October 2019 round up

I've lots to share so I'll get on with it 😉👍

The weekend after my last post we drove out to Tamahere Artisan market, there was a good mix of arts, crafts and toiletries.

I could have bought so much more but I was restrained,  Joe was with me 😉

We bought a selection of soaps and a body butter, made with booze! Just had to....

The weather is definitely improving and the garden is starting to look great, the dogs have been enjoying the sunny days

We were lucky enough to have use of the Karakaraki Christian camp for three days of crafting. 

I've been crocheting too, I finished the scrappy big granny square and sewed in all the ends. Earlier in the year I finished the cross stitch tulip rug, there was loads of yarn left, so I used it to make a wall hanging, the rug will be hung too.

Sue brought over a crochet magazine with a couple of really nice projects, I bought some brights colours and made a start, it's still a work in progress, just the flowers to do. I had intended to make it longer to fit on my chair, I didn't like the dimensions of it as a throw, but when I worked on another square I thought sod it! and I left it as it was. It's bright and makes me eyeballs ache! 😋

Our house is built into a slope, which makes some areas rather interesting. Outside our front door there is a tiered garden, it's in the shade from mid morning on-wards. It's had numerous things planted there, but how it is how I like it best. We have hellebore's and hosta's, and a few ferns that come up, they get huge so we cut them back regularly.

More of the rose arbour, each morning I am treated to more blooms on the Dublin Bay rose, the lavender is covered in bees. My limes have gone past the lime colour stage but are perfectly fine in a gin and tonic

One g&t coming right up!

I re-organised the pantry and gave the booze pride of place, all ready for summer drinking in the garden

I've been making good use of the new bread maker, lunch times are good

Spring always sends people into spring cleaning mode, not me! However we did have a trailer load of stuff to go to the dump, and while Joe was unloading it all I was in the dump shop looking for more crap to bring home! I found an old trolley calling out for a revamp, at $30 it was coming home with me. I may start it next weekend, I already have some chalk paint and some antique wax

Last weekend saw England playing the All Blacks, New Zealand, in the rugby world cup semi final. It would be an understatement to say we were happy with the result!

Michael was extremely happy, he'd been getting a lot of stick before the game. It's always good to beat the All Blacks. And while Michael sang his heart out there were some very quite Kiwis!!

 

The 27th was our 29th wedding anniversary, we took Michael and Natasha out for dinner at the Furnace in the city centre, my dinner, photographed, was delicious

There were a couple of scary moments with a Lime scooter, I thought me life was over people!

 

Last Wednesday I went with Sue who is a  member of Hamilton Gardens, to a preview of a new garden opening this coming Monday. It's called the Picturesque garden, I didn't take any photos because I shall go back when there are less people and better light. After our walk through, we had wine, ham off the bone in rolls with salad and chicken kebabs, there were also fruit kebabs. We all were invited into the Pavilion where Dame Malvina Major talked of her career and of the opera Magic Flute by Mozart. The Picturesque garden walks you through the story of the opera.
Needless to say neither of us lasted more than 10 minute of the rather poor movie of it!
I did take photos of my fave gardens though....

At that point I shall leave you there 

and go pour myself another glass of bubbles, 

have a great weekend xx

A whole lot of craftin' goin' on........

I've been knitting....socks!! 

Easy peasy and so warm.

I don't knit very often, my hands and fingers don't like it much.

My tootsies do though. I made these for me, 

and another pair in the same yarn for Joe

I made the sides on mine slightly longer than the pattern

I get cold ankles too.

I'm currently working on a pair for Natasha

As well as knitting I'm still crocheting the bed blanket

The first two photos were taken last week....

These two today, so slowly but surely it's growing

and my stash is slowly reducing.

It has to be right!

You get a general idea how much further I need to go.

I'll stop where the pillows start

I took my camera to craft yesterday but left the SD card in the computer!

So these are of last weeks craft session

Ngaire (right) had started another quilt, a log cabin this time. You won't believe it but this week she had another one started, a black and white.

The woman's a machine I tell ya!

And Jan has got her Calendar quilt blocks together and her quilt top is finished. Of course it needs batting and backing on and quilting. Another year in the finishing perhaps.

Some time ago Sue found this rather cute chook quilt in an op shop.

I liked it so much I borrowed it, traced it and made it.

I finished it today.

I used some Aboriginal fabrics in my stash, found in an op shop no doubt, and scraps from my box of scraps, perfect for appliqueing

I rather like it.

Remember if you click on any of the photos they will get bigger!

And that's it for today.

Remember the blog will link to Facebook and as

I'm taking a break from FB, any comments left there I won't see.

If you want me to see them then leave a comment on the blog

or email me.

It's a long weekend here, Queens birthday weekend

The plan is to wash the outside of the house

Have a lovely weekend

see ya soon

Slow down time, you're moving too fast.

