delicious

Two delicious things on this raining afternoon. Three if you count having a nap. Oh the life of a duck herding consultant!

Behold the Kiwi Melomel on day 3. The froth has gone. I think the froth was mostly pollen from the honey and a result of all the swishing and stirring to get the honey to dissolve on a mid winter day. 

And I have just ordered the yarn for a new project. How gorgeous is this crocheted cardigan! Gwynne from next door lent me the pattern. She has made the same thing but out of different wool. I fell in love with the colours as much as the pattern, so for once I am going to follow the pattern COMPLETELY and even use the SPECIFIED wool in the SPECIFIED colours! What fun to try a bit of compliance. How hard could it be?

Crochet with a Duck and a Llama

It's on again folks.

If you are a fellow ONCian who thinks they might just like to learn the gentle art of CROCHET, well, Alpaca Magic is running another CRAZY ABOUT CROCHET course and you can learn to crochet from a duck.

This was such fun last year. The course runs over three Saturday afternoons from 1:00pm to 4:00pm.

The workshops happen in a sunny warm space at Alpaca Magic out at Sutton. Dates for this year are:

Saturday 16th, 23rd and 30th June
From 1:00pm - 4:00pm
At Alpaca Magic, 2771 Sutton Rd, Sutton.

• Session 1 will cover the basic stitches, reading crochet recipes, yarns and basic Llama hugging techniques. 
• Session 2 will have you all ready to start on a lovely project of your choosing - perhaps a nice beanie or noodley spiral scarf.
• Session 3 will see us finishing up our projects, leaning another new stitch and going 3D into the world of crochet flowers. 

Cost will be $160 for the whole three days including a cuppa, lots of support and giggles and fun, enchanted encounters with the llamas and alpacas, course notes, your very own crochet hook and some practice yarn.

EVEN IF YOU HAVE NEVER HELD A CROCHET HOOK BEFORE AND ARE ESPECIALLY SCARED you are very very welcome. You will be able to buy beautiful yarn made from the fleeces of the alpacas that live at the farm - home grown fleece! Of course you are welcome to use other yarns of your choosing because THIS IS ABOUT CROCHET LOVE.

What do you think? Prospective Gentleman Crocheters are very welcome - CROCHET IS NOT FOR SISSIES you know.

Enrollment forms are available from the Alpaca Magic website. Is this a nice thing to do?

You betcha.
 

Daphne

Actually, this is my latest beanie. Beanie #6478920. Alpaca thank you - the yarn of duck herding choice. I am liking that ribbing so much I have started another one that is all alternating front and back post treble thingies. And it is looking pretty good. Super thick, variegated and squidgy.  I decided a clever way to do the increases was to do two front post trebles around one post, and then on the next row, when you get to those two front post trebles, add a back post treble into the second one before you add a front post treble into the same one....which gets you back into a front back front back alternating pattern.....if that makes sence.....hmmm, better wait untill there is a picky.

anyhoo. The DAPHNE is flowering like crazy and the house is full vases oozing that gorgeous kinda froot loop smell which I love so much and which is like a special special gift of colour and scent in the dead of winter. Yay for Daphne.

Learn to Crochet from a Duck!

OK my feathered friends. This is PRETTY COOL. Remember I went on an adventure to Alpaca Magic to huggle llamas buy BEAUTIFUL ALPACA YARN? Well, the gorgeous Glynda has ASKED ME TO RUN A CRAZY ABOUT CROCHET course for folks wanting to learn crocheting from a Duck, I mean, of fine things perhaps with lovely Alpaca yarn. Imagine learning to crochet and huggling Llamas all on the same day? Times 3!


If you are a fellow ONCian who thinks they might just like to learn the gentle art of CROCHET, then I would love to met you! It would be SUCH FUN!

We are still working out the fine details,and Glynda is still to update the website but at this stage, we are looking at holding a series of 3 workshops on:

Saturday the 9th, 16th and 23rd of July
From 1:30pm - 4:30pm
At Alpaca Magic, 2771 Sutton Rd, Sutton.

• Session 1 will cover the basic stitches, reading crochet recipes, yarns and basic Llama hugging techniques. 
• Session 2 will have you all ready to start on a lovely project of your choosing - perhaps a nice beanie or noodley spiral scarf.
• Session 3 will see us finishing up our projects, leaning another new stitch and going 3D into the world of crochet flowers. 

Cost will be $160 for the whole three days including a cuppa, lots of support and giggles and fun, enchanted encounters with the llamas and alpacas, course notes, your very own crochet hook and some practice yarn.

