Latest Knits

OK..here are the pics of the knits I have completed lately..finally..
Firstly, the boy units jumper.  Wool is handspun romney cross from Moseley Wools , handspun by me of course.  He didn't like the natural cream colour of the wool so he had my dye it.  The pattern is one I made up myself and you can't see it well in the pics but there is a diamond pattern down the front and around the bottom and cuffs.  The jumper is knitted from the top down in one piece using the contigious method for the shoulders.

And here are my socks, dyed and handspun by me too...and of course, toe up, at the same time.  Pattern is mine again.

 

Yet another flying year!!!

I cannot believe how fast this year is going and how little I seem to be getting done.  I am trying to spin and knit up a storm for the upcoming Australian Wool and Sheep Show at Bendigo in July.  But it feels like little is getting completed.


I also have a old/new obsession with body art.  Of course now I am not having anymore children I thought it was time to get some more tattoos.  Firstly was my little ode to the homeland with this piece.

 

 Its a very loose interpretation of the ole 10c coin with some of my yarn/fibre addiction added to it.

It was just after this that we made our annual pilgrimage to Warrnambool for a home edders camp..it was awesome!!! We went a few days early so had a full week away.  Here's our little footprint...

 And a family that makes smores together stays together.....

And what is a trip to a beach side location without a nice cold cider

From NEW ZEALAND!!!! omg...what a find in the local bottle store..talk about bringing back old memories.

Then came the re-vamp of one of the very old (24yrs old) tattoos from my misspent youth.  Which turned this..

Into this...

 

It hurt like a mongrel as the origninal was done badly and left quite scarred.

 I am not too happy with the tail, it's not quite right but it will be integrated into more work I have planned for that area which will fix it up.

Onto the new stuff.  The first of my kids works..

 Needless to say, Pip's was absolutely thrilled that hers was first.  But we decided after that to get onto doing the bulk of the rest at once.  Firstly, the outline...

Colouring comes next week.  I love it!!!  

I have actually done some knitting too...My lovely sister got married last weekend, so I knitted her this..

 

Oddly enough, my older brother and I were excluded from the wedding (yes that's right, not invited),  Neither of us have a clue why.   What can I say...you can't choose your family.......

Here is my mum wearing it at the wedding, apparently my sister told her she could have it..Gee, nice to know my handspun, handknitted creations aren't appreciated either.. (Mum refused and hopes she took it home with her and didn't leave it behind at her inlaws)

I have more knitting I have completed but will have to add photos when I have taken some.  One was a jumper for a boy unit and he has been wearing it since it was completed.  

And more fish stories!!!!....My Bristlenose Catfish went and made these....

there was about 60 when we bothered to try counting...we stopped there.  A friend gifted me with another 3ft tank so I have been furiously cycling the new tank and moving Mum and most of the other fish into it so these guys have room to grow....

the new tank...

Mum of the babies...

Some of the other residents...

So far things are chugging along nicely.  I love the new tank set up, so relaxing to watch.

Nice Girls Don't Bite Their Neighbours.

You're invited to the wedding of Nice Girl Jane Jameson to Gabriel Nightengale. NICE GIRLS DON'T BITE THEIR NEIGHBORS hits the shelves on Feb. 28.

Written by Molly Harper, one of my all time Favourite Authors!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'll be there knitting in spirit, I just finished this...

Another Proud Karate Ka moment

OK, so the little guy did his third belt grading.  

His grading was on a normal class day.

 The big boy helped out,

 He passed and is now an orange belt (orange? really)

 His grader giving him a wee pep talk.

 So...a couple of days later, they had another grading and all my black belts helped out.

We were sent a text message a couple of weeks before saying that Quinn was going to get a special award after the grading.
  He actually got two, first was an award of appreciation for all his help over the last 3 years with the junior class.

 He also got promoted to the rank of Sempai, teacher.  Part of his first Dan is a new uniform, he now wears a black gi with a red collar.  When he gets his second dan, the gi will also have red sleeves.