 Image from Google images

And here we are again with another week, nay a week and a half gone, more memories made. If only I could remember them!  A few things I do remember that happened over last week and a half are;
Monday 11th April: Sue came over and we probably put the world to rights as we often do, she brought lunch too, so an added bonus!
Thursday 14th: The Rotary club held their annual Book Fair at Te Rapa racecourse and because craft had been moved to Friday, I had to go. HAD TO. You know how it is? Then afterwards I called in at Sue's for a coffee, she's only across the road, so it would have been rude not to wouldn't it? I actually went to see the three kittens she's been fostering from the SPCA but don't tell her that! They go back at the end of this week so I thought I should go have a few more cuddles before they find forever homes.

Okay, so now brace yerselves.......Books purchased at the Book Fair. There are also some included which I bought on the Saturday. Joe wanted to go so I went with him, moral support you know.

I managed to find quite a few on my list of books to find. One of those lists being the BBC list of 100 books to read in your lifetime. At this rate I shall have to live for at least 200 years!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And Joe found these. 

What's nice is that Joe is reading more than he used to, I'm a prolific reader and I'm quite fast too, Joe isn't really. I have to say that I am enjoying the odd quiet evening, the two of us sitting on the comfy sofas in the lounge, our noses in a book. Joe's nose however, tends to make a beeline for his chest and within ten minutes he's sound asleep. 

Friday 15th: At the beginning of 2015, three of us in our wee craft group started a project. It's been a year in the making and is still ongoing. We called it the Calendar Quilt. Each month we made a block to represent that month in New Zealand, a seasonal montage if you like. Bear in mind that we are in the southern hemisphere and our seasons are opposite to the northern hemisphere. September sees the start of spring and Christmas is in the first month of summer. I know, you're all confused now eh? Never mind, I'll just show you the blocks. I won't, though, explain each block and how we've interpreted the months in this post (other than the Spring). I'll save that for another day, when each season is complete. I will be working on the other months over the coming weeks.

Last Friday I put together the three spring months. (Click on the photos to enlarge) 

September:October:November

Spring blossom:Bulbs are abundant:The garden is beginning to bloom

December:January:February
(I need to reduce the size of the December block, it doesn't sit right with the others yet)

March:April:May

June:July:August

 A Year in NZ

Once assembled I intend to embellish, embellish, embellish.

For me it's also going to be a memory quilt, memories of the past and I'll add memories to come.

Saturday 16th: After such a good week, it was all about to go tits up! The morning was rather mundane, it involved grocery shopping. And as I would rather not starve to death, it had to be done. We had other errands to run too, one of those involved popping into Bunnings DIY store to pick up some rat bait blocks. This time of year little critters get into the framing of the house and you can hear them scuffling about in the roof space and walls. We (read Joe) drops the sunken light fittings in the ceilings out and puts a block in and replaces the light fitting. Job done. Those rat bait blocks were to prove to be very expensive before the day was out! We had a party to go to that evening, our friend Pete was having a 60th party. There was a theme, "Dress up as somebody you wanted to be". I wanted to be an actress and Joe before choosing his current career path, wanted to be in the forces. He hired a Royal Air Force uniform. I had things I needed to get, so after getting what I needed,  we met friends for a quick coffee before heading home. With lunch out of way, we headed out again and browsed through the aforementioned book fair, before going to watch Michael play rugby.

He tackled......

 He scored a try......(blurred, excited mother)

 He got injured, pulled a hamstring, nothing serious. 

They won.

We didn't hang around after the game, we had a party to get ready for. But get ready, we didn't. We arrived home to find a certain small dog had managed to get at the rat bait, still in it's box and eat some!!!! F*CK! At that stage we thought he had eaten a whole block and some of a second. So the emergency vet was rung and we made a hasty trip to get Max some help. Rat bait if ingested and caught too late can be fatal. Luckily we caught it in time, he must have only just eaten it. He was given some dog food  which he promptly threw up again after being given something to make him sick. He was sick. A. Lot. Once that was over, he was given an anti nausea injection followed by a very large syringe of activated charcoal. Finally he was injected with some Vitamin K and I have to give him Vitamin K orally twice a day for the next 2 weeks. That will be $380 please, thank you! He will then have to go back to our vets in two weeks for a blood test to see if his blood is clotting okay.  

Max feeling very sorry for himself

Once home we discovered that he hadn't eaten a whole block of bait after all! Joe found it under a table. He'd had just a small amount off each block. Phew, he still has to continue with his treatment however.

So as you can imagine it was a pretty stressful day, it didn't help that we were both awake just after 4am that morning. We were feeling knackered, but relieved Max hadn't eaten as much as we thought and he was treated in time. 

Then Joe said, 'C'mon, get dressed up, we're going to Pete's party!"

"WTF!" It was gone 10pm by this time.

Joe took Max up to Michael & Natashas for the evening and out we went! Long story short, I'd only had a sausage roll all day, drank copious amounts of wine, got pissed as a fart and was carried to the car at about 4.30am! 50+ years olds can still party through the night! Not sure I could do it too often though. Oh and I have no idea if there are any photos of us dressed up! Nightmare!

And here's the li'l rat(bait)bag

If you've got this far, then well done you ;-D

see ya next time