EVEN IF YOU HAVE NEVER HELD A CROCHET HOOK BEFORE AND ARE ESPECIALLY SCARED you are very very welcome. You will be able to buy beautiful yarn made from the fleeces of the alpacas that live at the farm - home grown fleece! Of course you are welcome to use other yarns of your choosing because THIS IS ABOUT CROCHET LOVE.

What do you think? Prospective Gentleman Crocheters are very welcome - CROCHET IS NOT FOR SISSIES you know.

Enrollment forms are available from the Alpaca Magic website. Is this a nice thing to do?
 
Lordie I am so excited. 

THIS is what living a post project existence is ALL ABOUT.

Lacuna Sabbath

 Ok so last week I went on an adventure to Alpaca Magic near Sutton. My golly. I got to huggle some marvelous Llamas and bury my nose in beautiful soft gorgeous Alpaca yarns. I can not tell you how blissful it was/is to be surrounded by Mama Llamas and their little ones, feeding out the chopped up carrots I bought out 'specially. I was made to feel so welcome by the humans and by the llamas. What a lucky duck I was that day!

Mr Duck had been quite specific. He said he wanted a beanie with three grey stripes. So here it is. Hmmmm, that yarn. Alpaca is my new forever favorite. These are all natural colors - can you believe that?

And here are Mr & Mrs King Parrot - back again for winter.

And here is one of my loves for winter - parsley. Super.

Stay warm ya'll

Faithful Teacosy Friends

While there is nothing better than finding excellent appreciative homes for one's wilder teacosies, and also, nothing much better than crocheting away with a special tea drinking friend in mind, some teacosies never leave home and instead become part of the stable stable.

For instance, in winter, Miss Scallopini does a superbly functional job at keeping one's tea warm for an extended period of time. The pattern is available for FREE from Crochetroo. It takes a TONNE of yarn, but it is worth it for a super insulating teacosy.

And here are teacosies #1, #2 and #10 all in a huggle. Patterns for #1 and #2 also from the lovely Crochetroo. Here is the link here for the Crochetroo etsy site.

Teacosy #6 was until recently gainfully employed at the Pasha Bulka, more formally known as the big shipping container, but actually the Queanbeyan Government Service Center where a certain duck once kept a hot desk. (AGAIN, a crochetroo tea cosy base)

She is quite lovely from left and from right me thinks.

Tasmania - the crochet isle

Sometimes you go to a City and you just fit in. I mean, REALLY, just look at these dainty sweetly knitted bike racks in South Hobart.

This isnt a great pic, but it is where my sister and I had coffee.
You can see Mount Wellington covered in cloud in the back ground.

South Hobart is just so lovely. It is like a little village. I made friends instantly. People liked my new scarf.

Yes, this is my latest creation. It is BABY ALPACA. I really like crocheting in alpaca. It is so nice and soft to wear too.


The last time I was in Tasmania, I was a baby 19 year old hitch hiking around with my BFATT* having a marvelous adventure on just $8 a day. Folks are just as friendly 22 years later, and the food is just a delicious.

Everyone thinks Hobart is cold, but it is warmer and milder at night than the ONC.
I could live here very easily.


*boy friend at the time

Crochet Bag

Instead of going back to work I have been mooching and getting funky with the hook. No matter how frugal one might be, one can never really have too many handbags yes? Behold the newest edition to the crochet stable - a big fat purple bag loosely based on this pattern here.

Basically I used three strands of different yarns, crocheting in the ends after each color change as I went along. I used up lots of balls in the wool box mixing up sock yarn, alpaca wool and various tea cosy colours.

Instead of separate straps, I marked the center front and back, and then continued in two sections, decreasing two stitches each row until I got to 10 stitches where I just continued on until the handle got to a comfortable length, and then stitched the two sections together. It is roomy and strong and thick and sits nicely over my hip. I guess mostly one might see this sort of handle style on a dilly bag with a circle base, but I wanted the option of carrying an A4 workbook if necessary. (Or the paper!) I am most pleased.

purdy colors.

Tea Cosy #10

Well, here he is folks. Another Owlly. This time, made a bit bigger to fit my new blue tea pot.

Nice.

Tea Cosy #9

There are no words.

Except BIG LOVE to the Grand Purl Baa for the recipe for the famous Australian owl tea cosy. Owlly, I have searched for your DNA pattern for many years, and how fitting that Loani brought you to me.

He is made out of OWLpacca wool - get it?

Tea Cosy #8 finito

Well ladies, thank you for your very inspired suggestions. Feathers of course. However, then I started getting this picture of a big red rafflesia - you know, a CORPSE flower.

