blocking is not for the faint hearted

Imagine a rectangle 102cm x 96cm.

Now think about 126 round-headed pins. Yes, that's right, one-hundred-and-twenty-six!

That’s how many pins I used to block my Blanket for Emily.

It’s knitted in 10ply (Aran-weight) Fiddle-De-Dee by Cleckheaton; a sadly-discontinued line of 100%cotton which is both machine-washable and machine dryable.

Because the blanket was knitted in cotton, I needed less pins than if it had been knitted in wool.

I could get away with one pin in each of those scallops because cotton doesn't have “memory” like wool does. Once stretched, it’s stretched. Wool bounces back to it’s original shape (if not stretched too far). Items knitted of wool may need blocking again after a few washes if they were not severely blocked the first time. Cotton, on the other hand, stays stretched.

As I was saying, this is a good thing.

Good because I needed less pins to block it and was therefore on my hands and knees for a lot less time than I might have been!

Good because my niece can wash and dry this many times and it should retain its shape (unless she stretches it more (by hanging by clothes pegs or some such)!

Good because this particular cotton can be dried in the machine which, in the weather we’ve been having, is almost the only way to get the washing dry!

I love the way that blocking evens out the puckering that occurs while doing entrelac in stocking stitch.

So, may I present another finish for June? A blanket for Emily (details on Ravelry). The photo was taken while the blanket was still blocking (and before the ends were sewn in) inside on a very wet winter’s day without flash because that washed-out the colour. The lights were on which, of course, gives a yellow cast to the photo. The yellow is more lemon than the photo shows but I couldn’t get the right tones by editing.

The ends have been sewn in now but you don’t need another photo, do you?

Five finishes this month! I hope I can keep this up for the rest of the year next month’s 2013: Year of the Finished Object challenge.

life doesn’t always go according to plan

Here we are, twelve days into January and things have not exactly been going to plan.

I decided to run my Linky party on the first Thursday of the month which was 3 January. I thought I'd have plenty of time to organise it because mum, who arrived on 27 December, was going home on 2 January, and my sister and nephew weren't arriving until 4 January. That gave me all day on 3 January to write the post and set up the Linky!

But....

Older Grandson wouldn't milk the cow but was happy to brush her

We visited Calmsley Hill City Farm on Sunday 30 December. Mum was helping WM carry the picnic lunch up from the car and therefore had her arms full and couldn’t see the ground immediately beneath her feet. She fell heavily on some uneven paving and twisted her ankle. We spent most of the afternoon in the emergency room after an ambulance took her from the farm.

Mum's okay now but she ended up staying here until 5 January when the doctor said she would be fit to travel. As you know, I managed to get my post written so everything worked out okay.

Then ....

While my guests were here, I decided it was time to finish the Sideways Striped Baby Jumper that I had started in November 2011. All it needed was a collar knitted on and the seams sewn up -- one evening's work (or so I thought)!

But ...

Knitting the collar wasn't as easy as I thought and after four attempts over two days to get the collar right, I gave up! In the end I frogged it because the head hole seemed too small to go over a baby's head easily. No worries, frogging is a "finish" for that project and the yarn will some day become a cardigan knitted sideways to retain that vertical striping that attracted me to the pattern in the first place.

this used to be a baby sweater

And then...

One of my top priorities for this month was to finish the Hearts and Squares quilt. I had finished all the blocks and just needed to trim the 6.5" four-patch blocks down to the same size as the 6" heart blocks. I hadn't been in my sewing room since well before Christmas but in my head the quilt top looked great!

It took a long time to settle on a layout for the four-patch blocks. I knew the finished layout had to be 9x7, because there is a particular size I have to make for our community quilting group (roughly 56" x 64"). I had a large number of blue blocks, and almost the same number of brown blocks, and a few others in green, red, pink and yellow. I finally came up with a layout that I was happy with and started to add the heart blocks.

But....

The layout was okay but the squares seemed too “hard” for the hearts which cry out for a “softer setting”. It occurred to me that the squares made an attractive layout for a "man quilt" (we have to work harder to make those because of all the floral scraps we are given). But that's okay, I have plenty of fabric (that belongs to Caring Hearts Community Quilters) and I'm not adverse to making two quilts.

The question was which quilt to make first because it's unlikely I'll get two finished this month (given the goals I've set for myself and the time remaining). I settled on the four-patch blocks; after all, the layout is already on my design wall.

