Friday, January 29, 2016

Crafty Duties

It was some time ago that DH asked me to make some dishcloths to replace the ones we have. We are lucky to only use knitted or crocheted dishcloths but, truth be told, they are getting pretty ratty. Thus, DH has declared that we are going to replace all of our tea towels, kitchen hand towels and dishcloths. After twenty years of owning most of what we have, I guess I can agree to that;)!



I have to admit something. I don't like knitting dishcloths. I really don't like the feel of the usual dishcloth yarn that is used but love the end result. I've been lucky enough to have received most of the dishcloths we have as gifts or passed on from a friend of mine whose grandmother used to knit them for her in such quantity that she had too many (hand me down bliss!).


Partially because DH asked me to make dishcloths, I'm being very sarcastic and trying to make the majority of them as feminine as possible. I want pictures of him doing the dishes with pink dish cloths which is ridiculous because he genuinely won't care what colour they are as long as they do a good job.


The yarn that I've used for these dishcloths is KnitPicks' 'Dishie'. It's not as bad on the hands as some and crochets up lovely and soft. In fact, these cloths could easily be used as facecloths.

The stitch I'm using is called a 'linen' stitch and I love how it looks in the cotton. I got the pattern and tutorial at Dedri's Look What I Made blog.

Are any of you working on some dutiful crafting?

Thursday, January 28, 2016

A Holiday Hike

Although we have lots of snow now, we didn't on Christmas Eve, Day and Boxing Day. It dawned beautiful and bright on Boxing Day so all four of the boys and I headed out on a local hike.



Embarrassingly we drove to the trail head but I am sure in years to come as Youngest gets bigger, we will walk to the many trail heads just a short distance from our front door.



This day, our destination was Torbay Beach.

I love seeing red in the foliage at this time of the year!
 The trail down to the beach is not very strenuous and I enjoyed going last and taking lots of pictures. It was a very photogenic day.


We all feel very lucky to live in a place with views like these.


Boys always seem attracted to water!


The seagulls were floating in groups and salt water ducks - we call them 'turrs' - were flying back and forth overhead. They are so funny looking when they fly, their little wings beating as hard as they can to stay airborne.


Part of the beach is made up of rounded, smooth rocks and the other end more dramatically formed with shale rock. It was a bit 'slippedy' (one of Middlest's created words) in places.


How quickly the sun disappears at this time of the year.


I had never noticed the bridge in the distance before. We were off the trail by this time and beach combing but the actual trail goes right over the bridge itself.


All in all, a beautiful afternoon with the boys.

Wednesday, January 27, 2016

In Love With Snow

I love snow. I love the fluffy white stuff with a passion and love it even more when it come in heaps and heaps coupled with lots of cold, crisp sunny weather. Honestly, even if you're a warm weather person I swear that the weather I'm describing with make you feel alive. Sadly, the Avalon peninsula of Newfoundland and Labrador where we live is more often swathed in fog, freezing rain and drizzle.

We have had a couple of good storms providing lots of snow so far this winter. In between storms however, we have also had a day or so of very mild weather and rain then freezing agains so 2016 so far has also been a very bad year for ice. We have a solid sheet of it under the snow on our driveway at the moment and it's been a little tricky when I've been out using the snow blower.

For Christmas, our lovely BC family gave us all a set of snow shoes and we are determined to use them to our best advantage this year. Our first day out was only around the yard to see how they worked and to make sure we knew how to put them on.





Then, a couple of Sundays ago we went to Pippy Park in St. John's to check out their groomed snowshoe and ski trails. What a lovely day!




I was often in the back taking pictures or helping Youngest whose little legs did the most work of any of us.


I also got to bring the snack supplies!




 Tracks in the snow...


The paths are well marked and the boys ran (in snow shoes!) on ahead with no trouble keeping to the route.


This area is wide open and the wind had blown all the snow off the surface leaving huge, glassy ice spots that you can see the boys playing on. This was the highlight of their afternoon.


My highlight was the sun and then the lodge where a cheery propane fireplace was roaring. We ate our snack, enjoyed the warmth and marvelled that the whole adventure was FREE!


I'm hoping these babies are going to get a few miles logged on them this winter and their training has already started. Youngest and I went back to the park ourselves last Monday and we went again to the same park this past weekend with two other family friends who equally enjoyed the experience.


Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Happy New Year!

Hello!!! Hello!!!! It's me waving from our North Atlantic winter wonderland! How are you? I've missed you! We had a wonderful holiday and now are, unbelievably, into another New Year that is turning out just grand. We are lucky indeed.



Our holidays were full of family and friends, great food and conversation, wood fires and even some snow.


One of the things we did over the holidays is something I've been wanting to do for the past couple of years and that was a visit to a small town called Port de Grave in Conception Bay North. This small community has begun a wonderful tradition of decorating the boats in their harbour over the Christmas season. It has become quite the tourist attraction and no wonder. It's gorgeous!















It was such a fun evening the the boys did pretty well with the road trip. They aren't used to long drives and an hour each way was a little hard for them but they managed and only Youngest fell asleep on the way home.



Monday, January 25, 2016

Christmas Craft Update

One of the difficult things about hand making things for Christmas gifts when you're a blogger is that, if the intended recipients read your blog and you intend on said gifts to be a surprise. then you can't post about your accomplishments and FOs. Frustratinig.

Better late than never, I'm here to tell you about the frenetic chaos that was this house in November and December as I got out more hand made gifts than I have in years and years. Those boys are a growing allowing me some solo (still supervising with one eye;)!) time to create and - gasp! - finish projects.

Without further ado..

Mini snow men placed in petite jewelry boxes for our god-daughters.











Ornaments for each of my 2015 tea hosts:


A painting on canvas for the MFRC's playroom as a thank you for the support they've provided to me and my family over the years:






A quilt for my BC SIL:








Two cowls headed West - one to Alberta and one to Manitoba:




I apparently didn't get a finished picture of this cowl. 
Not too shabby!