Like this:

See, this one:

And from the side:

I am not sure, but I am thinking it may be the first crocheted rafflesia in the blogosphere.........

Tea Cosy #8

Dear bloggy friends. I need some help. I have been working on tea cosy #8. She is looking pretty nice. But what to put on top?

The body is made from the most beautiful alpaca wool from Grenfell.......it is just lovely to work with. Its only 5 ply, so I crochet two balls at once........

I can't seem to find my crocheted flower book. So then I was thinking some crocheted fruit. But perhaps she deserves / needs something more fluffy and in line with her current fluffiness............

ideas?

Tea Cosy #7

Behold tea cosy #7. It is for Carolyn across the road. It took a little while. I was waiting for inspiration......and then on Thursday I had lunch at Benedict House with my dear friend Rosemary and in the bead shop I found the cutest Jack and Jill and baby Jesus motif buttons to use as centers for some of the flowers and that was all I needed.

I don't have a teapot small enough to show it off, but hopefully my measuring was OK and it fits Carolyn's teapot like a.......purpose built tea cosy made to measure and made with love!

crochet house eaters & bikes

I have almost finished making one of these.

These have been eating my house again. If you look carefully, just to the left of this bastard cockies foot, you can see where he has been biting off pieces of pergola.

And I really want one of these:

But the one fellow in Australia who was importing them has just gone out of business............So unless I can import one myself, I may end up getting one of these:

I am over having to put on cycling gear and cleated shoes to ride anywhere. I want to travel by bike in my civilian clothes, skirts and nice shoes. I want baskets and bells and comfort and style - something to REALLY compete with the car for convenience and fun.

That is all!

Beanie #7 & The Daily Pie

Yesterday I was in Goulburn for work and it was COLD.

So last night I made a new beanie. This is beanie number 7.

Do you think I went over board with the buttons? No, I don't think so either.

Lucky I had a new beanie, because today was a CRAP day. I chaired a meeting for a colleague and I did a CRAP job at it. The meeting got away, and off topic and I just couldn't pull it back. It really wasnt obvious to me or anyone else that actually, I am usually rather good a facilitating groups and meetings and getting folks to play nice with each other. I am still sick with the flu, and I was tired and my brain just wasn't nimble enough to keep up.

I think the problem was that the meeting room was too warm for me to keep my beanie on. Because I reckon if I had been able to wear it, then they would never have gotten away.

Anyway. Sometimes I wonder why there are humans, and why I have to work with them.

And then I put on my new beanie, and drop in on my compost heaps to feel how hot and lovely they are even in this cold weather, and then I go out and feed the ducks and the chooks and everyone quacks and clucks and fluffs and all is right in the world.

In other news, the Grand Purl Baa Queen of Tea Cozies was interviewed on Radio National yesterday morning and she was WONDERFUL. Go Loani!!!!

In other other news, for all you ONCians, I have had lunch here at The Daily Pie twice and it is HEAVEN. You see, a sad thing happened a couple of months ago when Cedar Organics in Goulburn closed, and my source of lentil patties with organic salad and homemade relish was cut off. But then Helen and her team of gorgeous things opened up a PIE SHOP at Collector and well............everything is going to be just fine.

It is the COOLEST WARMEST FUNKIEST place ever and can you really go wrong with delicious homemade pies nestled on oceans of mashed potato, gravy and peas? I didn't think so.

There, I feel better now.

Tea Cosys #5 and #6

Behold the new season duck herder tea cosies. These are for medium sized teapots - and can you believe with all the teapots in abundance here, there are no medium ones for photo purposes?

Tea cosy number 5 (above) - for one of my teapots at work.

Tea cosy number 6 (below) - for my friend Robin. I surreptitiously measured up her naked teapot during lunch the other day. (do you think she will like it?)

Ok, so I got a little carried away with the flowers.

Beanies #5 and #6

relish the relish

Well, not EVERY post can be about Queen Atalia.

Thought some of the southern hemisphere folks might like a peak at Jay's Nanna's Relish recipe. Now us folks at the princess castle LOVE our relish - and I can honestly say, this is THE relish recipe - you can throw away all the others.

Tomato Relish

12 large ripe tomatoes ( the riper the better) raw, unpeeled

4 medium onions

570gms (20 oz) sugar

2 tablespoons Keen's Curry Powder

1 teaspoon Keen's Dry Mustard Powder

6 dried chillies - chopped - with seeds

Brown (malt) vinegar - almost enough to cover

Cut tomatoes in smallish chunks (ie less than quarters) and throw into colander, salting as you go

Slice and chop onions, throw into a second colander salting as you go

Stand colanders in bowls, cover with plastic or tea towels and let the tomatoes and onions sweat overnight. (Quite a lot of water comes off the tomatoes especially - so use a large bowl)

Place sweated tomatoes and onions into large saucepan. Just cover with malt vinegar. Bring to boil. Boil for 5 minutes.

