Elephants Tails and a new Collar

 There's been plenty of hand work happening here lately.  One of my goals was to hand stitch tails and eyes on to my three families of elephants.   There is Mother elephant, her older calves and the two babies in each family.  A couple of afternoons spent sitting quietly and the job was done.

Elephants tails and eyes

Once that job was done, it shouldn't take me too long to assemble the rows.  This is my number two project in the Chookshed Challenge for February and I would really like to get this top assembled by the end of the month.

Last month I had finally finished knitting and sewing up my navy blue cardigan (number 6 for January in the Chookshed Challenge) but...........I was not at all happy with the collar.  Silly me, I thought I knew better than the pattern and knitted a ribbed collar instead of garter stitch.  After thinking about it for a while, I decided that if I didn't like it now, I never would in the future, so there was only one thing for it.  The collar was unravelled, and reknitted, according to the pattern.  The colour is darker than shown, the pic was taken outside in the sunshine.

THis looks better

This cardigan has been a very long winded project indeed, and was started last year during our 10 week South Island caravan holiday.  It was a nice easy design to knit while sightseeing in the car, not much thinking to do at all.  But once I started on the back shoulder increases I realised that I had the incorrect number of stitches - bother.  So that was unravelled and knitted again.  And now the collar has  been redone too.  You would think at my age I would be better at following instructions!

But it is finally completed, and I'm happy with my efforts.  It will be tucked away till the winter weather arrives.

Home Again

We are home again after our recent trip to Hawkes Bay to attend my sister’s Kathleen’s Memorial Service.  Here are a few highlights of our time away.  What could be better than fish and chips for our evening meal the day we arrived?  The Filter Room was close by and consists of a cidery, restaurant, and also does take away fish and chips.  Just what we wanted.  We may have to go back next time and do a cider tasting, I think.  As we were waiting for our order to be cooked, Robin sat in front of a wall covered with cans.  Just look at them all, he’s saying.

That’s a lot of cans!

On Monday we retraced our route back south, going up and over the Saddle Road again, but instead of going straight back home decided to stop at a new-to-us Pop (Park over Property) in Palmerston North.  The owners  has about 12 acres and runs a few sheep on his property, as well as having several beehives.  He made a point to ask us if we were allergic to bee stings, just in case.  The weather was lovely and warm and I sat outside for an hour or so in the late afternoon, working away on my stitchery.  From here, it was only an hour’s drive back home.

Staying overnight on a small farm

Gemma was rather excited to be outside, there must have been so many marvelous smells around the sheep pens close to where we were parked.  She sniffed everywhere, she climbed up high, she climbed through the fence, no doubt wishing those mean owners of hers would take that dratted lead off her harness so that she could go wherever she wanted.  Not a chance, Gemma.  Just as well there were no sheep in the pen, that might have been a bit much for her to take, but she certainly enjoyed the odours left behind.  I’m sure she thinks she could be a country cat if we lived here.

So many interesting smells out here!

When she was inside the caravan Gemma helped me with blogging duties, as she often does.  She is very good at holding the lap top bag down so it doesn't escape.

She’s a big help when I’m blogging

And, I’ve got a finish to show you.  To be honest, these were stitched before we went away, but I never got around to blogging about them.  I had cut out several more masks, and then we were told that the preferred masks to use were the N95 type.  If we wanted to make and wear cloth masks, they should have three layers.  My two layer masks were pinned up ready to stitch, so I had to quickly cut an extra inside layer for them.  Here they are, all done.

New masks to wear when out and about

Making Masks

I spent several hours on Sunday afternoon, making a few masks.  Have to say I really admire those ladies who have been churning them out by the dozen, or hundreds, don’t know how you did it.  Previously, I had stitched a couple with triple pleats, and my friend Dot found out about a new design, tracing a circle with a dinner plate, of all things.  After seeing her sample, I decided to give it a go, luckily I still had some elastic tucked away, as it it in really short supply these days.  So I made four, two for me, and two for Robin.  His masks were a little small, especially with that beard, so I used a larger dinner plate to mark  the circle and make two bigger ones for him.

