The Daily Grind

Hi all, we went to a play centre in a different suburb quite a way away from where we live, a week or so ago and the boys had a blast! Being a school day there weren't very many kids there which I kinda like, as with my two boys being autistic, social skills aren't always understood and other parents can be quite a pain.

The other week M went outside very early in the morning to do something, he came running back in and asked for the camera as there was an amazing sunrise and he wanted to snap a picture. He did really well I reckon! Aren't they gorgeous pics??

What is it with cats and boxes?? Here's Muffin IN the box.....

And Keisha ON the box!! 

On this night when I found Keisha ON the box, I was deeply absorbed watching something on tv. Well I kept hearing this popping sound. The kids had already been in bed for quite a while but I thought it was M, so I called out and asked "Is that you M?" No answer.

In the end it got the better of me. This is what I found. We'd had pizza for dinner as a treat that night and Keisha decided that SHE wanted the box! The popping sound I heard was her clawing the box as cats do, to make it comfy.

Now I'm one of those cat owners who do NOT like their cats on any food benches, but I have to admit I did have a laugh, took the photo, and then she was heaved off onto the floor. And yes, she smelled like pizza!!

And here is "booby boy!!" The two boys were playing with balloons and then the giggles started.....

I do love their sense of humor!! xxx

Roving & Locks - Playing With Color

Hi all, well there's been lots happening in our little house over the past couple of weeks, hence the lack of blogging.

I've been doing some more roving dyeing and playing around with colors again. This one is space dyed, that's where you dye and set one section at a time.

Here you can see where I've finished the yellow dye and turned the roving to dye the other half purple. Clothes hangers are soooo handy!

This is how the pot looks when all the dye has discharged into the roving. It makes me really happy when I see the dye has ALL been discharged like this, that there's absolutely NO runoff left.

Here's the final result, I'm pretty happy with it and it'll be interesting to see how it spins up.

Remember the Romney X fleece I washed the other week? Well I wanted to try dyeing some locks and see how they came out, so I just used some dye in old ice-cream containers, then steamed it in oven bags.

It was a really fun afternoon dyeing these fibres and I'm excited to start spinning them soon!

Washed Fleece as Promised

Hi again, this is just a quick post to show you the fleece I've been washing, it's glorious and I can't wait to spin it!

This is the last of the two kilo's I bought, all washed and dry and ready to be flicked for spinning. The fleece is a Romney X which I bought from a friend. The sheep's name is Raggedy and is raised on her farm.

I Struggled With the Books.....

Hi all, well yesterday I spent the day de-cluttering like a crazy woman, this time it was under my bed and on top of my wardrobe. Everything got pulled out, sorted, and either put in piles near the front door for the Op Shop or repacked and put away. This is what my bedroom looked like for a while. Aaaargh!

As I was sorting through things, I came across my old nightclubbing clothes and smiled as I remembered lots of fun memories out with my girlfriends. Then I saw my boots, THOSE boots!! I really loved wearing those boots and they were a blast to dance in. I have a pair in white and another pair of black boots with tassels all down the sides, and pointy toes.

Well, T saw these white boots and wanted to wear them. I told him he wouldn't be able to manage as they're so high and a pointy heel, but NO, he WANTED to wear them. I sort of mumbled "whatever...." and went back to what I was doing.

A few minutes later a little voice said "Mummeeeeeeee???" And I put my head into the hallway....... What a fabulous camera moment!! He was stoked!!

After the bedroom stuff was done I went out to the garage, I needed to sort through a ton of books. I have to admit I'm a bit of a book whore, BUT I really need to change that as I could start my own library. Books are heavy and I really DON'T want to lug heaps of boxes of books when we move, books are damn heavy!!

I'd already sorted through a 6ft high by 3ft wide bookshelf full of books a few days ago and put the ones I wanted to keep into two tubs. That was one of the bookshelves that went out the front for hard rubbish pickup.

So, in the garage I had three 55 litre tubs jam packed with books, mostly craft books. These books were packed away and put out in the garage about six months ago and I haven't even missed them! These are books that I thought I could never live without!

Anyway, I thought about it and realised that between the local libraries and the internet, especially Ravelry, I really could cull my book collection back a LOT and not miss anything. So I did!

This is what I started with.

And I was able to cut them back to half of one box! Woohoo!! I made sure I put the containers of books for the Op Shop straight into the car so there was NO opportunity for picking.......

I felt lighter already!

Then I sorted through some other boxes of 'stuff' I had in the garage and this is what I ended up with - FIVE EMPTY CONTAINERS!!!! Woohoo!!!

And this is what my stationwagon looked like at the end of the day! The backseat is also folded down and filled with stuff too. This morning before we left for DS12's appointment I stuffed a few more things in and quickly shut the boot before it all burst back out!

This morning it felt SOOOOO good to give all that stuff to the Op Shop. It was still a little bit hard to give away my books, BUT I have plenty more and will probably cull again before I have cut back enough.

