FNSI

Well here are my efforts for the first FNSI of the year.  I decided to pull out the 3 balls of Bendigo Woollen Mills cotton that I ordered the other week and start learning some new and more complicated crochet stitches.  I am doing them as wash cloth or dish cloth size so that they can be useful.  Gorgeous colours to work with too.  I got orchid, daffodil and honeydew.  Making a change from black!  plus I needed another 2 balls of the wool from there for Sarah's jacket otherwise it would not have sleeves lol.

I also enjoyed some reading of a crafty nature and watched a couple of dvd's with Lance as he had the day off work too.

So I might head over to Wendy's and visit there for a while to see what everyone else has done.

Remember this.....

I loved spinning this bobbin up from the batt club I joined last year and just didn't want to ply it with its partner which was blues and greens so I dyed up some orange merino top and popped the two together.  Now I really like it lol.

Blend of mohair, bison, angora, hemp, tencel, cashmere, stainless steel, silk, camel, merino, glitz, north ronaldsay, manx loughen suri, angelina

So soft and what a blend!  Thanks Charly from Ixchel Bunny.

Now I think I might make a new goal for the new year.  Try new spinning things occasionally and count my finished skeins for a year!

Harvest time

Well from my three icky looking tomato plants I have managed to harvest 1 ten ltr bucket of tiger eye, black russian and lemon tomatoes which I am currently cooking up into a few different pasta sauces for the freezer.  The really hot sun did a bit of a number on these bushes a few months back but they still managed to grow and ripen for me.  Two of the bushes have some lovely new growth on them too.  Putting up the white bird netting has made a huge difference as chooks and birds can't harvest the vegies for me lol.

Also managed a huge bowl of blackberries but they were eaten before I could take a pic and there are some beetroot, raddish, beans and zuchini getting very close to harvest too.

Those black russians are just the thing cut thickly and popped in a buttered roll with a few basil leaves and nothing else.  The taste is unbelievable!

FNSI

Friday is the first FNSI over at Wendy's www.sugarlanequilts.blogspot.com.au
I used to join in on these all the time but haven't for months and months.  I just kept forgetting all about them so I have set it up on my phone to remind me lol.  Lance was thinking that I had gone all gadget girl on him because I had the phone out as well as the laptop and uttering a few strange sounds while trying to do it lol.

So I hope to be back on Saturday morning with the results of what I achieve.  Not sure what I will choose to work on but will make sure I remember to take some pics of it before and after lol.

http://sugarlanequilts.blogspot.com.au/

Blogging...

Monica over at Lakeview Stitching, which is on my blog list here at the side, has brought up a wonderful idea.  She is going to let the photos do the talking even though I love reading about the ins and outs of her thoughts on projects I so hope she will still blog like this occasionally.

So what has is made me think about?  Well the fact that I often feel that I do not have much to say on a particular topic or whatever comes to mind lol ie I find it hard to make things sound interesting that are the more run of the mill things I do here like the blog post which will follow this one later in the week.  Love scheduling them sometimes lol.  What can I say about gardening, harvesting and cooking crops, playing with fluff, knitting on projects which turned out to be very long term late last year lol etc, etc, etc.

How am I going to fix this?  I am going to join (pinch) Monica's idea and sometimes just drop some photos on here with very little words attached.  I am also going to make an effort to remember those stitching (crafting) nights that I used to join in on and yes actually remember to sign up and post about whatever I choose to work on.  Probably not much in the way of sewing or stitching but crochet and knitting and probably spinning will feature too lol.  No surprises there.

Now I have managed to write something lol and have no pics!  Never mind will be back with some later in the week.

Fibre test romney x merino

Wendy from Benalla sent me this little parcel of romney cross merino to try and to let her know what I think of it so I have decided to blog the whole process from start to finish with photos for her.

So here we started off with the raw product and worked my way through to the finished skein of yarn and swatch.

Now for a raw fleece this is surprisingly clean!  But I found this with Wendy's merino I got off her last year too.

Sun orchid and dusk are the colours I chose.

Here it is all fluffed up ready to go through the carder.

Two passes through the carder and I have these gorgeous balls of fluff!

All spun up and navaho plyed.  It is a soft mottled mauve in colour and washed up beautifully.

How time just seems to fly.....

over the last few weeks I have made some time to sit and spin up some singles and dyed some merino tops to pair with them.  Its been pretty hot here as well as busy as usual.  So many things to get done! and never enough time to do them in lol.

Firstly I would like to share my Christmas present.  Fibre of course and from some very rare breed sheepies.  I was also spoilt with some bubblebath and also some Lindt chocolates which are my favourites.

These will be lovely to spin up and ply with a soft alpaca/merino blend that I will dye to match.  Makes these purchased ones go so much further that way.

On the knitting front I have finally found some energy to actually knit again of an evening and am back working on the bands of Sarah's black jacket.  Just reached the halfway point with the 1x1 rib band and must say that my new needles are making it a lot easier and quicker.  Last year I bought Addi lace turbo needles in small sizes ie the ones with the gold tips and found it offered a lot less drag and were so much quicker.  The Addi ones have a fixed cable but I bought the really long ones so they will be useful for any project I might like to do.  I spied a set of large size Chaiogoo interchangables going out the door for a very special price so I grabbed them to finish off the collection.  These needles are lovely to use and just as quick but they are a little more clicky (noisy) than the gold tips of the Addi.  Never mind lol Lance will just have to turn up the tv a little when I really get flying with them.

As for actual fibre work I have been washing up nearly all those freebie fleeces I received a few months back so can get that all safely packed away in the shed.  There is now a very useful reason why we have days in the 40's!  Fluff dries in no time.  I have also pinched mum's drum carder and blended a lot of fibre on it for her pre Christmas and will now be able to start on some of that stuff I washed up!

Here's some 19micron merino that I have dyed to spin and ply with some of the club fibre I have already spun up.  So lovely, soft and smooshy.

Now here's a pic of the December club fibre and while I have enjoyed spinning it up I really don't want to ply the two together.  The batts are quite arty and really don't want to ply it with its matching braid.  If I decide to join the clubs again I might not worry about the batt one as they are very textured and it isnt really me.

Here are the November club fibres which look to be a much better match and depending on how the batt spins up I will happily put them together.  I am still wondering if the December ones were a bit of a stuff up in the bagging process but thats okay.

Smaug club is also spun up and ready to be washed and put into use.  I think I might have already shared this one but love it.  The batt was highly textured and the braid a lot smoother but both matched beautifully.  Smaug I believe is a dragon in a tv or movie series.  Don't know much about it really but hence the dark, sparkly and firey colours.

There is also another 250gm bobbin of the shropshire sock blend finished and waiting to be washed and dyed.  I have another bag of fibre to go and then I will dye it all up together and knit work socks for Lance.

This is currently on the wheel and nearly finished.  A beautiful red blend of fibres from a friend on our facebook fibre group.  Absolutely beautiful!  I'm not sure if I will choose red or black to go with it yet.

Well I think that is a big enough update for now.  Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and a happy start to a wonderful New Year!