Nah...

it wasn't just that I was busy spinning that made me miss yesterday's post. We went out to a quiz night, and trying to get the children vaguely ready for grandparents to babysit (thanks!) and getting everyone fed, was enough of a mission that the blog missed out.


I didn't take my camera, so I have some really shoddy phone shots (what the heck has happened to blokey husband's phone??). This is me hoping to have the lucky ticket - I'm not really that drunk, just in the middle of blinking. I hope. My friend L is most definitely not googling answers on her phone in the background either. No way. Nya uh. You can't do that with nuns around.


Nuns! Yes, real live nuns. Nuns are so exotic when you aren't a Catholic type. I feel the need to peer at them. This is another shoddy pic of our friend P cosying up to a nun to get some answers. We had to. We got a pathetic score of 4 on the religion round. Not fair when you are playing against nuns though eh?


His shmoozing didn't get him very far. I love the body language though - check out the ladies around the table, and the one bloke on the left....

Definitely a man for the laaaadeez (said in your cheesiest cheese voice) our P. Well, nuns anyway.

And in an attempt to redeem the photo front, I have only taken one pic in the last two days. It was this evening, and the light went that vivid yellow shade that only NZ can do. But, um, I had to put the dinner on, so I missed it. Gah! But I got this anyway, which will surely still fill any shepherd with delight?

Spinning Out Of Control

Ah, just lookie what turned up on the doorstep today....

Frustrating thing was P3 and I were in the middle of a big game of hide and seek, so with that lovely spinning adventure ahead of me, I was stuck hiding underneath my bed, looking at the dust and old tissues. For a while anyway. Soon enough I persuaded P3 to let me have a go on the spinning wheel, but first I had to find a distraction to keep her happy. Ah, the wonders of the make up bag...

First up on the agenda I needed to empty the bobbin. Somehow I managed to borrow a wheel but only one bobbin, but I am a kiwi girl after all, so I just needed a bit of number 8 wire - well actually a couple of empty toilet rolls - and I was set.



Plying was fun, and the slightly lipsticky P3 decided she'd take some pictures - and Mummy was in a yepsurethingbabyaslongasyouarehappy kind of mood. Thanks P3! That was handy to find on the camera.

I cheated and plyed with a commercial yarn, so I could clear the bobbin for this evening's spin-a-thon. I would show you the result but a ball of black, red and white yarn under harsh flash is just not a pretty sight, so you'll just have to wait for a finished knitted up piccie. I did manage a pic of the yarn from my first hour spinning though. It's pretty wobbly and thick, but I can always felt it right?

I'm hooked.

I'm not ready

to have a teenager :(

L6 has always been drained by people. Like me and his Dad, he can only be sociable for so long before needing some time to himself. But he has also always been pretty keen on Mummy. Sitting on top of Mummy most of the time. He often won't eat unless I'm right next to him. Usually our chairs have to touch.

But today after school he decided he wanted to be in his room, and shut the door. He emerged for food, then disappeared again happily playing with cars by himself. I know he was mostly hiding from P3, and I do prefer it to sibling bickering, but I missed my boy! I'm not ready for a teenager who hides behind a closed door. Nooooooooooooooooo not yet!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes P67 - that is the piglet picture you sent on his bedroom door :)

Indulgence

Today my friend L and I took our daughters P1 and P3 to town on the local ferry. It goes right under the harbour bridge, so it was a great treat for them. P3 loves boats, so she was super excited and asked this morning if we had to bring our togs. I hope not P3!




The girls had a great time. I realised how lucky I was to have a three year old now.


One year old's are rockingly cute, but boy are they hard work!



Ah yes, I remember the stair thing. I'm sure you do too if you have ever had a one year old. Luckily my friend L is endlessly patient, and P1 is strong on the cute stakes - plus she wore the cardy I knitted that P3 refused, so she is completely worthy of all the running around. Sweet girl.



And while we indulged them on a day trip in lieu of tidying our houses (sigh, the sacrifice) I noticed all the other indulgences around today.

Blokey husband must have missed me over the weekend, because I came home to flowers.

I missed him so I bought him wine glasses. Nothing to do with the fact that we had smashed all our other ones and these ones were beautiful. I found them in Tirau of all places (yeah, I dunno where it is either) but when I was there I saw these, and you know I'm a sucker for something beautiful, so a present was a great excuse. Yeah, the wine was tonight's indulgence too. Only because I didn't want to take a pic of an empty glass. Really.


And this? Indulgent grandparents sitting in a darkened room this afternoon swinging torches around to make a disco for P3 and L6.

But sometimes you can't indulge. Like when L6 announced that he was going to keep the potato that looked like a dog for ever and ever. Nup. I made him eat the doggy potato.

But I will have one more motherly indulgence - proudly posting L6's shark drawing on the internet. Cute picture eh?

Bounty

I decided it was time to rid the veggie garden of the evil diseased beans. And pretty much everything else too. But when I cleared out the bean stranglehold, lookie what I saw...



Sqillions of wasted cherry tomatoes. Those beans really were evil, hiding all those jolly red tomatoes.


Then I decided the tomato plants looked pretty skanky themselves, so had a good purge of them. Got a reasonable swag to ripen inside:


Maybe I'll be all flash and cook some up to preserve, says she pretending she has some idea how to actually do that.

