tiny happy

I realised I hadn't yet blogged about a jumper I finished knitting in May so I've included some pictures of it here. One with the garment sitting neatly on the windowsill, and the other showing it worn, with the afternoon sun shining directly in my face.

To make this I used the Ranunculus pattern and held two strands of yarn together while knitting: some fine wool/cotton in a light grey colour, and some super-luxurious mohair/silk in a dark grey colour. The effect is a slighty-marled, super soft and warm dream of a thing to wear!  The beautiful mohair was a birthday gift from my friend Nikki – she hand-dyes very gorgeous yarns just up the road from where I live. Thank you Nikki, and thank you to the designer of this pattern, Midori Hirose. This was my second iteration of this design (you can see my first one here) I'm sure I will knit it again one day soon.

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I found this bouquet of beautiful autumnal-wintry branches and flowers at a grocery shop in town last week and since I was on my way to visit a friend I couldn't help buying them to bring along with me! Also couldn't resist taking a quick snap of the colours against concrete. 

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A small project worked on this week was a stack of hot water bottle covers. It's that time of the year all right although it hasn't been terribly cold yet. But enough to wear coats and fill up a hot water bottle for the bed.

A few years ago, I made lots of these but they needed replacing when I pulled them out of the cupboard last week. I love to recycle wool garments that have been moth-eaten or otherwise worn out. The kids handed over some jumpers they'd grown out of, complete with holey elbows. It's satisfying to make something useful from something past its usefulness!

I wrote up a super simple pattern/tutorial for these a few years ago – you can find it here, in case you're in the mood for a quick and easy upcycling project…

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With hot water bottle weather comes the delicious chance to spend more time in bed generally – earlier nights, longer (weekend) mornings, and the odd post-work-before-cooking-dinner lie down. I've been reading a collection of essays by Zadie Smith, Feel Free, which I really like. Also a book of poems about the Whanganui River, Flow, by Airini Beautrais and a collection of stories, Black Marks on the White Page, edited by Tina Makereti and Witi Ihimaera. All three of these volumes contain small pieces of writing – essays, poems, short stories, which are perfect for small snatched reading times.

And because I outed myself as a keen TV watcher in my last post, I wanted to add that I've watched the newest additions to the Black Mirror series and have just begun Fleabag. Both very good!

I hope you have a lovely week with lots of time to do the things you want to do.