Surfacing

I'm posting this very quickly before plunging back into paperwork and packing. There's only two weeks to go before I'm on six months long service leave (hurrah!) and, as we're only half way through the academic year here in the Land of Oz, I'm preparing a handover for my replacement
so I am busy busy busy with work
but taking lots of little crafty breaks in between.

So the hexagon pillow cover has grown:

(By the way, you can find a link to a tutorial on how to crochet the hexagons here. ... and Andrea, who asked if I thought this would be good for people who aren't very experienced with crochet, my answer is yes! The second row and the joining row are a bit fiddly but the tutorial's so explicit this shouldn't be a big problem. )


I've started to make a new scarf:


which is based on the Romantic Wrap pattern (Ravelry link) from Crochet Today! magazine.


I have managed to get out into my garden and to enjoy,
if only for a little while,
the Winter sunshine and my beautiful, bright red, ivy geraniums:

and I've baked two batches of a quick yet delicious slice called Cammy's Father's Favourites.

I have also started to get ready for my wonderfully long holiday.
I'm planning lunch and dinner dates, and weekends away, with long neglected friends,
I've booked an overseas trip
and I've enrolled in (big breath)
a pastel drawing course,
a nuno felting workshop,
a glass bead making workshop
and a silversmithing workshop.

I'm so excited!

Have a wonderful week everybody.

Hexagonal Happiness

I've been crocheting hexagons
and it's fun!
Like lots of people in Blogland, I've long admired moonstitches' beautiful hexagon throw.
I also really like Linda Permann's crochet hexagon pillow
and,
now that I've discovered knittingnonni's half hexagons pattern
and Lucy from Attic24's excellent tutorial,
I'm making a hexagon cushion of my own:

I can understand why so many people are making these.
I love the flowery shapes and I'm really enjoying being able to play with different colour combinations.

The pottery shard,
by the way,
is from a hand painted pot,
made by a woman called Jo
and, sadly,
broken in one of last year's Winter storms.

Here's another little painted pot that I bought from her:

My work load's becoming crazy again
(I'm seriously thinking of working part time to get a better work~life balance)
but,
along with a little crochet,
I've managed to bead (yet another) memory wire bracelet:

(I love burnt orange!)
and taken photos of the pointsettias that are blooming outside my kitchen window:



and beside the front gate.:

(I love scarlet too!)

Hopefully, I'll be able to get enough time away from report writing to be back here soon.
Have a wonderful week everybody.
x

Pinkberryblue

This is another post brought to you by the colour pink!

I have almost finished my coral~coloured Chevron Lace Cardigan.
I've sewn in all the ends but I haven't blocked it yet.
I haven't come up with a way of closing it (that I like) either.
Here it is left open:




and here it is closed with an organza ribbon:

I'm thinking about making a floral pin to finish it,
something like the one from Interweave's Spiderweb Cardigan.
I'd love to hear your opinion.

...and now for some more rosiness,
in the form of close~ups of jewellery that you can see me wearing with the cardie.
One of the button necklaces:

(the other button necklace can be found here)
and my sequin and seed bead cuff:

I bought the necklace from a gorgeous, eco~friendly stall called Starfish Designs. You can, sometimes, find them at Kalamunda Markets. The necklace is made entirely from recycled buttons. The cuff is a Christmas present from my dear friend Felicity.

Tomorrow is forecast to be one of the last fine and sunny days of the season
...so I'm planning on wearing my cardigan out!
Today was a beautiful, light~filled day,
perfect weather for being in my garden.
Here, in a final burst of pinkness,
is a picture of some of the apple blossom hibiscus that I found blooming there:

Have a wonderful, joy~filled week everybody.

Buttons, bags, biscuits...back to business!

I'm very happy to report that my new bamboo floor has been installed.
It's taken a bit of doing.
There's been a lot of dust swirling around,
much packing and unpacking,
a weekend spent wading about on a gritty concrete pad
but it's all over
and I love it!
It's shiny,
beautifully patterned
and it even smells nice (in a woody sort of a way.)

