I blinked...

...and then it was December!

This is the post I thought I'd write about a week ago, sharing the last of my November finishes. Somehow the 30th November and December 1st merged into one (and are now a distant memory)!

I completed another embellished tea towel sometime during November. It matches the blue one shown *here*.

I've also been slow to share the finished Zookeepers Blanket. I really wanted to wash and block it before I took my final photos but I just haven't got around to doing that. You'll have to be happy with this shot until I get myself organised.

What I have been able to achieve though is this completed quilt (top) -- the second of the three baby quilts I want finished before Christmas. Keeping in mind they all need quilting too, I think I have a busy few weeks ahead of me!

However, getting back to this one, I'm happy with how it turned out; I did use the softer blue print I was concerned about (in my last post), and it looks just fine. There is a lot of open light coloured space and I do wonder about the practicality of that but oh well it's done and if the quilt gets washed to death, I'll be happy as it also means it's being used.

I'm going to be optimistic and link up to Elm Street Quilts' One Monthly Goal this month. Previous goals haven't come to fruition but I'm sure I'll be able to finish this quilt by the end of the month :-) Thank you Patty for hosting this monthly motivator.

I finished another Whimsical Woodland block last week which means the stitching on this mystery project is up to date for another few days, when the next one is due. I don't think I'll get the catch-up-piecing done for this in the near future but if a spare day comes along, maybe I'll give it a try?

I've had a lovely time with the grandies lately; looking after the girls when my DIL has a town day planned, or helping ED with her babies.
I don't get many chances to take photos, but manage the odd one. Here are two favourite shots —

Lily and George hanging out with Mum.

Having a chat while Ganma gets lunch ready.

The MOML isn't very well this week so I've been a proper farmer's wife again, back in the shed. As long as the right music is on the radio I'm quite happy to look after 'the girls' while he recuperates. It's a nice time of the year to be milking; it's not too hot, the girls have full bellies and are pretty content. As a bonus, they have nice full udders to make the job seem worthwhile.

So grateful to our family once again who are quick to leap in to help take the pressure off ♥

I can think of worse things to do than spend time getting the herd to the shed.

Till next time,

Happy stitches!!

 

A weekend away

Some days it seems like spring is well and truly here and summer is just around the corner.
On other days it feels like winter still wants us to know it exists - we even lit the fire this last weekend.
Luckily for the MOML and I, the previous weekend was a beautifully warm and sunny one.
Dairyfarming is a 24/7 occupation and time away for the MOML doesn't happen very often. Our three fabulous kiddos banded together and between them (and their own families and committments) made sure the cows were milked, the calves were fed and all the other animals were looked after so that we could have a weekend away. Some even made sure the house didn't get lonely and the food in the pantry didn't go off :-)
As we like to do, we headed up north. We went to Doubtless Bay to a fishing settlement called Mangonui. A lovely place to rest and eat and walk.

Many of the bays in the Far North are known for their swimming or surfing beaches. This one is slightly different with its rocky shoreline. It feels like it's carved into the hillsides and perched on the edge of the land.

Of course before we went away there was a bit of planning to do. Lots of tracing so I could stitch all weekend. Yeah right.

And we weaned a mob of calves to lessen the workload for YD. Weaned calves are taken 'out the back'...a 3 km track through the bush to more land out there.
First of all I get them to follow me as far along the track as practical...they follow the feeder knowing they'll be fed when it stops.

I've been cutting down their milk for a few days so it's a quick feed —

And a walk the rest of the way to fresh paddocks full of grass. Where they
forget that milk exists. Sort of.

I did get a little stitching done while we were away. I often find the lighting an issue when I'm away from home and all my crafting comforts. This compact/foldout rechargable LED light was great.

I finished Block 9 of the Whimsical Woodland mystery stitchery I'm doing.

But I mostly crocheted - once I got into joining the zookeeper blocks while we were in the car I got the itch to get them done so continued on  - and then started on the outside edge.

The joining stitch is OK. I think it will look better once it's washed and blocked. Maybe.!!!

Last week I spent my evenings knitting this Sunnyside cardigan - ED requested some 'next size up' spring time cardies for the babies. Happy to oblige.

I'll leave you with one last photo of our weekend away. this was the view from our motel room —

This week I've been getting a bit of sewing done - so who knows, I may have some quilty stuff to share next post :-)

Until then, 

happy stitches,

Bits of this and that

Whoops, I'm a day late for my end of month blogpost, so this will just have to be my 'start of the month' post instead!
As seems to be my style lately, not nearly as much achieved as I would have liked.
I did complete the stitchery for this Christmas hanging —

Jolly Santa by The Birdhouse

I also managed to spend an afternoon testing a pattern for Juliet of Tartankiwi. This Basset Hound had already 'been to the testers' but some modifications had been suggested and I got to try the new version out. (Juliet specialises in foundation paper piecing designs). Lucky me. I think he looks quite neat...pattern testing gives me an opportunity to play around with fabrics and a totally new/different design for a bit and I always enjoy it.

