Crochet Fragments

I was having another play with fd's flickr toys and came up with this image. I liked it so much I thought it would make a good title for this post. Fragments of crochet - bits and pieces, some finished, most not, lying around in odd locations to be stumbled upon when you least expect it. "Oh - there are those flowers I was making - better finish those!"

Bits and pieces from crochet, jewellery making etc.

Here's something I did finish - the Boy Beanie from Stitch N Bitch: The Happy Hooker. It took several attempts to get it to fit Jon's head though - much more time than you would think a simple beanie would take!

Here are the Skeleton Bride and Groom! They are an amalgamation of a couple of the patterns from Creepy Cute Crochet. The bride is the Skeleton Bride and the groom is the Day of the Dead Fellow - although mine looks more like a pimp! Perhaps it's the hat - it was meant to be a top hat, but came out rather gangsta-ish...! Perhaps I should just put some gold chains on him and finish it off.


And this skullie is a pattern from Flickr member Towe My. I want to make another and put rhinestone eyes on it!

I'm also working on another she loves painting. It's slow going this time. But maybe I'll have it finished for the next post... fingers crossed!

Back online and back on track

I have had a bit of an unplanned break from my blog, as our dial up internet connection began to rapidly deteriorate and I could barely have two windows open without it crashing. Needless to say uploading photos was out of the question! A couple of weeks ago I got a broadband connection set up and eagerly sat down at the computer to connect. Everything went well until it came time to actually connect to the internet and then we hit problems... no matter how many times we tried, it failed to connect. We rang tech support and were talked through numerous network and connection screens... we entered numbers, passwords and encapsulations... still no luck. The tech support man decided it must be the phone line. He announced he would send a technician out, and we never heard anything further.

I asked for opinions from computer-savvy friends and family members, who were all as puzzled as I was. "Are you sure the user name and password are right?" asked my dad. "Yes I'm sure!" I replied. Half an hour after that conversation it hit me... even though I had slowly and clearly spelled out our username "ruthandjon", what do you want to bet that the person on the other end put in "ruthandjohn". And that's what had happened.

Anyway, we got there in the end. And I have plenty of photos to show from the past month or so! In my last post I was moaning because it had been raining every weekend. Guess what, it still is. This winter has been the wettest and most stormy that I can remember. I had a week off work at the end of July and it rained every single day! We were supposed to go away for a few days but were thwarted by flooding.


But as you can see, in between the showers there were opportunities. The garden flowers put on their finery as they waited for the kiss of sunshine.

Even the broccoli was not to be outdone!

This was a project I started on my week off, and had to finish in a bit of a hurry after I left my all-time favourite (actually one and only) pair of fingerless gloves on the bus. This pattern is from Stitch N Bitch Crochet: The Happy Hooker. It was quite fun to do: moderately difficult, but not super complicated. If only I could find super-fine fingering weight merino in other colours (except white and pastel baby colours), I'd make more!

I had a massive update of my flickr page yesterday and as you can see I played with fd's flickr toys as well. I have more photos to share here, but we are off to do the grocery shopping now. If you can't wait, hop over here and have a look...

In which Lui and I potter around the garden

Well, here she is. My new miniature peach tree, Miss Rose Chiffon. She is covered with the tiny beginnings of buds which will burst forth in early spring, and the fruit itself will be white-fleshed and red-tinged. I am already dreaming of jams, pies and crumbles. Hopefully mixed with apples from the two ballerinas...

Here is an interesting article if you are contemplating getting miniature fruit trees. I don't really have room for more, but in the future I want to get a cherry tree and an almond tree!

This afternoon Lui and I spent a bit of time in the garden. It was a warm afternoon, and dry! so we made the most of it. Checking on the bulbs, pulling some weeds, sweeping up.

We were happily surprised by this sweet little clump of irises! I thought it was great last year when they bloomed in August, so finding them in July is a treat.

And, now that my package has been received, I can show you what I made for the Little Critter Swap. Birdies! They spent a bit of quality time together before being cruelly separated. Purple Birdie flew off to a new home in the USA, with a melting bar of chocolate to keep her company. And Brown Birdie, well I kept him. What can I say? Look at his little feet:

she loves to fall

she loves to fall

Mixed media. 190 mm x 113 mm.

Little Critter Swap goodies

My Little Critter swap package arrived! Inside were these three cute owlies - mama, daddy and baby! Or perhaps three sisters? Or neighbours who share the same tree? What do you think? They are sharing a shelf in my studio space, and seem to get along very well. (Perhaps that means they are not related...)

This wonderful package is from Emily. She also included these wonderful goodies and treats.

I love the rosette on this tea towel.

Here's my little critter, wrapped and tied with a bow. I'll show you more when it's been received!

