More Dyeing

This one is peppermint tea, a lovely pastel shade of yellow.

New Books and a New Wool Shop

  

Thursday was sit & stitch at Can Do Books.  I bought two books, the latest from Arne & Carlos and Shetland.  I follow Jamiesons of Shetland, a wool producer on Instagram and have seen this book on there.  Realised Stephanie had a copy.  We were talking about and she told me of a wool shop in Canterbury that carries Jamieson's yarn.  So we visited the shop Sunspun and it is lovely.  Lots and lots of yarn, it was difficult to only buy a few.  All this new yarn and dyeing yarn, I better get busy.

Selle's Tree Yarn

  

The yarn at the front is Selle's Tree yarn.  I found photographing the yarn with the original colour gives a truer colour in the photograph.  The yarn is quite a pastel shade of brown, actually it is skin-toned.  Dyed from the leaves, nuts and bark of a Mellaluca (Paperbark) tree, Selle's tree.   Selle was a dog we found at the RSPCA in Canberra where we were living in the late 1980's.  She had been there quite a while and was about to be put down, so we couldn't let that happen and we took her home.  Selle is on the left in the photo, Basil is on the right.  She was a mix of Silky and Australian terriers, is our guess.  Basil was a Silky terrier.  When we first got her she was terribly neurotic and very stressed at everything, she used to hoard food and hated men.  Poor thing, we don't know what she had been through.  She gradually trusted us and became a very loyal and loving dog.  She lived until she was 18.  I thought she might go back to her neurotic ways as she got older, but never did, even when she went deaf and blind, she was content.  When she died we buried her in the nature strip and planted a purple flowering Mellaluca, a lovely tree.  The electricity company came around to trim the street trees and I thought it would be a good thing to dye with, so I did.  On the left is an 8ply alpaca/merino mix and on the right 8ply merino.

Dyeing Yarn

  

  

I have been having a play with dyeing.  My first was using blackberries.  Photographing colour is notoriously difficult, as you can see every photo is different.  The first two photos is in the kitchen under a yellow light, the second two in the craft room under the daylight bulb I have.  The last photo, where the ball is next to the original colour is the closest.  The yarn is a pretty pastel purple/pink.  This kind of dyeing is a mix of cooking and craft, two things I love.

Jar Lid No.6

  

  

Crocheted Snowflake.  The snowflake is being held up by a pin.  The base is a crocheted circle in blue yarn.  This is the last jar lid, but there will be more to come.

Jar Lid No.5

  



Tiny Temari.  And even smaller wrapped balls and french knots underneath.

Jar Lid No.4

  

  

Ooma.  Marie Gilmartin Byrnes was Robin's mother.  I did a stitch sketch from this photo.  I worked back stitch in a variegated thread.  The green background fabric is a piece of Harris Tweed.

Jar Lid No.3

  

  

A Tiny Teddy on a Bed.  A granny square blanket and linen sheets.  I thought Robin could use this on her Sleepy Tea container.

Jar Lid No.2

  



Ladybug Garden.  I started with a sashiko-like stitching of white circles on blue linen.  There is a large circle around the outside, a smaller one in the middle and eight small circles.  Then I added some green and red french knots.  The flower is five crocheted petals and french knots in the centre.  I have had some ladybug pins for a while, just what this little garden needed.  The pin has been snipped down to fit and put in place with superglue.

Jar Lid No.1

  

Little Reindeer Head.  The head is crocheted in perle cotton and is about 4cm from base to top of antlers.  The backing fabric is a little piece of Harris Tweed.

Happy Birthday Mum

  

It is my Mother-in-law Robin's birthday today.  We asked if there was a course she wanted to do, or a book she had her eye on, and she asked for decoration in the lids of her storage jars.  I have given several Moccona coffee jars with different things in the lids before.  Six lids were posted down to Melbourne, filled and posted back to Sydney.  I will show each one and how they were made in the following days.

New Reindeer

This reindeer is similar to the others I have made, but different.  He needs a bit of tweaking, but is coming along.

Christmas Car

  

  

Finished.  The tree was already made a little while ago.  Now there is a fleet of two little cars.  I'm afraid that is all there will be.  I made this second one to see if I was a bit quick to dismiss the pattern, but no, not a pattern I could easily explain, or that people would really want to do.

Car Progress

Felt finished, windows on and window trim on front and back windows.

Another Car

Thought I would make another Christmas car, a grey one this time.

Crocheted Snowflake

It felt so cold here in Melbourne yesterday that is seemed appropriate to play with snowflakes.

Navy Recruits Photo

I am a member of a Wrans group on FB.  Someone posted some photos from their time in the Navy.  I had to look closely, but I'm in this one.  I didn't recognise the name of the lovely lade who posted the photos, but it was a long time ago and we were only together for 6 weeks.

New Books

Yesterday was Sit & Stitch at Can Do Books.  Came home with two new books, an embroidery and a knitting book.  The embroidery one I have looked at before and really liked.  The knitting one is new and has some lovely stitch patterns.

Brian Blessed's Dog

I was watching Who Do You Think You Are, the Brian Blessed episode and this is one of his dogs.  This little sweetie just needs to be recreated in yarn or stitch.

Pig Face

  

The Pig Face was at a local shopping centre carpark.  They were very pretty and undamaged.

This One's Tiny

  

 

This little reindeer is crocheted out of the perle cotton I got on Saturday in the cone on 0.75mm hook.  In the photo of the three reindeer, the largest is 8ply and the middle one used to be the smallest.

Mandoline

I bought a cheap mandoline slicer a few years ago to have a try, see if it was something I would use.  My knife skills are good so I didn't think it was something that would be useful, but all the cooking shows used one.  Well, I quite like the mandoline and  bought a better quality one.  This new one is sturdier, all the blades are within it, no separate bits, and being metal should clean better.

2nd Hand Finds

  

  

Yesterday we went for a drive to Geelong for some lunch and a rummage around the 2nd hand shops. Found some things, old clip-style candle holders (I found smaller ones last year, so these are perfect), a couple of wooden bobbins to add to the collection, a Beatrix Potter toy book, and a cone of perle cotton embroidery thread (still wrapped and a good colour).  The book has some great dolllmaking tips and includes basketmaking and furniture making.