Last month I lined myself up with the goal of finishing my next baby quilt. I even signed up with Patty D of Elm Street Quilts' One Monthly Goal to help commit myself. Sadly, I just didn't find the time to get it done :-( but happily I'm closer to getting it done than I was then :-) Who knows maybe, this will be the month for a finsh!!

Last night when I had no more armchair stitching prepared, I picked up my Zookeepers blanket. A wee while ago I had started joining the squares using this method, (shown below) quite straight forward to do but with the slightly different sized blocks (both ED and I made them) there was a bit of buckling so I decided to try something that would be more forgiving. (And I'd decided I didn't want to sew them together with a needle; using a crochet hook was more appealing).

Last night I experimented with this join instead. Not sure what it is called and where abouts in the world wide web I found the idea but I'm much happier with how this is looking. It separates the blocks out a bit too, creating a larger blanket which I'm not unhappy about.

Aside from these few things, it's still all about Calves and Kids around here. We weaned our first lot of calves this morning (yaay! 11 down, 125 to go!).
You cant get much better than mornings like this —

Beautiful. So peaceful.

Nor afternoons like this —

I took the girls pinecone collecting.
Don't tell them it's just about the wrong season for this; they had great fun
exploring, it was a new experience for them.

Until next time,

Happy stitches :-)

George has a quilt!!

After what seems like forever, I have finally finished my Eeyore quilt. George gave it a little test ride yesterday and approved heartily ♥

This quilt started as a Foundation Paper Pieced Eeyore from Fandom Stitches. I enlarged the pattern to a little over 12"  —

— and had fun building it up to about 39" x 48" 

(Although the background colour is actually a light cream, not white, the photo shows the other colours off best.) 

I used Karen's tutorial (found *here*) to make the flanged binding. In this method, the flange is part of the binding.I'm not a huge fan of machine sewn binding but this turned out fairly well so maybe it's just a matter of practise!!

You may notice in the first photo above that George is wearing a new cardigan. ED realised she didn't have many small sized cardies for outings so requested a neutral coloured one which either baby could wear.

I hunted out an easy knit pattern and found this one called Carousel. It's knitted from the top down and all in one piece. It went together really quickly.

Modelled by Lily....

While I'm showing baby knitting you may remember the vests I made a few months back. When the babies visited yesterday they were wearing them :-) Nice to see them being used. And the buttons at the side made them easy to remove when the babies were sleeping and heating up!

And in other news —

Here are the last two blocks of the Zookeeper's Blanket - a Seal and a Red Panda. Yaay!!

Here's the tally —

And I've started a new stitchery; this will be a sample for work (The Country Yard) and is also a scary reminder that Christmas is on its way!!

As you can see, I'm gradually getting some more sewing and crafting time. Calving is slowing down and I'm hoping that it won't be too long until Lily has her quilt! Quilting it will be this month's OMG (linking with Patty of Elm St Quilts).
This is where I'm at with it so far —

Basted, that's all....

You can see that it is similar to the quilt I made for George. To save thinking time it might end up being quilted the same as his one too!

Thank you for visiting, I hope your weekend is going well and you've managed a bit of creative time,

Happy stitches,

One weekend sometime in August...

It was a pleasure to spend my Friday night in the company of like minded friends from around the world. Friday Night Sew In has given me the perfect excuse to kickstart my blogging again after a hiatus for much of this month.

Regular followers will be tired of seeing my Zoo keeper crochet squares - I'm getting a bit tired of them too. But after Friday, and also Saturday, night, I have added two more to my tally and have just two more to complete!
Yaay!

Square number 27!!

Then I will have to join them up.....
Coming up with enough scraps of colourful wool has been a problem but I've found that if you delve deep enough, you can find bits you didn't even know you had!

Square number 28!!

Saturday was a quiet morning on the farm - no dramas and just two new cows calving - so I was able to do some much overdue quilting on my Eeyore quilt. I'm trying to keep it simple for our wee boy but it's not very imaginative quilting I'm afraid ... I'm guessing he won't care one little bit that it's the same old continuous curves that Ganma has done on previous quilts!

Thank you Wendy for encouraging us with this regular link up. You can visit her blog *here* to see what others have been up to.

Today was a lovely fine day...nice to see the calves enjoying the sunshine —

These are my oldest ones; they're about 3 weeks old now.

And being nosey parkers when I disturbed them with my camera —

After a baking morning and baby cuddles this afternoon, suddenly it's the end of the weekend, and time to publish this blogpost.....
Hopefully now that things are starting to quieten down (a little) on the farm I'll be back soon :-)

Happy stitches,