Seeya xxx

The De-Clutter Continues....

Hi all, well the de-cluttering is coming along nicely. On Monday T (DS4) and I started putting our big pile of 'junk' out on the nature strip ready for collection this Monday. He was such a good helper putting things into his wheelbarrow and taking them out the front for dumping!

I had stored a huge pile just inside my gate ready to go out and have put all that out except for some chaff bags of rubbish that I won't put out until Sunday night. People (me included) love to go through the hard rubbish piles and I don't want these bags emptied and left in a mess so I have to go out and clean it all up again. It's very rude when people don't leave things as they found them.

I've left the chaff bags in my driveway along with a huge old tv that I can't lift. I'll have to borrow my neighbors hubby for that one!

Since Monday, each time I've come home, it gives me the hugest buzz to see ALL that junk sitting there ready to go and know that in only a few more days, it'll be out of my life for good!

I've also been busily sorting out the inside of the house too. There were three bookshelves that I've put out too, they really have had it and I don't like the look of them. I'm trying really hard to only have stuff that is useable, gives me pleasure to look at, or I need to use at another time like Christmas decorations. It's just amazing how much stuff I have!! I am by no means a hoarder BUT we have been here now for 12 years and there's lots of stuff that needs to go.

I'm hoping to move house by the end of the year and I sure as hell will NOT be paying to move ANYthing that doesn't fit the above categories!!

Well T has just gotten up to start the day, so that spells the end of my blogging for this morning.

Here's a pic of our nature strip so far, there's much more to add!

Oh, and my car boot has a few boxes of stuff for the Op Shop too, I'm sure 'stuff' breeds by itself!!

Today there'll be more de-cluttering and some washing of fleece. I'm drying a gorgeous white fleece at the moment, pictures will come later today....

Have a good day! xxx

Dyeing - Playing with Color

Hi all, this past week the dyeing bug bit again, so as you know I've been trying to use up my yarn stash and that goes the same for my spinning stash. So I had a browse through one of my tubs and came across some Merino/Possum roving, Corriedale roving, Wensleydale/Teeswater roving and Jacob roving, so I dragged out my dyes and got to work!

Here's one of the rovings soaking in some vinegar and water while I got everything organised.

When I'm ready to dye, I just line up the roving as best I can on one of my tub lids, this makes it easy to catch the runoff dye and squeeze it back into the roving. The dye just washes straight off the plastic too.

Then I just pour on the dyes, this time I was playing around with pouring on little areas of color, sort of like spots. Then I very gently squeeze it out and pop it into an oven bag and into the pot to steam until the water in the water/dye in the bag runs clear.

This first batch is the Corriedale roving and on the right half of the picture I just dabbed patches of green, blue, red and yellow onto the roving to see what would happen. As you can see most of the yellow has been drowned out by the other colors but I'm very pleased with the results, it should make an interesting yarn.

On the left half of the picture I dabbed blue and green onto that section of the roving.

This is also the Corriedale roving and I made up some purple from pink and blue, and poured it in sections over the roving, I love the way it's come out in lighter and darker sections. It's much more purple-y than the picture shows too.

This one is the Merino/Possum roving, this is the only one out of all of these that I used Landscape dyes, all the others are dyed with food dyes. I used a deep dark purple and sort of a gold color and made striped areas. Apparently Possum is supposedly VERY warm....

And lastly here's the rest of the rovings, on the very right hand side are the purple Wensleydale/Teeswater and the blue Jacob, they were just small samples I got in a sample pack, so I was testing out how they'd dye.

The pink and blue is...... I've forgotten without looking it up which I'm not doing now as it's nearly 1am and way past bedtime.

So as you can see I had a lovely time playing around with color and making a huge mess! And yes, I walked around with green and blue hands for a couple of days again, because I kept forgetting to put my gloves on!

Seeya xxx

A Day at Home

Hi all, here's DS12's newest creation. DS4 is having a blast being hauled up and down the road on it!

And here's Mr Robot....

And here's what I made this afternoon for snacks for the next couple of days, if they last that long! There was a few dozen so I put some in the freezer for another time. These are really yummy, the recipe is from the '$21 Challenge' book, just simple cheese scones, and I have added bacon pieces and a ton of chopped onion, yummo!!

Today was just a quiet pottering around at home day, I got completely caught up on the washing which was nice, and tomorrow there'll be a ton of folding and putting away.... bleck!

It was nice to not spend ANY money today! This week I went through a fair bit of money on extras: box of nappies $27, DS12's school camp $320, yarn to finish charity blankets $30, meds $40.

You're probably wondering WHY I bought more yarn to finish charity blankets that I'm making to USE UP my yarn stash?? Well I needed some plain 8 ply acrylic yarns to go in between all the novelty yarns. I'm also half way through making a baby blanket too which needed yarn to finish it off. With what I bought this week it should be enough to completely finish off all the blankets, yay!!

Seeya xxx