Crochet, and op shop embroidery

Last weekend was the third wet one in a row, and came complete with rain, sleet and then snow. There was only one thing to do - curl up on the couch with a blankie, a pile of new books and some crochet.

Eat, sleep, work, brains! This is Corporate Zombie from Creepy Cute Crochet by Christen Haden.

The snow was gone by Sunday and we could leave the house, so we went for a trip to the garden centre. I ogled some dwarf peach trees and wondered if I could find room to squeeze them in somewhere. Conclusion: I probably can, so I might pop out again next weekend, weather permitting of course!

These are some embroideries I found at the Salvation Army shop. I wish I had time to make lots of pretties like this. One of my other new books is Doodle Stitching by Aimee Ray, so I'm hoping to get back into that soon! Regarding the tiny dolls house firescreen: I realised quite quickly that I would actually go blind if I kept on at that, so I've ordered a magnifying lens. Naturally it's on back order, so I've no idea when it will arrive.

Well, that's about it. As I've said before, wet weekends feel interminable but suddenly they're gone and you've got nothing done. There's something motivating about sunshine. Cross your fingers for next weekend!

she loves Frankenstein

I am doing a series of paintings called she loves...
This is she loves Frankenstein.

Little bits and pieces

I finished the tinyland afghan! Well, I think it's finished. I was debating putting a contrasting border around the edge, maybe in blue. I still might do it but for now, finished!

Actually I finished it several weeks ago and have tried to blog it several times. But alas, the dial-up internet connection has been steadily getting worse and worse, and I've barely been able to get online, let alone get my blog to load. So it might be time to move with the times and look at a broadband connection.

As promised in the last post, I did go out and take some piccies in the garden. Unfortunately I'm out of practice, and most of them were out of focus, badly composed or both. And, since it's done nothing but rain for the entirety of the past two weekends, I haven't had a chance to retake them. I now understand the phrase "to have a face as long as a wet weekend". This weekend was interminable...

One or two photos came out, so here are my blueberries! Still fresh and delicious in the middle of winter. That's something to be cheerful about, like the blueberry pancakes I had for breakfast yesterday. Yum!

I love the way the pea shoots tangle together. They are still going strong, despite the cold. I also have silver beet, broccoli and lemons. So it's far from being dead out there.


Cold winter nights mean snuggling up on the couch with a blanket and a Bollywood DVD. It's always good to have something to do with my hands too, so this is my next needlework project. It's pretty tiny so hopefully my eyes won't fall out while I do it. I'll keep you posted!

The hothouse in winter

The weather outside may be frightful, but inside the hothouse at the Christchurch Botanic Gardens it's still hot and steamy! And there are still some colourful and fascinating plants putting on a display. We went for a walk on a balmy Monday afternoon which felt like midsummer, although just two days before there had been snow falling to sea level.

I'm hearing stories of snow being forecast for next week. We had a -4 degree frost this morning so I'd almost believe it.

Which is why these colourful, tropical photos are so wonderful to look at right now! They remind me of summer and being warm.

This is my favourite, with its crazy curling stamen and paint-speckled petals.

This weekend I'll try to take some photos in my own garden, which is looking quite pretty and colourful for midwinter! The only problem is with days being so short, good light for photos is in short supply.

But it was just right for this photo, which was taken by my mum last weekend as we had lunch by the estuary. It was about 1 pm and everything was blue and gold and pearly. Imagine having this view on your doorstep... I'd never get any work done, but oh how lovely it would be!

Pincushions

These are some pincushions I made last weekend. I had a lovely photo I took of them all laid out in a rainbow, before I stuffed them, but I can't find it anywhere... I must have deleted it off the camera without transferring it. So, this one will have to do. Seven little pincushions, all in a... circle?

I love the vintage-look print on this fabric. I had to take these photos at night and then colour-correct them in Photoshop, which is why there's such a discrepancy in the colour of the background! The first photo is the closest. Oh, and there are more pics at my Flickr page.

I've been reading about this Orphaned Artworks thing and it's got me a little freaked out. Even though it's a US government bill, it's obviously going to affect artists worldwide. So I've decided to start watermarking my photos. It feels a bit strange to do it... like I am being arrogant to even assume that someone might want to thieve my lowly little photograph! But, I'd feel really sick to discover my photos being used somewhere without my permission, so this is hopefully a small step to preventing that. What do you think? Do you watermark your photos too?

On a lighter note, here's a lil' stuffed panda I made this week. He's off to a very special destination but I can't say more in case someone is reading this...

It's a gloomy, grey, soup-and-toast kind of day here today. Luckily I have a loaf of bread cooling in the kitchen as we speak. Time for lunch :)