To denote his teaching level, this gi has a red stripe on the trousers.  This is a pretty huge deal for a kid of 14.

 Kyoshi giving him his gi.

 

 

Ceremonial donning of the top.

The certificate.

There was one other person promoted in his grade (a young girl, not this guy but he was promoted too)

.

 

At the end of the ceremony, one of the mother of a young boy approached us and congratulated us  on raring such a fine boy.  We are very proud of him.  Sorry for the crappy photos..had to use the phone on some of them.

Mother Henna

OK...so we finally got around to using henna on our hair.  I wanted black so I also used indigo.  Both natural herbs and very good hair dyes.  My hair is long but very fine, the girls is short/mid length and again fairly fine.

We used just over 300g of henna powder mixed with lemon juice and left to sit overnight.

Here it is going onto my hair..

Afterwards we wrapped it up in cling wrap.

We left it for about 4 hrs, but apparently we could have left it for a shorter time.

My results were pretty impressive since my hair only had a little regrowth.  You could certainly still tell it had been henna'd.

The girls was vibrant!!!

 It will settle down and darken over the next couple of days..I'll take another pic then.

 So here is the indigo going on, I used 200g mixed with water.  There was a little left over..

it stayed on for an hour..

 and the results..

 Top veiw...I think she could have put a bit more paste down the part line..you can still see a bit of red..

Over all, fairly happy with the results.  Worth the extra planning and time.  It's like putting mud on your hair so if you are squeemish, you probably won't enjoy it much.  And I did find that my hair needed alot of conditioning after the indigo.  It feels a bit dry so I might look at putting an oil treatment on it in the next week. 

The biggest plus is that it's all natural and I'll keep on doing it.  I was using commercial dyed every 4 or so weeks and was a bit concerned about the exposure.

Now to do some dying of wool with the indigo.........

I'm a proud mother hen!!

I now have 3 black belts in the family.  Four of the kids do Bob Jones Zen Do Kai Karate and this weekend two of the girls graded to black belt and the boy graded to his 1st dan.  He had to write an essay of 250words + on how karate has helped him.  I took a couple of photos at the beginning then decided to video the rest of the essay.  He had the option of the Kyoshi to read it but did it himself.  He has never done any public speaking so I am very proud of him.

This boy is very conscientious when it comes to his karate.  I love this pic, it's him practicing one of his kata's.

Needless to say, he passed.

Now to my little girls and their black belts.  Here are some pics.

Our baby sitter was at work doing Mc Happy Day so we had to take the little ones along to the grading....

they were suitably unimpressed...

And then it was over...and they had the ceremonial donning of the new belts.

And of course...the final pics with their certificates and belts on..

And one with a very proud Teacher.

Here's his full essay if you are of a mind to read it.

Q’s 1st Dan Essay

I have been here for a long time and I have learnt the art of Zen Do Kai.

The techniques and skills, I also learnt discipline, respect and self control. Before I started I couldn’t control my anger and got provoked very easily. After two years of training here I had complete control of my anger and it was difficult to provoke me. I had mastery of myself with all I learnt. I know the next level of my training will be hard but I have complete confidence that the great teachers will help me reach my full potential.

With all my time here I gained skills which if I had not started; my life would be very different. The belt I have worked for all my time here, my black belt, is the sign that I did the time, I did the training and I learned it. It can be described as a great experience and I will never forget. As I grow older I will keep on coming week after week, learning more, just one step at a time. So this essay may be one little piece but all of the pieces makes all the difference.

And my siblings will learn that the smallest detail can add up to the full technique and all the techniques add up to the full knowledge of this form of self defence. I can’t wait to know all of the techniques. I do not do so many things that don’t give me something I can have forever. But this is the thing that I want to do for the rest of my life, till the day I die. And if I get sick or injured, I will come back as soon as I can and won’t stop coming so long as I live.

Over all I will do my best to master this art and help others to learn and train to their natural limit. And if they don’t put in much effort I will ask them, ‘do you want to do this?’ and their answer might be no, or yes but no matter what, I will teach them the techniques and make them awesome.

This is my goal.