pixie hat

The wool arrived in a hank, haven't seen one of these since I was a small child and was required to stand with a hank of wool stretched between my arms while my mother wound the wool into a ball.

I used two chair back to stretch the wool out.

Then started knitting using this (vintage) pixie hat pattern. It was a style popular in the 1940s and 1950. Not having much knitting expeirence I had no idea how the pattern would turn out, there were no pictures but somewhere it says "a knitted rectangle is folded in half and grafted together" but my piece of knitting ended up this shape:

and holded in half

I had to do some homework before attempting the grafting together - in kitchener stitch. There are squillions of online knitting help sites. I used this one and did a trial first with a different colour grafting wool so I could see the mistakes, the first trial had a couple. This is the second:
Now for the pixie hat...

The wool barely reached the end of the grafting but once I'd pulled the stitches tighter there was plenty.

Polar bear models the finished article but isn't really a good substitute for a 4 month old baby head.

Instead of trying to follow the instructions for a neckband with knitted buttonhole I made a
tie neckband using Sew Liberated instructions

And there's still some wool left over...

stop the web, i want to get off

Termite on a rain drop, on a cobweb, wafting around in the breeze.

More antics

foreign parts

New Zealand November 2009

airport

Recently I had to spend several hours waiting around at Dusseldorf airport - it was interesting, there were flying dogs and....

live music.....

pup & pineapple

road dragon, blue tongue and snake

A bearded dragon who chose the road as a good place so soak up some Spring sunshine, not a good place even with the small amount of traffic around these parts. Yes, that stoney ground is a road, an all-weather dirt road, we're just waiting for some rain to test it out. This pose is his response to a vehicle, he puffs himself up and tilts his body towards the threat (me this time). The warmer weather has brought other lizards out (and a brown snake at the back door but the snake didn't pose for a photo) including this blue tongue lizard displaying his method defense - his scarey blue tongue, also he was hissing. Both of these types of lizard can be kept as pets but these two are definitely wild and free.

rusty old vauxhall velox

we have lemons...

So I made Lemon Meringue Pie... it was yummy.

mystery bug

This the the fungus I found when I turned over a log while moving it and when taking a photo of the fungus saw this snazzy yellow and black bug which turns out to be (fittingly) a fungus-eating ladybird - not a very co-operative photographic subject. She (he) kept running away, or dropping off the stalk in an escape attempt, then the wind would blow the stalk and ladybird away.

something different for the vegetable garden

The next decision will be were the vegetables should be grown this summer as there may be no water (for gardening anyway) at the house where the garden would be most convenient...the garden may have to be two miles down the road, close to the bore.