I definitely need a trug. I didn't know what a trug was until quite recently, but now I know, I need one. Badly. I had to biff all the carefully sorted by size toms into one bowl when I got the urge to dig what had been a potato patch, but was now looking decidedly bare. Woohoo - tatties too!

They were from some organic potatoes that had begun to sprout, not even seed potatoes, so I wasn't that hopeful, but they are YUM. That is the official word after dinner.

If you look carefully there are even a few passionfruit in there too.

Then I was on a roll so I decided it was the end of the line for the next lot of carrots:

and they even looked carrot-shaped. It was a joyous afternoon! Okay, some of them had clearly been in there Way Too Long, but still generally carroty.

To top it off after dinner we went to investigate the suspiciously grapey looking thing that had been appearing in the driveway, and what do you know:

GRAPES! I have taken them inside in the hope of ripening them where wasps can't reach them, but that may be a mistake. Not my first gardening mistake, and most definitely not my last, but on the whole? Bounty.

I Went Away

and I love my friends. And I didn't have to cook or clean or get up in the middle of the night and I got to hang around in a hot pool and it rocked.

My friends also love yarn.



Most of the time anyway.

I have a new obsession thanks to the fabulous Lulu - how I love her! - who taught us the basics of spinning

and then (gasp!) lent me her spinning wheel for a while!

I'm so in love. Pretty soon I'll be churning out things like this:

Oh, no. That took eight years. Perhaps I won't just yet.

I was also lucky enough to meet E10, daughter of one of my knittng buddies. I think a few of us that weekend were thinking that we cannot wait till our children are ten after meeting this sweet little girl, who sat and knitted with the girls all weekend, got singstar going for us, and quietly proved her bravery after a justifiable panic on the abseil wall. I didn't do it. E10 it was a pleasure to meet you.

Goodness it was nice to come home too.

Gone Knitting

No pics for a few days, as I'm off on a road trip with my knitting buddies. Promise I'll overload you with pics on my return.

Joys of Summer

(When you are three anyway.)

Hanging out the dolly washing.

Wah! Off To Bed

. . . and I haven't even blogged.

Ummm . . . well technically it was yesterday, but I made some felted slippers.

(I think the process has broken my relatively new washing machine. Boo.)

Superdog

Baboo has recently been renamed Superdog, but I think it is just a temporary nickname. He was initially called Louie Blue, and this is the first picture I have of him, in a pile of Christmas presents from the children in my class, Christmas 2003.

It was easy to find pictures for this post, because Baboo has featured rather heavily in L6's life. Here in 2006 (it was Easter - that's my excuse for drawing on my children) he was obviously more cuddly than P-zero.

He has slept with L6 every night of his life. He almost missed one in 2005, but Mutti was kind enough to do a mercy dash from her house at 10 minutes passed bedtime, when we realised that Baboo had been 'lefted behind' after a visit.

This morning I was hurrying L6 out of the car to get to school when I peeped in to see what he was faffing with. He was giving Baboo kisses to get through the day.

I think I worry as much as L6 when this greying, threadbare creature goes missing these days. I love Baboo. He is a super dog.

Slides

I love my old Pathescope Puck - not least because it says on the box EMPIRE MADE. I bought it in an op shop about 18 years ago, and have never yet changed the bulb. I believe each time I use it that it will be the last time, but it hasn't let me down yet.

I am a sad old hag. I love slides. Still. And I want to get back into buying slide film.

Tonight Blokey Husband and I looked at old slides. We discovered that we used to be young (no surprise) and smiley (wow!). And how cute was M13 at 6? Too cute.

An Ordinary Day

where nothing unusual or thrilling in any way happened.

In the category of Poor-Deprived-Children-Who-Will-Never-Own-A-Playstation-Make-Own-Fun:

L6 made himself some roller skates.

In the category of Oh-My-Children-Are-So-Full-Of-Hidden-Talents-Waiting-To-Explode-Aren't-They-Just-Too-Gifted? ;) :

P3 took on the role of the daily picture taker, avoiding my face as is the current fad, but unfortunately showing up my laziness on a Sunday afternoon.

In the category of Oh-My-Goodness-My-Children-Actually-Played-Nicely-Together:

Accomplices in mud creation. So I will ignore the fact that they destroyed the garden while they did, because it was so unusually peaceful.

In the category of Awe-Inspiring-Garden-Goddess-ness:

I harvested the garlic. I know it is waaaaaay past the longest day, but it just wasn't ready then. I also tried to make a braided garlic plait, but if I show you that it will totally destroy my attempt at looking like a competent gardening type.

It's Good To Have A Yarn Stash

So today being Valentine's Day and all, Blokey Husband could hardly refuse me when I spied this creaky, old, scratched-up wooden suitcase in the local junk shop.

He makes such a great home for my Yarn Stash. I didn't really realise I had a stash, since I have only been knitting for just over a year, and I do only buy for each project, never succumbing to Yarn For Lust, which I know would be completely fatal for me. Still - I thought I needed to go shopping after current WIP, but it appears I don't.

Clearing all that out I discovered this cushion I knitted up for P3, that just needed sewing up, and so - voila! Done.