still working on those blankets for fire survivors

I'm still here. My plans for finishing my own projects are well and truly on hold as I use every available minute to work towards completing more blankets to be given to survivors of the recent devastating bush fires in the Blue Mountains.

Both fires are still burning but they are contained and, as far as I'm aware, there is no threat to life or property. But 200 homes were lost and 200 more were damaged, probably irreparably.  So blankets and other household items are needed.

After a suggestion was made to the president of the NSW Knitters' Guild, donations of squares have started trickling in. I have the feeling that this is just the beginning of what might be a flood! 

I was naive! I had no idea how long it takes to put 28 squares into an acceptable layout, then seam all those square together -- 1,125cm (450") of seaming per blanket, in fact! Oh, yes, and then there are ends to be sewn in...

That's assuming that the squares are all the same size to begin with! Most of what has been donated so far, while very much appreciated, is far from being a standard 25cm (10") square! And that means additional work of knitting or crocheting to increase size; or blocking for a bit of extra stretch (a waste of time since most of the donated squares so far are acrylic and will not retain their blocking!).

Beside my knitting chair, I have one blanket on the needles. It is being knitted in one piece, based on the "Moderne Baby Blanket" (found in Mason-Dixon Knitting by Kay Gardiner and Ann Shayne). I knit on this while WM and I are watching television; it has nice long rows of garter stitch which is just perfect in this situation. (I can't sew seams while watching TV).

Also beside my knitting chair (in the background of the photo) are some squares I am knitting for Knitted Patchwork II. 

It's just as well WM is very forgiving and compassionate -- the living areas of our house are slowly being overrun by knitted/crocheted squares.

This is a corner of my living room floor, where I have laid out the remaining thirty five pieces of knitting left over after I completed the "Knitted Patchwork" Blanket. I am adding more by knitting on to these pieces and joining them using the garter stitch no-sew joining method taught by Ghalena Khmeleva. 

My dining table looks like this. It contains all the squares I collected form my LYS last week plus three completed blankets all knitted by one person; hurrah for such kind knitters who donate full blankets so that my only task is to deliver to the local charity!

In the corner of the dining room, on the floor, are three bags of squares delivered to me by the Guild president yesterday. I haven't even opened them -- it will probably be weeks before I even get to them. 

Maybe it's time to hold a sewing bee. Anyone want to come and sew squares with me? Pleeeeeez?

I've been reading

Because I mostly read ebooks, I don't have photos of book covers and don't want to take them from other locations on the web without permission. I apologise for the lack of pictures but it is, after all, a post about reading! LOL

 The Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Pie Society is the one fiction book that I have read lately which stands out; not because the writing was particularly brilliant, but because it is set in post-war, previously German-occupied Guernsey -- something I've not thought about before. It's a simple story, told well enough to become compulsive but easy reading.

The book is obviously popular, over 10,000 people on LibraryThing have read The Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Pie Society. The book was written by Mary Ann Schaffer, a retired librarian in her seventies who died before the book was published. The revisions were done by her niece, Annie Barrows. Written in the format of letters, it is an unusual format but works well in this case.

While travelling to my mother’s earlier this month, I finished the first section of Mao’s Last Dancer (by Li Cunxin), the autobiography of a poor Chinese boy who became a famous classical ballet dancer. I have not seen the movie and probably never will now that I am reading the book. I am actually reading this book in print format; perhaps that's why it's taking me so long to get through it! ;-0

While sitting around the motel room in Moree after mum's surgery, I read Head Over Heels (by Sam and Jenny Bailey). It is the biography of an Australian country boy who dreamed of following in his father’s footsteps and becoming a farmer – and how he reached his goal despite becoming a quadriplegic in a dreadful car accident when he was just nineteen.

Currently I’m reading another Australian book: In Search of A Wild Brumby by Michael Keenan. Brumbies are wild horses, introduced to Australia and considered by some as pests.

I also have in my pile of non-fiction books, Life at the Edge and Beyond: Living with ADHD and Asperger Syndrome (Jan Greenman) -- this directly impacts on my family and I really need to take the time to read this carefully.

But wait .... there's more!

How can one go to the library and not borrow craft books, more specifically books related to stitching! At the moment I am being inspired by these four:

• French Girl Knits (Kristen Griffen-Grimes) -- a book of patterns, two of which I would like to knit
• Design Your Own Knits in 5 easy steps (Debbie Abrahams) -- I need more time to take this one in!
• Long and Short Stitch Embroidery (Trish Burr) -- also known as needle painting, thread painting or silk painting; I would love to learn how to do this but not right now!
• Freddy and Gwen Collaborate Again (Freddy Moran and Gwen Marston) -- a book written by two well known quilters with two very different styles; I love it and have added it and its predecessor to my wishlist!

 If you're over at LibraryThing and want to take a look at my whole book-list (I am adding to it slowly), I am, not surprisingly, ellebee57.

What are you reading?
Did anyone give you books this Christmas? 

12-12-12

Today is my uncle's 75th birthday -- a jubilee indeed and an auspicious date!

I don't believe in coincidences but I do have a little story to share:

I had an embroidery class this afternoon. I went early because we were sharing lunch -- it was our last class of the year. Being so close to Christmas and in the heart of a shopping area, it was very hard to find a parking space. I had to drive around for a while, then wait while a woman backed out of a space. Very. Slowly.

I parked my car in that space, it had a three hour limit so I glanced at the clock. You guessed it -- 12:12 on 12-12-12! I couldn't have done it if I'd planned it!