Yarnivorous

G'day all! Long time no blog.  And I am soooo happy that we are nearly at solstice because the gloom is starting to get to me.  Sunset at 4:18pm is much much too early.  And the sun only rises at around 7:45am if it can be bothered.  Some days we don't actually see any sun at all - it just stays grey and dim all day long, like living in twilight. It's been truly flat chat around here.  Late November I was making a quilt to enter into a quilt show - didn't get in but mine joins the other 75% of rejected quilts.  I'd show you pics of it but I don't have good ones of the back yet. Ah heck, lets show you some pics of parts of the front.  I don't have good shots of the back - every time it is clear and sunny here at the moment, I'm busy doing things other than taking pics of quilts!  But I do have to hurry up and get shots because I'm donating it before Christmas, which leaves me very little time indeed! Note the direction the needle is heade...

G'day all! Cider day almost sounds like Saturday, and it was both! Busy day today.  It was pretty much non-stop for the whole thing! Seattle Modern Quilt Guild had a sew in at a near by church hall, so I popped up there for a while and sorted out some scraps, pressed them and started cutting 2.5 inch strips or squares - I'm going to make a scrap vomit quilt eventually.  It turns out I don't have that many scraps - I tend to use up the fabrics and throw out any little remaining bits.  Sacrilege, I know....  But still I got a few bits and pieces sorted and cut in a couple of hours. Strips, waste and squares! Then I toddled home and saw that the guys (aka R and DH) were happily working out how to put the skylight in so I left them to that and popped up the hill to visit a "neighbour" who was going to spend the afternoon making apple cider. Hole in ceiling.  No hole in roof, yet. My fellow Aussies (and Kiwis and Poms) will tell me that you cann...

G'day all! I may be a bit excited. We have keys! Keys!  About to be changed keys! We went up to our "new" house this evening and looked at what we want to do before moving in.  Painting is the main thing. But what colours?  DH is really keen on BLACK for the living area!  Lovely leaves and stone. Nothing to do with our "new" house. His proposal has been vetoed.  I have this power.  I want something light and bright because the room is pretty dull - we have a massive Douglas fir in the front yard but it is on the north side so whilst it dulls down the light, it doesn't actually shade the house.  The room is currently brown. The bedroom will be a range of blues because we will keep our fish wall.  I am not keen on stapling felt to the lathe and plaster wall, however.  Am wondering if we will just use dots of sticky stuff. Little Lady Liberty at Alki Beach The study?  Dunno.  I am still keen on light/yellow...

G'day all! You might think that I am not knitting much at the moment. Well I am knitting but I am knitting the body of this cardigan and really, progress looks slow (though I did knit a good 6cm of it on Friday whilst awaiting my CT scan). It is boring to show progress pics when the only progress seems to be endless swathes of stocking stitch. I must say I am mighty impressed so far with the yarn I am using. It can be a little splitty but the yardage is amazing and for $2 a ball (down from $7), I am quite quite happy. It has only taken three balls to do the yoke and the upper body down to the waist. I've just added the fourth ball. I bought 10 or 12 balls and am now thinking I might be able to make a little top too! I've been busy with work, knitting, quilting, gardening, house renos, the 365project (a picture a day) and DH, and in the last couple of days tests for my six monthly checkup. Yep, we only count from when the operation was, even though I was diagnosed wit...

G'day all! When Nathan asked me what I wanted my kitchen to look like, I said "Open and airy." I didn't expect it to be so true! This is really bringing the outdoors indoors. Just as well we have a few fine days ahead of us, eh? 8-) BTW, for the winner of the Christmas stars? I shall announce it tomorrow! (and I'll have to make more cos most of the ones I've made I've given to family so far! My bad) I'll show a little of an Oz Christmas too, but maybe on the travel blog. Mebbe not either... anon!

G'day all! Still trucking along here. So far so good. Currently the chemo side effect is a bit of indigestion, though that could just be me gutsing my food. It is humid (not by tropical standards, I admit) and not very hot but plenty warm enough for me at the moment. It is making it very unpleasant to do stuff around the house. Move a box, sit down and sweat for half an hour. I would say rinse, repeat, but I seem to lose interest in moving stuff or even investigating box contents pretty darned fast! (Cheshire making himself at home on the bed. Normally this is Nutmeg's place. Note the cats are on a diet...) We had some friends over on Sunday. They helped out around the place. They fixed up the walls in the study and washed them and started on the painting. They did more cleaning up around the kitchen. One of the walls in the loungeroom is now washed and awaiting ideas for colour. Two chaps got into the mess under the lemon tree and sorted it out somewhat, and wen...

G'day all! I am totally zonked. That is Australian for exhausted. So far this week, it's been Too Friggin' Hot. Sunday night, Nutmeg couldn't settle and kept me awake half the night (wash wash, jingle jingle goes her collar's bell, wash, jingle...argh! Rock rock goes the chair she was sitting on. Rock, jingle wash!). Monday night was hot. Tuesday night was hot. Wednesday night is promising to be hot. On Monday, they started digging up the curb on the other side of the road, work starts at 7am and they moved the equipment into place at 6:45am. They aren't allowed to do any work before 7am but apparently they can move their massive road (and curb) munching machine into place and also the big dump trucks (or lorries as we used to call them) can drive up and down and unload bobcats and stuff. I much prefer the men who just wheel down barrows full of concrete. Anyway, when one gets to sleep at midnight and the cat plays up and then at sunrise the workers s...

G'day all! I haven't even started chemo yet and already I am b*ggered. We moved into our place on Sunday night. DH has been madly ripping up more carpet with the help of his father and sanding floors. I've now helped with oiling one of them (orange and tung oils, nowhere near as lethal smelling as tung mixed with petrochemicals). We've been washing walls and ceilings and painting them. The bedroom is mostly done (enough that we are sleeping in it) but we need to do the second coat of paint on one wall and above the pelmet and also rearrange the furniture when we haven't got half the study in the room with us. The place looks like a bombsite but at least two rooms are mostly done. There's a fault in the lighting wiring that DH has not had time to track down. So far he's found shorts or evidence of arcing in three different lights. (The shorts are not the sort you put on, btw, just to be clear.) He has to get into the roof to see if there is a problem ...