Sophie and Lady

Most of you know that we have a gorgeous Labrador named Sophie.  She is 13 years old now and has slowed down immensely.   Poor Sophie has a problem with her spine and struggles with walking very far and has other difficulties too.  Despite this she is still a very happy dog, enjoys her short walks and still has the appetite of a Labrador but we know she is in her twilight years.  We had been thinking of adopting a rescue dog for some time and I particularly wanted another Labrador but it seems Labradors get rehomed very quickly. 

Sophie

 So the lovely dog we've ended up adopting is a Labradoodle named Lady.  Lady is 9 years old and has been a breeder.  Her owners had no more use for her and were going to have her put down and then a lovely person came to her rescue.  Lady's rescuer had many dogs of her own and couldn't really keep another one so that's where we came into the picture, answering an advertisement for her online.

 

Lady

 Lady has the sweetest nature and is very gentle.  She gets on well with Sophie although is a bit pushy when it comes to getting attention.  She isn't the slightest bit interested in our cats and they are slowly getting use to her.  Lady has only been with us for a week and has settled in beautifully.

 

Besides adopting a dog I have been very busy in the garden, mowing the grass, whipper snippering the weeds and doing the edges, weeding, pruning and tidying up.  In among all the hard work it's so nice to have some spring roses in the garden, enough so I can bring some inside to enjoy.

 It is nice to have some crafting on the go as well and I'm slowly working on my Sanda Paul of Cherry Heart  Spice of Life blanket.  The colours I'm using are more vibrant than shown in this photo and the yarn I'm using is from the Stylecraft Special DK range.  I love this yarn, it's so soft and very economical.

 It was a nice project to work on while we were driving to get Lady which was a 3.5 hour drive.  On the way home Lady was sitting on my lap so no chance to do any more.

 I'm currently working on a sneaky crochet Christmas project which I'll share in another post.

Anne xx

Catching up

Hello.  Once again it has been a long time since I posted on here so I thought I'd do a catch up post.

The usual things have been going on in life as they do and my days have been filled with crafting either knitting socks or crocheting blankets.  The garden is there waiting for me to get into when the weather warms up but for Melbourne this takes quite a while.  

We bought a second hand caravan from good friends several months ago so have been enjoying planning our first weekend away which is happening soon.  I'll hopefully have photos to share.  In the meantime here are a few of the things I've been getting up to.

Hubby and I enjoyed a day out visiting the Yarra Valley Dairy, one of our favourite places.

 

We saw the Wedge tailed eagle in the distance while there.

I made these bed socks for Mum.  Not quite a perfect fit.

Enjoying the colours of some sock yarn I ordered.

A skein of sock wool I hand dyed using camellia petals, melaleuca bark beetroot tops.

Knitting of socks in progress.

 

 

More socks.  This pair went to Genevieve.

  

Enjoying some colour in the garden.

Hubby and I cutting down branches from the old pear tree in the back yard.  Sadly the tree was diseased and all the wet weather didn't help so down she came.

Working on a stripey throw. Pattern found here.  Using colours from Lucy of Attic 24 cosy pack.

Five jars of yummy home made corn relish.  Delicious with a cheese melted toastie.

Rainbow lorikeets visiting this weekend.  The might be colourful but they are noisy and agressive, not my favourite parrot.

See you soon,

Anne  xx

Something cosy

It's cold and that has me thinking about cosy things like soups, casseroles and hot water bottles.  I used 8 ply acrylic yarn from my stash to crochet the hot water bottle cover below.  I started out with a pattern but got bored and decided to do my own thing which has resulted in a slightly wonky looking cover, a bit rustic but that's o.k. with me.

 I've been working on the granny squares below to make another hot water bottle cover.  The early morning autumn light coming in through the family room window was lovely and perfect for taking this photo.

We don't use hot water bottles at home as we have an electric blanket so the ones I'm making covers for will be used elsewhere.  Hoping to tell you about that soon.

Anne  xx

Winter days

Winter has finally hit Victoria and with a bit of a vengeance too.  Some days in May were quite mild  but now we have cold winds, rain and even snow in the high country which means the snow resorts will be breathing a sigh of relief.  

I've been making an effort this past month to get out and walk every day for my benefit and for my gorgeous Labrador Sophie.  Usually in winter I don't want to walk because of the cold so the purchase of some wet weather gear and making a few crochet items is helping to make walking more pleasurable.

Please excuse the quality of these next photos, it's a bit hard taking selfies when it's freezing and you can't quite get the angle of the camera right.

First up I made a scarf in an 8ply teal acrylic.  I chained 250 stitches with 4.5mm crochet hook, crocheted 2 rows of double, 7 rows of treble and then 2 rows of double.  I did a simple picot stitch around the edge to finish off.  This scarf started life as something else entirely but adjustments were made when I ran out of patience.

