Friday, October 26, 2012

Shearing Time!

Spring has arrived today so all excess baggage needs to be dropped off at the door.   Time for the girls to shed their woolly winter coats and enjoy lots and lots of sunshine.   I always worry a bit about how they are looking under all that wool - no need for worries this year, these girls are looking a-ok.  I was going to post pictures of the girls getting shorn but really it doesn't show them in a good light - all dignity certainly flies out the door on shearing day.  Needless to say that there was a bit of ruckess, lots of spitting and generally argy bargy for an hour or two at The Farm Up The Hill.  I have ended up with six beautiful fleeces all sitting in bags in the shed.  Weather permitting I intend to clean all the foreign matter out of them on Sunday and get them off to the spinners asap.  I have decided on two-ply and I have found the perfect singlet pattern that I just need to knit.  I am sure the girls will just love it when I go and sit down in the paddock with them - they won't think I'm at all nutty I am sure.   I love the way they look after they have been fleeced. All sleek and racy and ready to go.

Thursday, October 25, 2012

Tastes of summer

The weather is finally getting warmer and there are more and more seasonal veges coming into the shops.  I am really really lucky in that one of my customers makes her way to the Farmers Markets and buys me bags of seriously good tomatoes every Saturday.  I really appreciate these sweet bombs of flavour.  I also bought my first bunch of asparagus this week and they have all come together to make one heck of a tasty dinner.

I made a tomato sauce by frying a red onion, two stalks of diced celery and lots of garlic.  I then added heaps of diced fresh tomatoes and seasoned with salt and pepper.  Simple.   I already had some diced pumpkin roasting in some coconut oil.  I then simply baked the snapper in fresh lemon juice and steamed the asparagus adding a smear of butter towards the end. 

So simple, so tasty and so easy.  I certainly did enjoy. xxxxB

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Happy Scrappy Nine-Patch

Finally went searching for my scrappy ninepatch quilt.  Of course I looked in the most obscure stash spots in my sewing room first.  When they proved unfruitful I glanced through my baskets of projects all ready to be worked on and there it was, all in it's own basket.  Yay!

I just love the stripping that I have used with the purple and green.  I had the stripe in my stash and went hunting for the green and purple to go with it - and voila! perfect stripping.  The cream linen was another fabric I had collected somewhere along the way, not patchwork fabric but just seems to fit in perfectly here.  I got all despondent with it when I ran out of the swap blocks - I wanted it bigger.  But now I have got it out and played with it I think it is the perfect size.  I am now imagining a border of the cream linen and having a lovely scrappy floral applique as a border.  OH!  So I will have to look how much of the cream I have - if there isn't enough I guess it's a perfect opportunity to find another cream/beige fabric to take the scrappy another step.



So there is that quilt.... one of many on my to-do list.  I haven't played with fabric for so long but now I can feel the urge returning.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

One Cog of my Knitting Obsession

Thought I would share one of my current knitting projects.

I am knitting this scarf with the devine Rowan Kidsilk Haze Stripe with the feather and fan pattern. 
I couldn't resist a ball of delightful wool when I went to the shop for something completely different - one stroke and I was a goner :)  Or at least my purse was.  Really loving how the colours are working with the feather and fan pattern.  Making this has made me realise that there is always stuff to learn no matter how long you have been doing a craft.  I figured out that I have been putting my yarn around the needle all wrong when doing a YO.  Crazy!  So once I sorted that out I was off and now I just have to keep knitting to get to the next colour in the ball.

I cast on 76st and used the following pattern. Row 1: k2, k2 tog x 3,[(yo, k1) x 6, k2 tog x 6] x 3, yo k1 x 6, k3 tog x 3, k2
Row 2: purl
Row 3: knit
Row 4: purl
Repeat these 4 rows until all the wool is used.

It's a lovely easy knit now that I have the pattern down pat. Very quick to grow and will be so lovely and warm for next winter.

So much more to show and tell - I'm going to really enjoy popping all this pictures on here and then putting up the finished pictures super soon.



The colours remind me of this picture I took in the weekend of our lavender.  Its kind of a reversy colour thing tho.... the green and the purple are doing the opposite dance in each photo.  I love the combination of these two colours.  It has reminded me of a lovely nine patch quilt I made from some swap blocks many moons ago.  It came to a grinding halt when I ran out of the nine patches - they are all scrappy and I tied them together with a combo of green and purple. I will have to find it and post a photo tomorrow... and then maybe I will have to start making some nine patches of my own.   Now off to bed to knit myself to sleep. :)

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Alpacas in the Mist


Up here in the hills things can be so different to down in the city lights.  Came home on Monday to thick mist and very nosy alpacas.  There must have been a huge downpour just before I made it home as everything was just dripping with moisture.  Managed to grab these shots of the girls - loved the way the old dead poplars looked in the background too.  Next on my wish list is a decent camera.... in the meantime my phone is doing an ok job.




















 I love these girls but I really need to get things moving with them this summer.  I would love to breed again but need to raise "boy" money by selling a couple of them.  So bring on summer and lots of pictures on Trade Me and hopefully lots of people that want to buy my girls.  In the meantime they get to hang out and eat and poop and sleep - they seem pretty happy doing just that.

Tuesday, October 9, 2012

My Sunday Post - that did a wee stint in NeverNeverland

Sunday was a very lazy relaxed day of in my world.  Bit of shopping with Tom for his birthday then home to play with knitting and crochet.  I have started my blanket for Lewis' and Zoe's baby (due in March) - may the powers that be let it be a girl because this is a VERY girly blanket.  Plan B in reserve so just have to get them both on the way.

I love Sundays for so many reasons - one of them being that I can cook up a storm at my leisure.  Tonight's inspiration for my dinner (yes I usually cook two meals) came from an insert in the Herald.  Hot Smoked Salmon Cakes - few adjustments to fit my amazing eating regime of the moment and I have created what looks like the most amazing dinner of the month!  I have a small rack of free range pork in the oven for himself, a few roasted potatoes and a few more peas and he'll be a happy man.  I love the fact he is so easily pleased but some days it makes me anxious that he is so easy to please.  But I'm not his mother and he just loves these simple meals.  On to my wonderful salmoncakes tho - they are smelling devine and I can't wait to try them in their cooked state.

I roasted some red kumera in my wonderful Cere's unrefined coconut oil and then smashed them up.  The kumera's were still wrapped in their skins - the best part I reckon.

Then I mixed together some seeded mustard (sugar free), chopped parsley, lemon zest and juice, beaten egg, salt & pepper, chopped red onion and added the salmon..... oh yum!
Then it went all together and wow - it really looks like my dinner is going to rock tonight.  I then rolled it in processed wholegrain oats and have left them to sit while the other dinner cooks.  Maybe some capers next time... I love freestyle cooking.... and that is partly for starting this blog, just so I can remember what I cook and then play with it some more.

So while that is all happening I have made the time to start my journey in the world of blogs.  I'm not brave enough yet to tell folk about what I'm up too.... I'll just take a few weeks to get the feel of all of this and then maybe I'll invite a few people to drop in and have a look at what I'm up too.  Great to have made a start and I really look forward to placing a few more words on this page as the day's go by.


Confusion in the blogger world!

I just love reading over this blog. It's so me and my muddled head with so many things happening - or not happening for that matter.

Anyway - the confusion is that I started a new blog and I thought it was under this email. But no! Hmmmm..... I can find the blog but have no idea how to access it so I shall transfer it to this one and them I have all my stop-start blogs all together! Funny how this seems to be a spring thing restarting my blog. But life has a good feel about it this year so lots to share.

See you there.