Oh for a month of Sundays

G'day all!

I have been awfully busy recently. I need to blog stuff for the house cos most of it, but not all, has been house related.

Remember the big tree root that is literally blocking my ideas of grey water in the backyard? (BTW in Victoria, Australia it is legal to use grey water on the garden either direct from the drain or after treatment. If you don't treat it, you can't store it. We are going with the direct into the apple orchard version, no storage/treatment.) Well after finding several camphor laurel roots, I decided that trying to get the water to run uphill by digging a deep trench was a dumb idea.

The apple orchard is going out into the front yard. I only have to take on roots from the photinia stump there. So the trench started today. I have to dig it deeper, but that awaits the ground being softened by the shower water. Still it works - the water from the shower runs down to the front yard, with a drop of about 10cm from the drain....

I managed to finish not just one but two socks on Friday night! The casting off of one took over 45 minutes (and it was half past midnight when I finally finished) all because someone known as me confidently decided the amount of yarn I would need was this much. Or would you believe quarter of a row tinked back? Or maybe this much... a half row tinked back? On black yarn under artificial light?

The socks are seen here with a fast moving Cheshire:

The black/purple/grey sock is a Jawoll sock made to my usual toe up pattern with a little extra ribbing in the leg. Feels a little itchy so far but once it is washed I hope it is better. The other sock is some 5ply/sportweight that I dyed myself and knitted using the Straight Laced lace pattern from Knitty, but again my own toe up pattern. It is very interesting how the blue and the yellow pretty much disappear in the photo. They are not very strong colours compared to the red and green which pooled madly. The sock is quite pretty closeup where you can see the different colours in it. I have two skeins of a brighter/stronger colourway than this one.

The other day I stuck some washed fleece in the dye pot and painted it sunsetty colours. Lookie how it came out!


Lurid! I am now flicking it and spinning it as a single to turn into a scarf, like the Harlot's one row scarf, only in different colours :-)

Minor problem with the flicking - Cheshire is taking an extreme interest in it, probably because there is a yarn-like substance moving about six inches from her nose (and I have to be careful not to spike her with the brush cos it is VICIOUS! It has tasted human flesh and it wants more!).

On the husband front - he has deigned to send me an email once saying the talk went well. However his reply to my email was not an answer, if that makes sense. I am mightily pissed off with him. He has not made any effort ot contact me. I go away and he gets upset if I don't call him every day! I know that some of you would be dancing in the street (with your knitting) if your husband went away for a week but I am grumpy cos I am lonely. I guess we just get along well or something.

Here's something pretty for you -

Despite the drought, the roses are forging on with their spring flowering (which I am sure is about two weeks to a month ahead of schedule) and the rest of the front yard is trying hard too. Most of my roses are either English roses or Old Garden Roses. One of my faves is in the left foreground - Cardinal de Richelieu, one of the darkest of all roses.


And who says that Australian plants have to be dull? Red, hot pink and bright yellow in the foreground centre-right. Ouch! There is lots of purple and blue in that bed too. When this bed grows up, it will be an eyesore :-)

Why do I want a month of Sundays? Well, I got lots done today. I sent off my ISEIII scarf. I dug a six metre long trench in the front yard (and my un-tennis elbow is letting me know about it). I plastered more of our in wall bookshelves (which I am trying to get done before DH gets home as a surprise for him, though if he reads this it won't be much of a surprise ;-) I caught up the the PiLs (or at least the MiL - it pleases me mightily that I get along just fine with my MiL).

Tomorrow is going to be a big day. I want to finish the plastering and sand parts of it back. Since I am crap at plastering I have decided that it needs to be textured. Then I need to undercoat it. Top coat won't happen tomorrow but I can deal with that. In my usual style it will not just be one colour. Just as well that we are not planning to move in a hurry cos this place is gunna be eclectic. I also have to tidy the loungeroom (an ongoing project), the study (ditto) and finish spring cleaning the kitchen. And spin more yarn. And start my socktober socks. It is only half way through the month....

anon!

Comments

  1. Hey there! Thank you for the package!!! I absolutely love everything in it. I'm not sure the chocolate even made it home (hehe, I had you send me the package at work). Anyway, thank you, and I absolutely love the sunset colors. You really have a lot of talent. RT didn't even believe me when I said you did that stuff yourself.

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  2. That's great that you can utilize grey water that way! Here there's 4 million laws and water quality things and it's not done privately.

    Beautiful socks and fleece! I don't know where you find time to knit, what with all the plastering and gardening.

    I love your native garden. I like lots of color in my garden too! Odd though, that I like subdued yarn. Hmmmmm.

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  3. Oh, gorgeous colors you dyed!

    Hmph, I'd be mightily annoyed by such behavior, too. When does he return?

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  4. Anonymous3:01 pm

    He is very wicked: sauce for the goose etc.
    Very nice socks!! The pooling is excellent. I am tidying the dining room today and sewing a lot!! One of the relatively fast Labradors can usually get in a photo too. Aren't animals nippy?? Have a happy and ache free day!!!

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  5. You always have the most beautiful fleece! And the socks look fabulous!

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  6. ok, what is grey water? soapy water from washing? or septic tank stuff? ew!

    at least your apple trees will be healthy, lol

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  7. Hi,Lynne
    I was curious to learn how to navajo ply but after looking at the picturial lesson, I think it would be designed for use on a treadly! One thing though,do you end up with little lumps where each ply begins and ends?
    The reason I ask as I am going to dye some roving and want to get the same efect as Harlot did with scarf wool.
    I have ideas to make a couple of scarves for co workers for Xmas and I think they would be thrilled with a handspun one!

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