my creative space: grandma's scarf

Oh dear... grandma's scarf had to be re-done, I found using a size 4.0mm crochet needle was making the crochet really tight and a bit stiff... not soft and snugly like I had imagined! So I tried a size 7.0mm crochet needle but that didn't work, it ended up being way too loose! I'm now using a size 5.5mm crochet needle and I'm really happy with how the crochet looks and feels! If I had loads more the wool I would have done something else with the old crochet but I needed that wool for grandma's scarf no. 2! So I had to unravel it **boo hoo boo hoo** all that hard work rolled up into 2 balls of wool within minutes... arghhhh...oh well!!

old tight scarf  and new & snugly scarf

1 ball unravelled and new scarf

2 balls unravelled and new scarf

It just amazes me how much wool goes into crocheting a scarf...I can't believe that was two balls of wool in that bit of scarf... amazing!! I know this is a bit sad/daggy but I timed how long it took me to crochet 1 line.. 5 mins (going fast) - I counted how many rows I have already done from the center back of the scarf  - 45 rows, which means it has taken me approx 3 hours and 45min (probably more) so I am now starting the other side - 45 rows and 3 hours an 45 mins to go... woo hoo!

ps. I'm loving every minute making something lovely for my grandma :)

There are loads more creative people over at our creative spaces...

watercolour: Water Paper Paint

I really love Heather Smith Jones' work and just had to get her book "Water, Paper, Paint"! I was so excited when I got the it in the post last week! I have been drooling over the pages for days! Such a beautiful little book with lots of information about watercolour painting, brushes, paint etc. The book is full of interesting projects to do which allows you to explore your creativity! I love the fact that it's totally hands on learning!

Since my watercolour course has now finished, I'm going to complete a project from the book each week. I have started with Project 2 - working wet onto dry!

It's a very interesting little exercise... you may think painting coloured squares is easy but it really makes you think about placement, size, colours/hues, techniques and it's also really good practice in painting straight lines with watercolour too - a tricky, uncontrolable little beast at times!

time: around 8pm... just getting into it!

I got a little carried away on Saturday night... yes I was at home painting (and loving it) and I was up until 1am painting...ouch!! I had no idea what the time was as I was so engrossed in the project... I had to finish the first layer, which I think turned really well! The next step will be layer number two with stronger hues! I can't wait to do some more this week... it's just too much fun :)

time: around 1am... finished the first layer!
my eyes were a bit blurry and so is the photo :)

Heather Smith Jones has a little blog and a website of her wonderful work... very inspiring!!

my creative space: blue cat

I have once again completely ignored my "to do" list over there → and decide to make a little cat softie for my little man! I have been meaning to make one for ages, he really loves cats and spends a lot of his time crawling around on the floor pretending to be one, it's fun having a little pretend cat!
I used some bright blue fleece and a softie pattern from the internet which I completely changed (it was a bear). It only took less than an hour to sew, with a few alterations and then stuffed with a little help... there was fluff everywhere :)  "M" chose the eyes and nose, I made the whiskers out of wool. He LOVES blue cat!!!

Maybe a little too much... after about 5 min of intense loving, blue cat had a bit of a tail explosion, due to being spun around in circles by his tail! I think a little medical procedure will be required :)

There are loads more crafty, creative people over at our creative spaces...

watercolour course: week 7

Boo hoo...I feel a bit sad today, as last night was our last watercolour class! It was a really fun night, we all brought a plate of food and one of the blokes brought some wine... so we had a lovely evening of chatting, painting, eating, painting and enjoying a glass of wine!

We continued working on the still life and the colour mixing chart exercise. I still have a bit of work to do on both! My still life is coming along nicely, though I have made a few mistakes while doing my glaze no.4!! While mid-glazing, I was fixing a bit of a little mistake I had made and forgot to keep an eye on the rest of my work and ended up with watermark issues everywhere... hmmm! I am hoping when I do glaze no.5 it will cover them up! Fingers crossed!

Argghhh... watermarks!!!

I also did quite a bit of work on my colour charts... I love mixing colours!!

Watercolour mixing colour chart exercise

I really found it quite a challenge getting the greys right, especially in the cool colour chart... they turned out more green??? We weren't allowed to use black or white to get grey, they are totally banned from class, so it was a real challenge just using the primary red, blue and yellow! Kerry (Tutor) suggested that I haven't been using enough pigment in the washes! So I think I will be redoing these charts again with more colour pigment! I don't mind :)

A little someone just couldn't stay out of the picture :)

I have really enjoyed this class so much and it really opened my eyes to the world of watercolour and how varied it can be... it was just too much fun!! Quite a few of the students will be going back next term and I wish I could too (there is so much more to learn), but I will be moving on and doing a drawing class next term... I really need to learn the basics again!! Can't wait!

Knitting: big wool and big needles

I've had a very big itch that needed to be scratched... I tried to ignore it with all my might but it just wouldn't go away...   big wool and big needles!! I saw these gorgeous chunky scarves on the Harvest Textiles web site (yellow and green ones on the table in the first picture), and haven't stopped thinking/obsessing over them! I told myself "You already have enough projects on your plate... knitting.. crochet...etc!!!" I ignored myself and gave into the big itch! :)

So now I'm knitting another scarf! It's lots of fun and I feel like a little girl with such big wool and needles... and the best thing of all is that it doesn't take long get quite a lot done! Love it!

my creative space: potato and bubble wrap

I was lucky enough had a few hours to myself on Tuesday morning, my little man and his daddy went for a trip to grandma's house and had a great time! It was so nice just to have some uninterrupted time to do whatever I wanted... bliss!