Then the question became: what blocks to make to enhance the four patch blocks? I don't have enough of any one fabric to use plain 6.5" squares nor do I have the quilting skills to make a 6" block look interesting!

I settled on square on square blocks, the central square being the same size as one quarter of the four patch (that is three inches finished) with a light neutral border around it to make it up to the correct size.You might not have noticed, but I've made further changes to the layout of the four patch blocks.

I must make up my mind which way those four patch go!

So despite the fact that yesterday was forecast to be 41°C (106°F), I took myself to the garage to find some suitable fabric and then to my sewing room to re-introduce myself to my rotary cutter and sewing machine! I think it actually got to 37°C (98.6°F) but the air-conditioned kept things at a comfortable 24°C (75°F). I got slightly more than half the blocks made, pressed and trimmed.

I think it’s shaping up to be a good unisex quilt, don't you?

How are your plans for January shaping up?

it's great to be back home

"Gee but it's great to be back home
Home is where I want to be.
I've been on the road so long my friend,
And if you came along
I know you couldn't disagree."

from  Keep the Customer Satisfied by Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel

I may have been away for only six days but I feel like I've been on the road so long!

It's grey and cloudy outside, it's a very cool 18*C (63*F) after a week over 30*C (86*F) but I don't care! I'm home! Hurrah!

And the fact that I have an appointment today for a full body massage after six days of sitting doesn't hurt either!

more finishes

I have not been so productive over the last couple of weeks – life gets in the way of crafting sometimes! And then there are times where I just don’t feel like sewing. I usually knit because I can do that with my eyes closed and find it very relaxing.

Anyway, I have finished two things – one sewing, one knitting.

The first is the angel I made from a pattern and fabric given to me at our quilting group. I mistakenly thought they were for a secret Santa project but they are actually to sell when we have our Airing of the Quilts in April (our annual fund-raiser).

The angel was made on the machine but joined together by hand. 

There is running stitch around the sleeves, wings and dress as well as the banner.

The face is drawn on using a Sharpie with a fine point.

The rosy cheeks are coloured pencil.

The hair is some dark brown 5ply (sport) yarn that I had in my “scraps”.

I didn’t have any gold thread for a hanger so I crocheted a chain using 6 strands of embroidery cotton and a 2mm hook!















 My knitting finish is a baby blanket for our latest great-nephew (we have eleven great nieces and nephews; MIL has seventeen grandchildren and thirteen great-grandchildren).


The pattern is Bernat Baby Blanket; it is knitted in Belle Baby “Buttercup” (4ply/fingering, 75% bamboo, 25%  acrylic) on 4.00mm (US 6) needles. I used 6.66 x 50g balls to make a blanket that is 106cm x 112cm (41.5”x44”). The yarn is machine washable and can be line-dried, something young mothers seem to prefer to hand-washing and drying flat; I wonder why? LOL

My November to-do list looks like this:

1. Christmas Angel – finished
2. Cloth book – finished
3. Christmas Tree embroidery – to be worked on today
4. Baby  Blanket – finished
5. Very Hungry Caterpillar Quilt – more work on the quilting will be done today; this project will definitely not be finished this month!
6. Intarsia Blanket – finished
7. scrappy blocks – 16 blocks made; hopefully there will be more done today

Not bad after all!

The weather is going to test my motto (“never too hot to stitch”) today – it is the last day of spring and the forecast maximum is 40°C (104°F)!

not what you expect in spring

For those who don't know Australia, let me explain: I live in Sydney, the largest city in Australia. It is situated in a temperate climate zone. The metropolitan area of Sydney is large - it is about 60km (37.5 miles) from the outer edge of the western suburbs to the city. The entire metropolitan area is on the coastal plain and affected to a greater or lesser extent by the coastal weather patterns.

It's mid-spring in this part of the world. Last Friday the temperature in some of the western suburbs was a very warm 35*C (95*F).

West of Sydney are the Blue Mountains, which are part of a range of mountains that run down the east coast of mainland Australia. Just 56km west of the edge of metropolitan Sydney, lies the mountain village of Blackheath, elevation 1065 metres (3494 feet).

Here's what the railway station looked like yesterday (thanks to Kelvin at Blackheath for his permission to use these photos).




Surprised? So were all the people who went to bed in springtime and woke up in mid-winter!

good news and a warning!