 

Blue floral for me and Kiwi silver ferns for Robin

The trick, it seems is to use something across the top of the nose to keep the mask secure.  Dot kindly gave me some thin plastic coated wire which (to tie plants up in the garden) she used on her masks.  It just gets zig zagged in place and then you can bend it into shape over the nose.

And here we are, all masked up.  Please excuse my “just out of the shower wet hair” look.

Wearing our new masks

The country is still in Level 2, so we can go out and about as long as we take precautions.  Such as sign in to shops, or scan the QR codes, practice social distancing, hand hygiene, and now masks must be worn on public transport, which seems a very sensible idea.  This is our “new normal” these days.

As well as mask making this weekend, there was some cooking going on.  It’s still winter here in New Zealand (although Spring is not too far away) so I made a big pot of pumpkin soup, so yummy.  That lasted us for several warming lunches, and it is so nice with a swirl of cream on top!

Pumpkin soup for lunch

For our Saturday evening meal Robin fired up the Weber BBQ and we cooked a tasty leg of lamb with roast veggies, so nice.  And the smell…..out of this world!  Even better, we purchased the lamb on special!  Did I tell you I love roast lamb?

Roast lamb on the BBQ

And our Sunday mornings usually start with bacon and eggs for breakfast, our Sunday morning tradition, and cooked by Robin.   Once again, the food didn’t disappoint.  It’s always a lovely leisurely start to the day.

My Sunday morning breakfast

My daughter Nicky celebrated her birthday on Friday, so it was nice to have a chat with her on the telephone, and yes, her birthday parcel arrived in time.  She was born 1 year and 4 days after her brother, so I was a very busy young Mum indeed back in the day!

Thank You Cynthia - More Lockdown Sewing

While browsing my favoutite blogs the other day, as you do, I came across this great idea from Cynthia, on her blog “Quilting is more fun than housework”.  It was all about how she made a cover to put on the handle of supermarket trollies - read about it here.  So practical, I just had to have a go myself.

Mine started with a small table topper made with New Zealand designs which I previously used in the caravan.  That will do, I thought.  Gemma decided that of course I wanted her too in the shot, isn’t that why I laid it on the carpet?

Mmm, I can see some kiwis here.

It was quite an easy make, what's a little more Lockdown sewing to fill in an afternoon?  First I chopped the black borders off, then sliced it in half, giving me two rectangles.  Sew some binding on, add some Velcro for closure, and here we go, all finished.  I wasn't quite sure how to judge the diameter of the handles, so used a roll of baking paper to give me some guidance.  I can always resew one side of the Velcro later on if its not quite right.

Two supermarket handle covers

So here they are, two supermarket trolley handle covers.  It seems a great idea to use these, take them home to wash, and pack away till the next visit.  (Perhaps using a terry hand towel would also work).  Mind you, it’s not only supermarkets which provide trollies is it, our local veggie shop, big stores like The Warehouse, Bunnings and Mitre 10, and that old favourite, Spotlight.  Once these stores open up again the covers will come in handy, not only protecting us from Covid 19 but also from coughs, colds and other germs.

Thanks so much Cynthia for sharing such a great idea, much appreciated.

Stitching during the Storm

She may have been downgraded by the weather people, but Cyclone Gita still packed a punch.  To prepare for her arrival on Tuesday we moved from the Golden Bay area  to Marchwood Park camp in Motueka. and hunkered down.   The heavy  rain arrived on Tuesday morning, noisily beating down on the caravan roof.  The puddles started to join up into a rather large lake outside our van, across the roadway, and across the camping area to the side of us. Then the winds arrived, sudden gusts kept shaking the van, and I for one was certainly worried what the night would hold.  We cooked and ate the evening meal, watched the TV news, seeing the devastation which Gita had brought to some areas of the country.   Eventually as the evening drew on, the wind started to die down a bit, perhaps Gita was moving on?

Heavy rain all day

During our day tucked up inside the van we checked the news and weather reports on TV, read some blogs, flicked through a magazine,  and I did a bit more on my stitching.  My bits and pieces are tucked  away in my sewing pouch.  I diligently stitched on for a while, but I must admit it was hard to settle with worrying about the storm.