I have been itching to do some printing on M's plain tops and so I thought a nice quick way would be to do some potato stamps! Triangles are really easy to cut out and I also cut some lines into them to add a bit more texture. I applied fabric paint with a sponge roller and started stamping! I really love how his little top turned out :)

It's hard to get a photo of my busy little man sometimes!

Then I went a bit crazy and decided to make a bit of a mess using some bubble wrap as a stamp! I'm not sure if I like the result but I love the colours and it was a lot of fun experimenting.

He looks like a little raver - dancing in the lounge room!

There are loads more crafty, creative people over at our creative space...

watercolour course: homework

There was no watercolour class this week as we had a public holiday here on Monday. We had a lovely long weekend, lots of family visits and fun; and I managed to do a bit of work on my watercolour still life and colour chart homework.

I used my traced still life drawing with shadows and shading numbers as a guide of where to paint the watercolour glaze shades.

I painted a watercolour glaze colour no.2 everywhere, except where colour no.1 needs to be - I painted the watercolour wash of colour no.1 on the whole page, last week.

After colour no.2 had completely dried, I painted a watercolour glaze of colour no. 3, everywhere except where colour no.1 and colour no.2 needs to be. It was quite tricky getting all the areas done quickly without letting the watercolour dry! I'm really glad I have two paintings, one to practice on... phew :)

It's really beginning to take shape and it's quite exciting to see it develop as the darker shades are added. I'm really happy with how it looks though it's not perfect... there are a few errors! I have two more shades to do, hopefully I will get them done by the end of the week.

I also managed to do a little bit of our watercolour chart homework. It is so interesting to see how the colours mix together! I love mixing colours, they just look gorgeous! I can't wait for next weeks class which is sadly the last one!

my creative space: crochet

I have started crocheting a scarf for my dearest grandma's birthday next month. Her favourite colour is green so I'm using the lovely teal green wool she sent me last year. She told me that she has never been able to crochet but always wanted to! She is left handed it was all a bit confusing for her! So I thought rather than knit, I would crochet a scarf :)  I got off to a rocky start... after three attempts, I finally got it right! 1st attempt - not sure what went wrong... I just couldn't follow the pattern and it ended up a big crochet mess! 2nd attempt - I found a new pattern no. 90608 from Lion Barn Yarn. I had to change the width as I wasn't happy with it but I made it way too wide! 3rd attempt - I made it too narrow! 4th attempt - I finally got it right Yay!! With all these attempts I could have had half a scarf by now! I'm really please with how it is going now.. Yay!!

3rd attempt - Hooray!!
- please excuse the toddler scribbles on the coffee table :)

I have quite a lot of dc/double crocheting to do!

M adding his creative touch to my crochet pattern :)

There are loads more crafty, creative people over at our creative space...

watercolour course: week 6

This week we finished off the shadows on our traced outline of our still life drawing. Once we were happy with that, we then trace the basic drawing outline (no shadows) onto watercolour paper. I traced two, one as my practice (mess up) one... I think I will need it! Then we worked out the 5 glaze tones using one colour, I decided to use Burnt Sienna .. a nice change from blue! Water is used to achieve the different glaze tones. I thought this was going to take a while, but I did my first set and Kerry (tutor) said they were great! I was a little disappointed as I was really enjoying mixing the colours :) I did a wash of the lightest tone over the whole paper for the two drawings and then let them dry.

two washed, tracing and five glaze tones of  Burnt Sienna

That was all we had time for this week.. time just goes so fast! I can't wait to do the next wash... colour number 2! I will be doing some more painting during the week!

It was such a excellent class and it is great to have everyone at different levels (return students)  and getting to see what they are up to, very inspiring!  I was so happy to get back into the painting in the class again! Love it!

a bit of: blog styling for Rowan Bishop - food writer

Recently, I was lucky enough to be asked to do a little bit of "blog styling" for a dear friend of my partners mum, Norma.  Her friend Rowan Bishop, is a well know vegetarian food writer in New Zealand and has been writing about vegetarian food for over 30 years! She is currently travelling overseas on a big food adventure... so exciting!  I got to meet her last year when she was in Sydney, she was just so lovely! So when Norma asked me if I would be interested in styling her blog, I jumped at the opportunity! I had such a great time putting her blog together, I'm so pleased with how it looks and Rowan loves it too :)

Rowan Bishop - food writer blog

Rowan has just released her new vegetarian book "Rowan Bishop's Vegetarian Kitchen" which I have my very own copy of and have been pouring/drooling all over it! The recipies are great, easy to follow and uses a lot of average ingredients that you would have your pantry and fridge, which is excellent! Such a great cook book... I love it! :)

Visit Rowan Bishop's blog - Rowan Bishop - food writer and she can be found on facebook too :) I'm looking forward to seeing what she gets up to on her trip... so exciting!

my creative space: knitting frenzy

It seems I am currently on a bit of a knitting frenzy! I have completed beanie no. 2! Late last year, when I was getting into crochet... I told my dearest grandma and she was SO excited and happy (she is an obsessive knitter from way way back) that she sent me a massive box with about 40 balls of lovely, various coloured wool!!  I was so excited, but I haven't done much with the wool as I was a bit scared to "stuff up" with grandmas beautiful wool!  I had done a little bit of practice knitting at the time, which I found incomplete, in amongst the wool yesterday! I couldn't remember what I was going to make but I saw it and thought beanie!! I know it's a bit of a daggy beanie but I'm so pleased I could make this little bit of "odd" knitting into a beanie, it looks so cute! So now we have a back up beanie... just in case something happens to the first one!

unfinished knitting find

back-up beanie completed

a bit of beanie modelling

My poor little grandma LOVES knitting so much but can't do much these days because of arthritis in her hands, it's very sad! I'm going to knit her a little scarf next! :)

There are loads more crafty, creative people over at our creative space...