(The first photo best captures the real colour.)

Molly,
who's terribly timid and who's spent a lot of time hiding under the bed,
is very glad it's all over too:

Renovating has been unexpectedly time consuming but,
since the floor's been finished,
I've had more time and energy to devote to being creative
and my chevron lace cardi now boasts a sleeve:

Incidentally, here's a close up of the button necklace I'm wearing with the cardi:

I made it, stringing the buttons with fine wire, a few years ago.

I've been keeping the cardi in this gorgeous bag that I bought from the Station Street Markets out at Subiaco:

I love the applique flower, the polka dot lining and, especially, the vintage corduroy fabric ~ my mum made me a butterfly sleeved smock out of material much like it in the seventies.
When I've finished the cardigan I'm looking forward to wearing it with the bag.

I've even been baking. I made these orange and poppyseed shortbread fingers for friends who came over for morning tea:

They're moist and tasty
and my visitors left with the recipe, which is always a good thing.

Have a wonderful week everybody.
...and thanks for dropping by.
I haven't been posting a lot of late, I know, and I really appreciate that people still take the time to come and visit.
Blessings.
x

Small is Beautiful

I'm sitting typing this in the middle of an empty living area. Everything but the telly, the laptop and the fridge has been put into storage so that new bamboo boards can be put down. My horrible old flooring is going to be pulled up tomorrow, and I can't wait!
...although someone around here is going to miss the carpet:

(It's OK ~ I've got a new rug at the ready so that she can roll around on that instead.)

Much of the past week has been spent packing boxes and moving furniture, but I have spent a little time out in my neglected garden which, despite having grown even wilder and more tangled, is still pretty.

The potato flowers are blooming,

the pomegranates have ripened

and I've unearthed a wire candle holder that I like, made at a Saturday workshop a few years ago, and I've hung it from my little gum tree so that I can see it from my bedroom window. The glass is very reflective and glows in the sunlight:

I haven't been doing a lot of crochet but, when the floorboards have been put in, I would like to start making some new scatter cushions. I've decided that I want to make something like the first pillow you can see here. I'm going to use motifs from a Japanese craft book I own called Crochet Motif Item. (Sadly, it's now out of print.) I particularly like Motif Number 30, which I first tried crocheting last year:

I want the cushion to be sturdy so I'm crocheting the motifs out of kitchen string and I am planning on felting the backing.

...and of course, in between all the packing and moving, I've still been gaining lots of inspiration from the internet. I've really enjoyed visiting lucy at attic24. Lucy creates colourful, joyful posts and has put together some excellent crochet tutorials. I've also been loving jek in the box for her exuberant, quirky photos...and when I've been feeling tired of renovating my cramped little unit I've been going over to Apartment Therapy and reminding myself that small really can be beautiful, as you can see here and here.

Have a fabulous week everybody.

Photography Tips...with a little crochet thrown in

Sometimes, people leave lovely, complimentary comments about the photographs I take. Amybel did in my last post (thank you!) and said she'd looked in my photography tags to find out more about what I do. I checked my tags too, and realised that I haven't really written anything of substance about taking photos. So, in the hope that this information is useful, here's something about how I approach photography:

• I researched my camera thoroughly before I chose it. Although it's a very modest camera, an old point~and~shoot Canon Powershot A85 which didn't cost much, it is capable of taking good photographs. I read lots of reviews on Steve's DigiCams and decided on the Canon because it handles interior light well, takes good close~ups and comes with an optional, detachable macro lens.
  