The following day we woke to sunshine and counted our blessings.  The lake of water had drained  away, none of the large trees on site came crashing down around us,  and the the strong winds hadn’t toppled any vans.  We had certainly escaped the worst of the weather.  But the news was grim – Ex Cyclone Gita had caused chaos across central New Zealand – roads closed, flights grounded and a state of emergency has been declared in Christchurch, Buller, Westland, Selwyn, Tasman, Taranaki, and Grey District.

We very fortunate to have  made the return journey from Golden Bay over the Takaka Hill in Monday, as it is now impassable, the road badly damaged and closed with 16 slips.  Helicopter footage showed the Takaka Hill road cluttered with mud, debris and fallen trees.  The damage will take several days to clear. Food supplies for Golden Bay's 5000 locals and 1000 stranded tourists will be delivered by sea tomorrow.

One of the many slips on the Takaka Hill

On a lighter note – let me tell you a family story.  This town has a historical connection to the maternal side of my family.  A young man on the Green side of the family jumped ship at Motueka and supposedly hid under the voluminous skirts of the publican’s wife while the search was on for the absconder.  Once the ship had set sail he was free to start a new life in the colonies and did quite well for himself in business, married and had quite a large number of children.  There is even a local street named after him.   And how about this blast from the past - this is a photo from our previous visit here six years ago when we tracked down my “family street sign”.  Do I look six years younger?

My “family” street sign, named for an early relative

Stitching in the Country

With our caravan hitched up behind us, we traveled away for a weekend in the country.  And I was pleased to find a little stitching time too.  I was sheltered from the hot Wairarapa sunshine, nice and shaded under our awning.  I didn’t do a great deal of stitching, but every little bit helps, doesn’t it?

We had a lovely weekend away with our caravan club friends, camped by a pretty little duck pond.  The pond residents got up to all sorts of ducky antics to keep us amused, quacking loudly when annoyed by their neighbours, then swimming serenely in the pond.

The resident ducks

There were horse events going on at the adjacent grounds – before they compete, they walk the horses around the course to get warmed up and orientate themselves.  We had the use of a meeting room overlooking these grounds, so had a good view from one floor up.

Checking the course

On Saturday we went out to a cafe for afternoon tea, and the owner also had a gorgeous Christmas Shop, chock full of all sorts of beautiful items.  I love Christmas, and although I was tempted by several lovely things, walked away empty handed.  Sometimes there is just too much choice, and I can’t decide!

A corner of the Christmas shop

As the weekend progressed, the weather changed and by the time we packed up and started the journey home, up and over the hills, it looked like this.

Misty rain on our journey home.

It was a lovely weekend away, and after our two hour journey, we arrived home to sunshine again.  The caravan was unpacked, a load of washing put on, and we can finally relax with our feet up, before we have to ponder the big question – what's for dinner tonight?

Off we go Again

Patchwork projects have been put on the backburner once more as we are off again in our caravan for the next two weeks.  Starting with a visit to Hunterville, a small community on SH1, to spend time checking out the annual shemozzle.  This is a fun day that the whole community gets behind, and kids and adults  alike enter races, doing crazy things, and having fun. The town festival and market held on the first Saturday after Labour Day has a "Shepherds Shemozzle" – the premier race of the day with shepherds and their dogs  travelling from all over New Zealand to compete for the top prize.  We secured a good seat to watch the fun unfold.

Waiting for the fun to start

I purchased some Shemozzle merchandise too, a handy jute shopping bag and  tea towel, both featuring images of the iconic Huntaway dog.  These sheep dogs have great intelligence, agility and stamina needed for days of working on steep, rough country over large distances, driving very large mobs of sheep. Their bark is deep and repeating, usually with a short pause between barks, which allows the barking to be sustained for very long periods

Mementoes of the shemozzle

We are now slowly heading northwards to attend a Leisureline Owners Rally in Auckland next weekend.  Yes, I know, we are hardly ever home.  We had booked into Awastone Riverside Haven for the first night of this trip with our travelling companions, a great little camp beside the Rangitikei River.

