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Monthly Archives: April 2005
Flight
A big hello to you from the back seat of the little plane I flew in this morning:
New Plantations in the Strzelecki Ranges
The flight went well. Although it was a beautiful cloudless sky, there was a lot of smoke in the air due to various bushfires/burnoffs around the area, not least of which being the fire at Wilsons Promontory.
It was a treat to see a plan view of the Latrobe Valley with it’s power stations, coal mines and paper mill. The townships were very interesting to see too. We headed over the Strzelecki Ranges towards the coast, where we could see the new (controversial) wind farms and the coastline off in the distance.
The plane we were on was very tiny(4 seats), and very old. But I felt pretty safe the whole time. It’d be wonderful to have a licence and access to a plane so we could pop over to Tasmania whenever we felt like it. (If money were no object, of course!!). Continue reading
When Taking your Knitting to Work Really Pays off
Sorry this site was offline for a while today. There must have been a power outage which turned my computer/server off.
Now, onto the story. I took my knitting to work today as I was out in the field again and I knew I would have a 15 minutes to fill in after lunch.
So yes I did get a nice 15 minutes in. Then I continued on with the rest of my working day.
I was rushing back up the freeway trying to get back to Traralgon by 5pm so I could drop my quilts off for the show this weekend. Murphy’s Law kicked in and I got a flat tyre. After calling Roadside Assistance to come out and change the bloody thing I climbed up the batter with my knitting and happily amused myself ’til the guy turned up and whilst he was working.
I almost wished he didn’t work so quickly. It was very, very pleasant.
We’re off to a BBQ tonight. Tommorow morning we are taking a 1/2 hour joy flight, then we will be working like trojans in the garden for the rest of the weekend. We’ve hired a rotary hoe to help us make the new garden beds (the ground is very hard and dry at the moment). Continue reading
Posted in Photography
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Hanging Sleeves SUCK!
What possessed me to enter two quilts into the local show??? I’m sewing hanging sleeves every night, and it is terrible. Way more tedious than sewing the bindings on by hand…. AND I’ve lost 2 needles.
The good thing to come out of it is that I’ll now be more likely to hang one of the quilts on a wall as was intended when I made it.
Check out this photo, about 2-3 minutes into our evening walk the other day I noticed the low sun shining on this tree. Riscy ran home to get the camera, and this is the best photo out of the lot. I’d say this is a tree which existed here prior to suburbanisation.
Taken by Riscy on our evening walk
I spent my lunch hour with the spinners and hand weavers guild yesterday. They were knitting outside under a tree when I arrived, it was beautiful weather. I’m a bit jealous as they are headed off to a spin in at Leongatha today and next week I think they are going to Langwarrin. I’ll be stuck at work.
The one and only bloke in the group showed me how I could spin wool with a pencil and we discussed Navajo plying, which I’m thinking about trying with the merino I’m spinning at the moment.
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Posted in Knitting
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Lookee lookee!!!!
Before I launch into photos of the very exciting delivery I got today from TreeTops Colour I want to tell you that using my sewing machine is not as fool proof as I imagined. I taught Riscy to use the machine on the weekend and now I’m in the market for a new bobbin case. Perhaps freemotion quilting was too ambitious for his first sewing experience since grade 7. I think I can still sew ok with it, but it is damaged.
OK, without further ado, I’ll launch into photo yum yum:
250g of Merino Top in heaps of colours. I think I’ll spin this into a wild veriagated extravaganza. I don’t have a project in mind for the finished product.
ORANGE – I love orange 🙂 I’ve got 250g of this stuff. I’m thinking I’ll knit a big generous scarf and a matching hat.
Silk Silk Silk. I love this stuff, I hope it spins up as well as I think it will. I’ve got some beautiful grey merino that I might ply with it. I don’t have a project in mind, but I’m hoping to spin it very finely so maybe I can try my hand at lace.
I also got 1kg of beautiful undyed merino tops so I can dye some myself. It’s gonna sit for a while so I can spin the beautiful colours I’ve got already.
And some skeins I plied on the weekend.
The yellowy, off white is plyed with mainly green and at the end of the skein there is a veriagated red from some left overs I had laying around. I think I’ll knit this into a beanie.
A very light greeny yellow plyed with a yellowy, off white merino. I think I’ll knit this into a mobius scarf.
I also plied up a skein of the angora/alpaca verigated single with the light yellowy merino. I’ve already rolled it into a ball and I attempted to cast on about five times last night. And bloody hell I’m a bad knitter. My ambitions far outstrip my abilities. But I will persist. I want to use this yarn I’m spinning! Continue reading
Posted in Linocut
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About the Bag
Just a quick note in response to some comments about the bag I made for Sophie.
Karoda, it is not coincidence that the surface has a ‘road map’ feel. I use maps all the time in my job as a road engineer, and sometimes I wonder if I should have gone into cartography because I love maps of all kinds (I thought about becoming a surveyor for the same reason). I’ve been mulling over how I could make a piece which gives the feel of topography or the feel of a map. I like what I did with the bag and now I’m working on making a larger piece and taking it further.
Lisa asked about my technique. Its reverse applique, raw edge (so Sophie may have to give it an occasional haircut). I layered 2 fabrics together over the batting (I love Matilda’s Own). I stiched a loose grid over the fabric (including the wavy lines) Then I started to cut out the negative shapes. The tricky part for me was working out when to stop cutting. The quilting is my favourite part, I suppose it borders on embroidery and sometimes that’s how I describe it.
Construction of actual bag was time consuming. When I started making them, I had a simple way of making the bags, but now I’ve got more complex with the 3D construction. And this is from someone who vowed less than 4 months ago that I would never make a quilted bag as I HATED them. LOL! Continue reading
Sophie’s Bag
Check out this fantastic Blog: Daily Dose of Imagery. When I grow up I want to be a photographer like this guy. I’ve just got to start taking photos consistently. Riscy and I have been talking about setting up a joint photography blog, I’ll let you know when we have it set up.
Sophie’s bag is in the mail and she would like to see it on my blog before she even gets it!! 🙂
So, Sophie, I hope you like it. It is my favourite bag so far and it was hard to give away.
Tonight, I’m going to continue spinning the mohair angora fibre I started last weekend. I hope to ply it with some black alpaca fibre that Bev gave me on Tuesday. I hope there’ll be enough, otherwise I might have to beg her for some more 🙂
Sometimes I wonder about my job. Today I found myself driving at very slow speeds on the fast lane shoulder of the Princes Freeway (Gippsland). I did have a little flashing light and I was using the hazard lights, but I didn’t feel great about it. Half the time I diverged into the median, it’s been pretty dry here this month so there wasn’t too much chance of getting bogged. We got all our initial scoping work done today though, so hopefully there will only be a few quick site visits to finish off our project.
Posted in Knitting
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