Our gorgeous baby girl is 21

Darling Daughter turned 21 last week.  Lucky girl is in Portugal celebrating with Jack Sparrow.  Not sure where all those years have gone but she has turned out spectacularly well.  Love her and miss her.  xo

The most recent photo of her and the special man in her life, last month in the Dolomites, Italy.

Lots of crochet happening around here

Whipped this Brighton Cowl up in record time, one day!  

Love receiving these parcels in the post.

Great simple pattern and all assembled as you go, even better!  

Eagerly awaiting my next yarn club parcel.  

My July yarn club shawlette is finished too!  

This one is really soft and drapey and beautiful to wear.

Easy pattern to follow.  I did do a border around the whole trapezoid shape and it made blocking very easy.

Upside down but an easy pattern to work.

Sock wool is very versatile.

On the 7th August our Darling Daughter and her boyfriend Jack Sparrow headed off on a 4 month adventure of a lifetime in Greece, Turkey, Croatia and Italy.

She's quite little and that pack is full, luckily weighs only about 12kg, but I'm sure it will feel heavy in 35 degree heat in Greece.

Miss Ruby is sure going to miss her.

I thought this bandit style cowl might be handy for Darling Daughter but she tells me she just doesn't like things around her neck.  It could be worn as a headwarmer!

I bought the wool in Alexandria last month while we were on our VIC roadtrip.  Cleckheaton California was really good to work with a 6mm hook and has washed up really soft.  I started using the Bandito Cowl pattern but it just wasn't working well for this yarn so I just carried on making my own design up as I went.  

Claw marks on gate by Miss Ruby when she is panicking about a storm.

I think this ball of sock wall that I bought at Sackville and Lane in Wangaratta, VIC would make up really well in either of these scarf patterns I bought at the same shop. More adventures in crochet for me!

Rwally loved the little collection of postcard style business cards I picked up at The Finders Keepers market in Melbourne.

A 50g hank of handspun wool from a very talented young spinner.  I'm itching to get this one worked up into something special.

Found these two English crochet mags while were on the road too.

A birthday gift in the making, wool and soya bean protein yarn. Somewhere between the two photos is the real colour of this yarn. 

Made the Ripple Lace Fingerless Gloves again and from the pattern made up my own cowl design. 

Gift well received.

That seems to be about it for the last fortnight other than my new passion, crocheted stones.  More about that later!

Crochet......I've really caught the bug

Finished this last week, soaked, blocked and worn once already.  I started this project back in January and I'm proud of my efforts to finish this.  It is really delicious, so soft and drapey, my first fine crochet work.  It weighs 142g and measures 58"wide by 28" deep, perfect for bandit style wearing.  I added a 5 chain picot to the centre of each scallop in the final row which looks great but was really handy for threading the blocking wires through.  I had 8g of wool leftover so this project cost $1.42, not bad!  I have 134g of this wool in a pale turquoise, might have to search out a pattern for that very soon.

In June my Jellywares winter yarn club package arrived and inside was a ball of Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino and this is what I made with it.  A pair of Ripple Lace Finglerless Gloves for Darling Daughter who is leaving next week for a 4 month European backpacking trip of a life time with her boyfriend of almost 4 years, Jack Sparrow.  I was slow to get started on my first yarn club package, I was a bit scared if the truth be know, crochet is still a bit out of my comfort zone but I pushed myself and I did it.  I made the pair in one evening.  Great easy pattern, free on Bethany Scofiled's blog.  I did use a smaller hook,  3.5mm and started with 36 chain to start, bit firmer and thicker fabric.  I'll be making these again, great quick gift.  

Made this lovely soft cowl for our shop a couple of weeks ago, reminds me of Lemon Delicious pudding!

July yarn club package arrived, and it exceeded all expectations, loved the great choice of wool by Jodie, the cute homemade choc chip shortbread were great and the tea is very special.  So glad I joined this club.  

What to make this month?  I wasn't keen on any of the suggested projects so I found may own on Ravelry.  Sunset Shawlette by Tamara Kelly, another freebie.  This wool blend is a 4ply sock wool and the pattern is worked using a 5mm hook so this project is working up very fast.  I have done a lot more while we were away last week, will show you the finished project very soon.  The colour of the yarn is most like the boxed hank, the worked photo is too green, poor lighting at night on my lap.  

Also had time to whip this cowl up.  Bought a ball of Noro a my local yarn store and used almost every inch.  Might write the pattern up so you can make one too.  Never written a crochet pattern yet but I did write notes while I worked so maybe I can do it.  This washed up so soft and I've worn it half a dozen times already.  

Annie the cat is 15 years old today

When Darling Daughter was 4 years old she picked out this little black and white kitten and named her Annie.  Today Annie is 15 years old and these two have had a wonderful time together, they adore each other.  Annie really is Darling Daughter's cat, there is so much love between them it is beautiful to watch.  This week we tried to re-enact the photo from the day Darling Daughter picked her kitten from the litter, it was an instant attraction on both parts as you can see.  Annie is a very small cat who is still fit and healthy and loves being out in the garden with our dotty dog Ruby but her favourite thing is to snuggle in bed with Darling Daughter.    

Recent portrait of our old cat enjoying the sunshine in our garden this summer.

First OS holiday for Darling Daughter

They had a wonderful time and did many exciting things while holidaying in Thailand earlier this year.  The worst part of their holiday was losing their camera while snorkeling so these photos are all courtesy of a great couple from Wollongong they met over there.  How good is that!  They shared over 100 holiday snaps with Darling Daughter and Jack Sparrow so they now have some precious holiday memories to treasure and some new friends to keep in touch with.  

I think they might be saving for their next OS holiday already!