  
• I bought the macro lens and use it constantly. It captures details and delicacy, adding so much to the range of images I can produce ~ I can't tell you how much I love it! I used the macro lens to take these shots of the little affirmation pebbles that I made for my mum and dad's 50th wedding anniversary:

• I make the best use of natural light that I can. I take photographs in my back garden in the first few hours of sunlight in the day...and, if I want to take an interior shot, I know that my kitchen is sunniest around ten o'clock each morning and that my bedroom catches the sun in the early afternoon. The shots of the affirmation pebbles were taken in my kitchen but I like taking photographs outside, in the morning, most of all. Morning light throws lovely soft shadows, as you can see with this shot of a Paris daisy:

• I avoid using the flash because it tends to flatten out objects and distort colour. Sometimes, if the light's low, I can achieve flash~free photos if I put my camera onto night mode. These pictures, shot in a shady part of my garden, have been taken this way:
  

(I made the little pinch pot and the base of the birdbath at Fremantle Arts Centre,
by the way. )

• I usually upload photos as soon as I've taken them ~ I can't really tell how well focused a picture is until I've seen it on my computer screen...after I've viewed the shots I then decide if I need to take anymore.

• Sometimes, virtually all I have to do is press the shutter button and the photograph works:

• But most of the time I do lots of photoshopping, using Photoshop Elements...and, to illustrate the difference that photo~shopping makes, here are Before and After photographs of the swatch I crocheted for my chevron cardigan:

Before~

and After~

• In the After photo I've played with the brightness and contrast in the image. I've also painted out shadows I didn't want. I've custom rotated the image too (I love getting right angles if I can) and I've cropped it. I think Photoshop is a really powerful tool. Incidentally, I often photograph small objects, like the swatch, on a white background (I use a shelf that was left over from my kitchen renovations) which seems to help my camera focus.
  


• Before I bought the Photoshop Elements program I used to work on my photos with a free program, called Microsoft Photo Editor. I still use it sometimes because I like the effect of the watercolour function:
  

Basically,
I love the process!
There's something sublime about taking a picture that captures some sort of beauty.
So,
I wonder,
what do you do?

As for crochet,
I haven't been doing anything complicated or time consuming. I've been busy with renovations again (I'm replacing my grotty old carpet and lino with bamboo flooring which is very exciting!) so I've been working on the simplest crochet project I have ~ the border of my Easy Daisy blanket:

..but when I do have the time to focus on something more challenging, I'd love to have a go at making Doris Chan's Lacy Cardigan, especially now that it's been released as a free pattern.
Gorgeous, isn't it?

Have a wonderful week everybody.

Love Notes in Library Books

I love the internet and the way it allows me to connect with and be inspired by creative people. I've just been reading a beautiful blog post on joy, written by a dear soul called Brandi. She has a wonderful, whimsical take on random kindness and senseless acts of beauty, and has had me secretly posting love notes in library books, telephone boxes and bus stops.

It's fun!

...and I've also been drawing inspiration from my friend Andrea at abccreativity. Amongst other things, she facilitates creativity workshops and gives great guided meditations.

Meanwhile, I'm still painting. I've had trouble with the the feature wall in my living room and have changed the colour three times. I started off with a french wash in a butterscotch colour but couldn't get nice, clean edges so I painted it over with a matt paint called Banana Crepe:

Frustratingly, that colour came out too bright and clashed with the lime~washed pink walls in my bedroom:

so I've just painted it again with the cafe~au~lait shade I used in the kitchen
...and I really, really like it!
Phew.

Of course, I've been crocheting and currently have a chevron lace cardigan on the hook:

Although the pattern's written for wool, I'm making it out of cotton and so far it's draping well. It's a great design ~ it involves top~down construction so I can try it on as I go and it's really quick to crochet.

I've been growing silverbeet too:

It's extremely easy to cultivate and it's lovely to have fresh greens on hand. I've been putting it in salads with fresh and sun~dried tomatoes, marinated fetta and avocado, as well as trying recipes from here and here. (Edited to add: silverbeet is called Swiss chard in the USA and Britain.)

I have been working really long hours as well. I'm glad I have enough energy to spend some time on living creatively outside of it.

Wishing you all a week that's touched by kindness and beauty.