Awastone Camp, beside the Rangitikei River

And yes, I’ve packed my stitching bag, although I haven’t actually done any stitching so far on this trip.  But I’m sure to get stitching shortly – I hope!

Still Traveling

We are still on a caravan trip and since collecting my quilt from Linda at Taupo, we moved on to Hamilton.  Want to see another peek of my beautiful quilt?  Linda quilted all around my simple candlewick blocks and really made them look special.

Another peek at Linda’s beautiful quilting

The trip to Hamilton was to visit the “Motorhome, Caravan, and Leisure Show” where all the brand new vans and motorhomes are displayed.  There was free parking for vans at this 3 day event, and we joined about 900 others.  I climbed up the road to the top of the hill to get a photo over the site – and was I puffed when I reached the top!  Certainly worth it though, and walking back down was so much easier.  We went for a walk and saw vans parked all over the place, many at the back of buildings so not easily seen from the road.  And caught up with some old friends from different parts of the country whom we only see at these type of get-togethers.

Looking at all the bright and shiny new vans was great, but I was also quite taken with a display of restored retro vans, all beautifully styled with accessories too.  This little cutie in particular.

Pretty little retro van

Leaving the show, we traveled south at stopped off at the little town of Kihikihi – it was time to do some laundry.  Keeping up with the laundry makes me a very happy camper indeed.

We are staying for the next couple of nights at Bell Block, New Plymouth, under the shadow of Mt Egmont.  What a great view we have from our caravan site.  Hopefully I will get a clearer shot next time.  There is a saying up this way – “If you can’t see the mountain, it’s raining, and if you can see it, it will be raining again soon”.

Mt Egmont

I’ve only managed to do a little hand stitching while we have been away, and need to go and buy some more thread – I’m stitching a NZ native bird and  need blue for tail feathers and a red/yellow for the beak and feet.  We will be having a catch up with friends later for an evening meal, so that will be very nice. 

A little More Soul Searching this week

The roll of the dice brought up number four this week, which is my Soul Searching UFO.  I had previously sewn all the strip sets as “leader and ender” sewing, and also constructed several of the large blocks.  This week I had to make my choice from these.

Strip sets left to sew together

So what colours did I chose?  So far the dark blue and light blue blocks have been put together.

Dark and light blue blocks sewn

With red the next one to be worked on.  I like to lay all my strips out in order, to make sure I have them all in the correct order.  Those sneaky little strips have been known to lie there quietly the wrong way round, to see if I notice before they are pinned and stitched.

Starting on the red block

And I’m quite pleased with my sewing this week, in between other commitments.  Such as cooking – I seem to be doing an awful lot of this lately.  It’s winter in our part of the world, and to tell the truth, I love homely winter foods.  Recently I’ve made steak and kidney casserole in the crockpot, cooked up a big pot of curried sausages, made some soup, and cooked a big bowl of tamarillos.  As kids, we used to call these winter fruits tree tomatoes, who can remember that?  These days they are known as tamarillos and I love them cooked  to eat with my cereal for breakfast.  They are full of all sorts of good vitamins, and taste good too.  Robin doesn’t like them, so they are all mine!

Be-twist and Between

What’s a girl to do on Saturday when there hasn’t been a roll of the dice early in the week to let me know what UFO to work on?  I had finished stitching the binding on my new quilt, added the label, took some photos and wrote a blog about it.  What can I do now, without upsetting my “roll the dice” campaign, which incidentally, always (or like this particular week, sometimes) happens on Monday morning?

I know, I’ll work on that summer skirt I’ve been meaning to make for sometime.  It’s been cut out and put away for ages.  The pretty autumn hued leafy fabric was purchased on our trip to Australia from the Aboriginal Fabric Gallery in Alice Springs, and I purchased enough to make a skirt.    I suspect that they are gum leaves, but I’m happy to be corrected.  Read about my visit to this lovely quilt shop here.