Mix curry powder and dried mustard in a little liquid from the saucepan, add this mixture and thee sugar and chillies to the pan.

Boil, stirring fairy constantly for somewhere between 45 minutes and 1 hour.

The time depends on the size of the tomato chunks, the ripeness of the tomatoes, the amount of vinegar used, how hard you boil.

To tell when it is ready:

1) it has to reduce

2) the bits of onion should no longer be white

3) non of the tomatoes should look fresh or uncooked

4) the colour should be reddish brown - more brown than red

5) the consistency should not be as sticky as jam, but it should have reduced enough to feel "dense" when you stir with the wooden spoon. Like jam, the tomato and onion should stay on the spoon when lifted.

6) The surface should have a slight sheen.

Pour into clean warm jars. Sterilise as per your favourite method.

Serve with: Anything.

Oh, and here is my latest dishcloth.

Oh, and I almost trod on a brown snake today at the community garden. oops.
Oh, and some $#@#*& #^@&* cut the fence of the community garden to break in overnight. Sucko kiddo - we don't keep the mower there anymore. Hope you get tetanus from the fence buddy.

Oh, and here is my Zuc Bread. We are living on this stuff atm. Yum yum. I want some RIGHT NOW.

Tuesday Stuff

free embroidery design from http://www.needlecrafter.com/

Well the duck herder is officially famous. yup. I have made it into "Inside Waste" magazine. Actually the project is famous. But still, it is the little things. There is nothing like finding folks who get the whole organics back into agriculture closing the loop thing. I think the editor liked the fact that I confessed to loving compost windrows perhaps more than anything. Luckily he didn't print that bit.

In other news, finally finally the tomatoes cometh in more than dribs and drabs. A WHOLE buckets worth yesterday. Now that's more like it. Enough of blackberry jam - bring on the relish! Last year was the year of the Brandywine. This year it's all about the Ukraine and surrounds. Today we give thanks for Black Krims and Black Russians and all the other gorgeous purple, green, black and dark burgundy tomatoes. Naturally we also give thanks for vodka - the other special thing from the Ukraine. Oh, we also give thanks to the Ukraine for half my beloved's genetic material.

The garden is loving us atm. We havnt bought veggies or fruit for weeks and week. I have the most AMAZING salads each day. There are two chooks laying now so we have eggs.

The young chooks are maturing nicely. The Big Fella is definitely a girl faverolle - probably too darkly marked for the standard, plus wrong number of toes, but she is lovely and sweet and quiet. I declare her an excellent introduction to the breed and I look forward to trying again next year to get a few more faverolle eggs to hatch at great expense and extravagance.

Poor old Charlotte the oldest crankiest red chook is feeling a bit down atm. She goes through stages where she gets all droopy, her perky comb goes all blue at the ends and she just sits on the back door mat all day in a bit of a daze. In the past this has lasted a week or so, and just when I think she is at deaths door (as well as the back door) she perks up, colours up and gets on with it. She is old. She has had a good life and I am OK with her drifting along a bit in her dotage. I wish she wouldn't crash tackle the silkie and pull out her pom pom feathers though - it is so MEAN.

The last of the baby ducks have gone their new home. Well, the last two drakes have gone to live with Mario untill they are fat enough for the pot anyway. So finally Miriam is back with his girls and a certain calm as returned to the backyard.

I have a secret project happening - I am crocheting a jumper. There is no pattern, except for a conceptual idea of how a one piece top down raglan jumper can be constructed from one piece of string and a crochet hook. The colours are a bit crazy, but as a prototype it has been a good experience. It has been hard to stay focused on one big project - my mind and hands want to grab different colours and make small projects such as tea cosys and beanies. But I am gently persevering.

And in the continuing vein of doing things that don't involve my brain unless I am being paid, I found this cute free embroidery design from www.needlecrafter.com which I am planning on trying to sew onto a plain food cover keep the flies off thingy forgotten what they are called. I wish my Nanna was still alive - she would be so proud of all my fruit growing, the veggies, preserving and crocheting and feeble attempts at embroidery. I miss you Nanna. The older I get the more I become like you and that is only a good thing.

Sox #4

Latest off the hook. Notice the ribbed leg!