when the end was in sight. Strange too, the wording of the first son's memorial : son of Henry and M. Sanger. Why didn't Maria get her full name on there? Did the stonemason run out of room or did Henry think only his name mattered?

There didn't seem to be quite as many graves of young children as I have seen at the Castlemaine Cemetery. This touching one for "our darling Roy" described him as "another little bud in heaven"

bush ramble

Most of the native flowers [ other than the ubiquitous wattle ] on my bush block are tiny and easy to miss, but worth the effort taken to seek them out.

Sun Orchid [ about 3/4" across ] has no leaves .
Scented Sundew. I showed this carniverous plant a couple of weeks ago before it flowered. now there are hundreds thousands of them.
Early Nancy [ about 1/4" across ] This one is REALLY hard to find as there are only a few of them spread over the 10 acres and they bloom for about 2 weeks of the year. Last year I missed them completely. This one is a male flower and the female is similar with a slightly different centre and often only a single bloom. Apparently they occasionally throw up a hermaphroditic form as well. Who knew? Kinky floral sex in Central Vic!

[ now if I'd made that the title of this post, can you imagine the searches that would have thrown up?]

Hey lookit what I found!

It seems there is a growing trend of which I was until this past week or so completely unaware and I'm not quite so how the genesis of such a truly important trend managed to pass me by, seeing as the wilds of Central Victoria is usually such a hotbed of all that is 'new' and 'up-to-the-minute'[ that was sarcasm in case you missed it ]
Yes I'm talking about the cat yoga again.
You may remember that Suki is the one responsible for introducing Sophie to this esoteric eastern art
so I was rather happy when in a nice piece of serendipity, I found THIS waiting for me at my favourite second hand book store [ and before you ask, Val, not the one at Campbell's Creek ... Soldier and Scholar, the smaller one in Barker Street opposite the Library ]


Ms Caramel was seen practising what looked very like the cobra pose yesterday so obviously it's catching on. Currently Oakley is the only holdout Chez Catsmum.



HE says it's because yoga poses are not conducive to the gravitas required of the more 'mature' purrson.



Sophie and Caramel just think it's because he's too fat.

ETA:

Sophie has pointed out that I am in error. She has been doing yoga for years and was originally taught by Swami Smokey [ sadly no longer with us ]

Hey Baby

Nadie and The Boy looked after Riley on Friday night and she was under orders to make sure that there was plenty of photographic proof [ as I haven't seen him since April, which is a whole other story ]
Being a thoughtful and dutiful daughter, and needing no encouragement whatsoever for the wielding of the camera, she duly obliged:
My grandson is now blonde apparently and no curls. Completely takes after his mum, that one.
In a showing of great restraint, I've just pinched this one photo from his besotted aunt so if you absolutely need to see more baby photos, you can follow over there.

Mummy's little helpers

I think David got tired of seeing the same measily few feet of handspun sitting on the Ashford for the last six months few days. Being the subtle creature that he is, he appears to have hit upon the ideal way to draw my attention to the apparent lack of progress in the spinning department - he ever so carefully unwound the thread and rewound it like so:

Not to be outdone in the helping department, Sophie decided that the other yarn parked on the Ashford would look better worn as a head adornment. Very fetching.

and the end result?

Sophie's five minutes of Fame

My friend 'Jane' and I have long known that Ms Moggie and Sophie are identical twins separated at birth - except for them being different ages - and back in May I left a comment or two on her Blog. Today, she decided to update that post by adding a photo of Soph. So now you can all judge the similarity for yourselves. That's Sophie at the bottom.
Meanwhile Caramel would like to introduce you to the new love of her life: BBB [ big brown bear ] She's currently spending hours a day giving him back massages. How do you feel about interspecies relationships? Do you think they have a future together ?

Are these ME or what?

Gee, I don't know ...

beautiful ceramic buttons ?
blue and white ?
japanese motif ?
locally made ?
reasonable price ?
yeah I thought so too :]

Found these buttons at the Central Goldfields Gallery, Maryborough for $3 a card of two. The maker is Jean Taylor from Bendigo. No email or website details but there's a phone number.
I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to do with them but I don't really think that's relevant. They are beautiful objects in their own right. For the time being I'll probably just add them to my bowl of japanese blue and white beads and balls.
ETA [again] well there weren't any more at the Gallery on Wednesday this week but I've just come back from an event there tonight where I met the button lady herself. I've ordered another two cards and she's also okayed putting the phone # here for any of you aussies that might be interested. So : [03] 54418070

monday musings

Spring is waiting in the wings but Old Man Winter hasn't quite given in yet. He's a stubborn old beggar, quite capable of giving us freezing temps into October.

This morning's minimum temp was minus 1.9 C for the second day and it was a bracing .1 [ yup point one ] when I went out to chop firewood before breakfast in an attempt to resuscitate the fire which had almost, but not quite, expired during the night.

Once the sun came out it turned into the perfect [almost] Spring day, so after dance class this morning and a timely migraine tablet, I spent the afternoon milking Rosie, pulling umpty-gazillion weeds and admiring the new colours in the garden.

The irises are just days away from opening, the jonquils are out, and today I found the first of the daffs.

I may have put Sophie's nose a wee bit out of joint the other day when I enthused to her about how limber her 'niece' Suki is. I caught her surreptitiously practising her own version of feline yoga this morning. Not too bad for a middle aged moggy... and stretch that paw ... arch that spine ... and hold ... and

... relax.
and this is what I knitted over the weekend when I should've been doing other quilty related stuff.
Specs:
Hand dyed 4 ply [ fingering ] machine washable baby wool from Bendy.
3.25mm needles
started off with a vintage Patons pattern and then sort of went my own way - mainly because I wasn't paying attention - and repeated the lace pattern row an extra time and then decided 'what the hell' and just made the rest up as I went along.

Fryerstown Friday Fotos

Fryerstown is a very small hamlet about 15 minutes drive from here. It's one of those faded little places that time and fortune have pretty much passed by, a relic of the glory days of the Victorian goldrush left to languish after the gold ran out and the miners moved on - which is probably why so many of the mining era remnants remain. Surrounded on all sides by State Forest,and with more sheep than people, it's too small to even boast a general store any more, and in fact about the only thing that keeps Fryerstown on the map is the Antiques and Collectables Fair held there on the weekend closest to Australia Day. Chris and Maz have a permanent 'booking' at my place for that week each year.

I trot out to Fryerstown a couple of times a week for dance classes and the drive is a pretty one, so I thought that today I'd take you with me. Not to class per se. I may be a dag but I don't really have to provide you with visual proof ... but just a wee taste of the surroundings.

The deep gullies caused by mining :

the Duke of Cornwall Engine House

interesting old stone walls.

Some years ago I was told, apparently in all seriousness, that the Fryerstown Cemetery is the 'most haunted' in Australia and that the temperature drops by ten degrees as you enter the cemetery gate... I haven't as yet had reason to check that out for myself. Colour me somewhat sceptical!