I'm thinking Stripey makes a better model than me.   :)

I rather fancied making a shawl or something similar to throw over the top of my clothes when venturing out.  I finally bit the bullet and purchased a pattern from Etsy that I fell in love with.  Big mistake.  Nothing is wrong with the pattern, it's wonderful but trying to find a similar yarn in the right ply was a nightmare.  I finally found (after spending about 1 1/2 hours in Spotlight) a yarn I thought might be suitable, Patons Midnight, an acrylic, wool, metallic polyester and nylon mix made in Italy.  The wool was heavily discounted at $5.00 for a 75g ball so it being the best affordable option for me, a purchase was made.  Trying to find a nice 12 ply yarn in this country for a reasonable price is rather challenging so I hoped my yarn which seemed more like 8 ply than 12 ply would suffice.  Of course the right hook size for the pattern wasn't in stock in Spotlight so I decided to wing it with 6mm hook I had at home instead of a 6.5mm.  I'm a bit of a novice when it comes to crochet but I did think to add more stitches to increase the size of the wrap.  My wrap is o.k. but it's not at all like the one in the pattern picture which looks soft and drapes beautifully.  I've opted not to use a button to secure it with, rather using a large kilt type pin I embellished a couple of years ago which doesn't show up particularly well in the photo.

Oh the joys of developing ones skills  :)

As our days are cold, gloomy and overcast I decided to bring a little colour into the house with these Camellias from the garden.

 
 I'm eyeing off the Daphne that will be in flower soon too so I can bring some of the fragrant blooms inside.

Have a lovely day everyone.

Anne xx

:: 52 weeks of happy, 13/52 ::

Here are four happy moments of many this week.

1.  Finish crocheting this little cardigan for my grand nephew.

2.  Making origami boxes for Easter treats.

3.  Starting this crochet blanket in bright colours for my grand nephew.

 

 

 4.  Grateful for good health and medical tests that are clear.

Wishing every one many happy moments this week and a wonderful Easter.

Anne  xx

Baby crochet

There is a new baby in the family, a great nephew on hubby's side.  This is my opportunity to try crocheting some baby things and I've started on this little cardigan.

This free pattern comes from debscrafts55.blogspot.com and can be found here.  I'm using a 5mm hook and Moda Vera Yarn, Marvel Soft 8ply in a gorgeous blue.  I'm so excited to be crocheting something for a baby and to learn new crochet skills. 

 

 Also in the pipeline is a striped blanket/throw, some little socks and a hat.  The new baby is petite so the little cardigan can be something he can grow into.

 

Anne  xx

:: 52 weeks of happy, 9/52 ::

Here are four of my happy moments from this week.

1.  Eating these delicious homegrown tomatoes.  They taste like a tomato should.

2.  Making and eating these soft gingernut biccies.  Yum!

3.  Knowing Stripey is o.k. after two visits to the vet with a bladder infection.  Poor kitty!

 

4.  Learning how to crochet African flower hexagons and joining as you go courtesy heidibearscreative.blogspot.com

Wishing you many happy moments this week.

Anne xx

Great Grandma's crochet

Florence Olive Moore nee Holt was my Great Grandma and she was born in Aston, Warwickshire in 1879.  She immigrated to Australia in about 1911 and lived in Melbourne with her brother for a year or so before marrying my Great Grandfather Thomas Moore in Fremantle, Western Australia in 1913.  

Tom and Olive on their wedding day.

Before coming to Australia, Florence or as she like to be called Olive, worked as a domestic servant, a cook and a parlour maid.  The English Census records make for fascinating reading.  Life in Australia after she was married was very challenging for her and the Western Australian countryside with it's flies, heat, dry and harsh climate vastly different to that of her country of birth.

Here she is a photo of her with my Grandma in her arms.

Those whites look very white to me which would have been no mean feat to keep clean with all the dust and dirt around.

Great Grandma was a keen crocheter and from what I've seen, she mainly concentrated on fine crochet work, edging doilies and the like.  My Mum lived with Tom and Olive during the 2nd World War together with her Mother and Sister while my Grandfather was away overseas in New Guinea.  After the morning chores were done and lunch over, Olive would settle  down to spend some time crocheting.  

Years later when Olive found out that her Grandaughter (my Mum) was pregnant with her first child, she crocheted some little fine booties.  I can only imagine the blue touch was added after she found out the baby was a boy.

 

You can see the detail of the button hole in the bottom of the photo.  The booties were closed with a little pearl button but has since been lost from this booty.  The pair to this booty has been lost over time too.

The underside of the booty.

A little piece of fabric was sewn in the inside of the booty so the baby's toes wouldn't get caught in the fine work of the crochet.

You may have noticed the very interesting object I photographed the booty on.  It's one of Olive's shoe trees which she brought with her when she came out from England all those years ago.  I thought it was a lovely piece to use as a backdrop to her crochet work.

 

Here is a photo of Olive in her older age.

Mum tells stories how Olive would fall asleep and have a little doze while she was crocheting.  She would wake up and continue crocheting intricate lace work without missing a stitch.  My Grandfather or my Great Grandfather would tease her that she had been asleep which she hotly denied.

I'd loved to have known this amazing lady but unfortunately she died before I was born.  I feel privileged to have some of her work and personal items.  I have more of her crochet work to show you but I'll save that for another post.

Anne  xx