Cotton quilting fabric for my new skirt

The pattern used was nothing too fancy, just a simple summer skirt with an elastic waist band.  It didn’t take too long at all to stitch up, and will be nice and cool to wear now that the weather has changed yet again.  We have gone from the torrential showers of yesterday, to hot, muggy and sticky temperatures today – rather like Aussie, actually.  No two days seem to be the same lately.

My new summer skirt

With that extra bit of sewing accomplished, I’m looking forward to rolling the dice again on Monday morning.  Wonder which UFO I’ll get to work on?  I’ll just have to wait and see what number comes up.

Slow Sewing Sunday

With the binding of my new quilt all pinned in place, today was a slow sewing kind of day.  The plan to sit outside on the patio, shaded from the summer sun under our large umbrella while enjoying my stitching time just never happened.  Summer deserted us today, after a gorgeous day yesterday.  The  cold wind was blowing, a few showers passed by, so there was no sitting outside for me.  Instead I set myself up at the dining table. 

Stitching at the dining table

Everything was at hand.  My pin container – check, small scissors – check, thread catcher – check.  It’s a bed quilt, so stitching the binding down by hand will take a while.  But this is a rather restful task to do, so I’ll take my time, and enjoy it, every step of the way.  And I don’t have to finish the job in one day, do I?

Camping amongst the Pohutukawa Trees

Finally finished – several projects for our caravan – using up just about all of the remaining camping in New Zealand fabric, featuring cute retro caravans, beach scenes and flowering pohutukawa trees.  With their beautiful crimson flowers tipped in gold, the trees are known as New Zealand Christmas trees.  All that remains of this fabric is just a few tiny pieces, although I have a reasonable amount of the plain grey homespun left.

New Zealand summer scene fabric

My plan over the weekend was this – to complete two placemats, one apron, and a double handed oven cloth.  So a little after lunch time on a wild, wet and windy Sunday the current number 6 has been knocked off my List of Six UFOs.  In between showers I stepped out to get an outdoors photo, hoping that the wind wouldn’t pick everything up off the wooden bench and blow them all over the fence!  I’m so pleased with another finish, and these items will reside in our caravan and get good use, I’m sure.

Sewing for the caravan

Update – and my new List of Six

Our Aussie Adventure holiday is now a distant memory, and we have been home a couple of weeks now.  So it is time to get serious, and start stitching again.  How else will I get through all my UFOs?

But first, an update.  My grand-daughter’s horse quilt (previously number 5 on the list)  is now in the care of Paula, of Rabbit’s Patch Quilting, for her to work her magic on it.  I’m gifting this quilt to Emma for Christmas.

And number 1, the quilt for our caravan, the top is completed and this will have to wait it’s turn with being commercially quilted too.  I find big bed quilts just too much for me to quilt on my domestic machine.

So with two numbers off the list, I’ve had to look around to see what I would like to replace them with.  I like to have a variety of both big and smaller projects to work on.  So…… without further ado, my new list is:

No 1:   Animal ABC quilt - new to the list.
No 2:   Stitchery Bag.
No 3:   Winter Welcome Wall-hanging.
No 4:   Candlewick quilt
No 5:   Christmas Stars and Nine Patches – another new addition to the list.
No 6:   Caravan Placemats and Apron.

So there we have it.  Two new additions, I’ve previously worked on No 2 and No 4 from the list, and although No 3 and No 6 have been on the list a little while, their number has not yet come up.

My current List of Six projects, waiting for the roll of the dice

And the winner this week is………..number 4, my candle wick quilt.  There are nice big blocks in this, so hopefully it won't take me too long to get the top together.  Mind you, my social calendar is fairly full this week, so I had better get on with it.

Any Guesses?

Any guesses what I’m up to this week?  It all started with this bunch of fabrics which I sliced and diced.

For a mystery project

Then I made a whole bunch of these.  Oh no - I'm making yet another UFO!

All stitched up

What do you think?  We have some exciting news coming, and this will be part of it.  Meanwhile, normal service on Rolling the Dice and the List of Six has been postponed for a while.  I’ll let you know all about it next time.