WM and I arrived home around 6pm on Monday – I can’t believe it’s Thursday already. Where did this week go? Oh yes, washing (laundry for my American friends), a full-body massage (on Tuesday), knitting, reading blog posts and making art!

The good news, great news in fact, is that we now have our internet connected to another provider and it is fast enough for me to download your blog posts, even if they are photo-heavy! Even better news for me is that I can now watch the videos from my art course: which, of course, has inspired me to do some art work of my own! Nothing I want to share yet (sorry) but fun none-the-less.

The days have been warm and sunny so I have taken to spending a couple of hours in front of the computer catching up with blogs while the sun shines into my sewing room. Then I take my pencils and art journal outside; I have my lunch out there too.

When the shadows start taking over the backyard I move inside again, this time into the lounge (living) room on the western side of the house where I sit with my Kindle and read for a while before I turn on the television and knit. Ah, retired life: there’s nothing like it!

And now for the warning. I have checked this and this is not a hoax. It is so serious that the Australian government has actually set up a site which will check people’s computers as they log on! To keep it brief, cybercriminals have hacked into millions of computers around the world and infected them so that as of 9 July 2012 they will no longer be able to connect to the internet. These criminals have been found and arrested but there are millions of computer users at risk. You can read more about it at Hoax Slayer (the site I use when I want to check if something is a hoax or not).

Now, I’m sure you’ll want to check if your computer is affected (or infected). Go to this page and it will give you the site for your area; for my fellow Aussies the site is http://dns-ok.gov.au/. It took me less than five seconds to find out my computer doesn’t seem to have been affected.

Please, friends, I don’t do chain emails and I don’t pass on hoax emails. This one is genuine -- check your computer before it’s too late.

the first of winter

In Australia, the first day of a season is the first day of the month in which the equinox or solstice occurs, hence today is the first day of winter.

It has been unseasonably cold here; in fact, we had the coldest May on record. The last three days seem to have been non-stop rain, at times exceedingly heavy - the kind when one must turn up the volume of the television or iPod.

As I look out the window, at the small patch of sky I can see (thanks to our neighbours garage just over a metre from my window - uphill from us) all I can see is grey, grey, grey.

To relieve the greyness, here is a photo of a banksia flower trimmed off the neighbours' shrub (hanging over our fence) when WM was tidying the garden last week. The flower is about 25cm (10 inches tall). The banksia is a species of shrub named after Sir Joseph Banks, a botanist who accompanied Lieutenant James Cook on the voyage during which he 'discovered' the east coast of Australia and claimed it for England (1770).

sunshine in Patonga

We had one day in eight that was sunny from beginning to end. Fortunately, it was the day that DD, SIL and GS#1 visited us.

At low tide, we had fun on the beach.

There was no bath in the house so Grandad washed GS#1 in a plastic tub. After his initial refusal to cooperate, he enjoyed his "bath" (especially after the camera appeared)!

Knitting weather

This morning, I was sitting outside in the warm sunshine under a clear blue sky. At noon the clouds started to build up and increased rapidly; the wind also increased. In half an hour it had cooled so much that I had to go back inside and put on a jumper/sweater ('cos that's what they're for! thanks Brenda)

Unfortunately, inside is where the computer is - and I haven't knitted a stitch since I came in three hours ago!

This morning I completed the first of my third pair of socks in four days - what was that about addiction? LOL They have all been knitted in 8ply (DK) acrylic and are destined to go to the Salvation Army to be given to the homeless. Acrylic will hopefully be more hard wearing than wool though probably not as warm. I think I'll use the leftovers from the skeins to knit hats/beanies - I'll knit the ribbing in the patterned yarn until it runs out then use plain yarn to finish the hat. I'll knit those on dpns too - I don't like seaming (although grafting/Kitchener stitch isn't so bad, now that I've got the hang of it!)

On the social front, I had the pleasure of meeting Donna and Em on Friday morning - we met for coffee during a break in Em's eisteddfod schedule. Donna had her Shetland shawl with her - it's just a beautiful in real life as it is on her blog though the Shetland yarn is not as soft as it looks! Em is a polite, well-mannered girl, a credit to her parents. Donna is friendly and outgoing; she is the founder of the Australian and NZ knitters' blog-ring and shared some stories about her blogging history that were very interesting. She seems to know everybody on the ring! LOL
Thanks, Donna, for inviting me to meet with you.