Achoo (or My excuses for being slack)

Sorry I haven't posted for a while. When I went home I managed to catch my dad's cold (although he was claiming it was bird flu) and I've just been tired all week. Everything I did seemed to take more time and energy, including thinking of what to write. I'm not 100% better now, although the brain fuzziness has pretty much gone away and I've just got a bit of a cough, a blocked nose and the dreaded peeling of the skin on my nose from all the nose blowing I've been doing. I'm not sure how many people it happens too, but whenever I get a cold 3 or 4 days later all the skin starts coming off my nose. It's gross and unpleasant.

I did manage to finish all the squares for the Afghan and now I've just got to sew them all together. I'm guessing that will take a couple of weeks at least, but as everything always takes longer than expected my goal is to get it finished within 3 weeks.

Afghan Square Tally
Light blue: 124 out of 124
White: 93 out of 93
Yellow: 48 out of 48
Dark blue: 20 out of 20
TOTAL: 285 out of 285

I've been a bit slack with the photos lately. I like photos, but I promise, I'll put some up in some new posts soon. They might be old projects but that's alright. Either that, or I'll wander round and take some artistic shots, or maybe do a self portrait day. I've got lots of ideas now! If there is anything you want me to post about, or take photos off (no nudity, or shots of my sink, because I do need to do some dishes) let me know and I'll try to oblige. I'm always up for a bit of creative input.

Going home

I had a bad day yesterday. It started off having to get up at 5am, and things just progressed from there. I made a pretty big stuff up at work, which to be honest could have been much worse but just made me feel completely terrible/useless/stupid etc and I'm still feeling bad now.

I also went to the laundrette to do some washing and came back to find I hadn't started one load properly. When I came back again to pick it up I'd left a tissue in the pocket.

Finally I had to do night checks, and everything was more difficult than usual which left me frustrated and annoyed. I guess when you get into a bad mood, you tend to stay there and be bothered by smaller annoyances than usual.

Never mind though, I'm going back to Melbourne for four days and so that should give me a nice break and time to refresh myself and I get to see my family and my doggies. So I'm really looking forward to the rest of the weekend.

Afghan Square Tally
Light blue: 124 out of 124
White: 93 out of 93
Yellow: 48 out of 48
Dark blue: 0 out of 20
TOTAL: 265 out of 285

I achieved my goal for this week. As I'm going home I won't be working on the blanket until mid next week but I should be able to get all the dark blue squares done, and then it's just putting the whole thing together, weaving in ends and crocheting a border. So quite a bit really, but I know that I'll get it done by my mum's birthday now.

Afghan progress

Well I've finished all the white granny squares for the Afghan, and I've woven in the starting ends (if that makes sense) so it's nice to know I'm getting there. It's quite good to have smaller and smaller groups of squares left to do. I think over the last week I've got more squares done in one week than I have before, so I'm not sure if I'm getting faster or I've just found more time. My goal for this week is to make all the yellow squares, hopefully I'll manage it but if not I'm probably ahead of where I need to be anyway.


White granny squares 

Afghan Square Tally
Light blue: 124 out of 124
White: 93 out of 93
Yellow: 0 out of 48
Dark blue: 0 out of 20
TOTAL: 217 out of 285

Tags

I've spent a bit of time over the last couple of days trying to set up tags and categorise all my posts. I won't say it's working 100% yet, because I don't think it is, but hopefully I've got most of the work done.

On the blanket side, here's the newest tally.

Light blue: 124 out of 124
White: 79 out of 93
Yellow: 0 out of 48
Dark blue: 0 out of 20
TOTAL: 203 out of 285

I'm really impressed with how much I've done this week!

Keys and Locks

I have bad luck with keys...or maybe it's the locks. I don't really lose my keys, I just leave them inside and lock myself outside. It's not as if it's an isolated incident, so I thought while I'm working on my blanket I'd entertain you with a few examples of my stupidity.

Example 1: I had to break into my house a number of times when I was younger because I forgot my keys (I wasn't the only one, my dad managed to break his scapula (shoulder blade) by trying to climb into a window by getting onto a wheelie bin...at three in the morning...while drunk). When we fixed the security issues I had to go over to the neighbours. It was lucky that I had home economics that day and could share the cake I'd made with them until my mum came home. Time locked out = 1 hour

Example 2: I was staying at a friends house while on a university placement and managed to get myself locked in the backyard while hanging out washing. No keys, no phone, no money, wearing my slippers, and my friend wasn't going to be home until about 10pm. Eventually one of the neighbours came out to hang up her washing and so I climbed over the fence and went to their house. These were neighbours that I'd never met, and my friend didn't really know either. Once there I had to phone the Vet hospital at university, who put me through to some people in my year who would take the horse emergency calls and stuff like that, except they put me through to the emergency number. They got a little annoyed, but phoned me back (at the neighbours) with my friends number. She came home early (after a couple of hours) and I got to know the neighbours. Time locked out = 3 hours

Example 3: When I was at college we had swipe cards to get in. I'd go home on the weekends and this week it was my friends birthday and I'd purchased the present, a dvd player, from a group of us. I put my first bag in the foyer, checked that my friend wasn't around, and raced back to my car to grab the DVD player. Got back to the entrance and looked inside to see my swipe card sitting on my bag. So now I was wondering round, carrying a DVD player, looking into windows to see if anyone was around, and hoping my bag didn't get stolen in the meantime (we had a bit of a theft problem). Time locked out = 10 minutes

Example 4: I was monitoring a blood transfusion at work, and popped home to get some dinner. Managed to leave my work keys on the table. Got back into work because it was still open. Went to leave and realised I was locked in . Luckily there is a spare key, in a safe which I didn't know the location of or the combination. So I phoned someone (at 10pm), got the details, and managed to get out. They then worried about me for the next hour. Time locked in = 10 minutes

Example 5: Last night I left home, shut the door and realised I had the wrong set of keys. Had to phone someone from work, get the number for someone closer, and get the to come around and let me in. I've worked there for 6 weeks and already had lock/key issues twice. Time locked out = 20 minutes

So if anyone has any handy hints on remembering to take your keys with you, or handling doors that lock automatically, let me know.

Current Afghan Tally
Light blue: 124 out of 124
White: 32 out of 93
Yellow: 0 out of 48
Dark blue: 0 out of 20
TOTAL: 156 out of 285

BIG Project!

A couple of weeks after I moved I started this, the Nine Patch Crocheted Afghan, which hopefully I'll manage to finish in time for my mums birthday. It's at the end of June, so I've started early. I'm using more blues and yellows because it'll go better.


Granny squares 

So here's my current tally of squares.
Light blue: 124 out of 124
White: 5 out of 93
Yellow: 0 out of 48
Dark blue: 0 out of 20
TOTAL: 129 out of 285

Tatting

I'd love to learn how to tatt. All the pieces I've seen look gorgeous. So in order to learn I bought this book from a second hand book store.


Tatting book 

And eventually managed to find a tatting shuttle.


Tatting supplies 


Then I tried, I really did...but could only come up with something which I'm pretty sure isn't right. The instructions in the book looked clear until I had a go and ended up in a bit of a tangle.

Nevermind, when I've got a bit more time and patience I'll have another go, and hopefully I'll get the hang of it. I haven't given up yet!

Clover Earrings

I made these earrings a few weeks ago, but I've only now got round to taking photos of them. They're quite simple and my first attempt at earrings. I still need to get the hang of bending the wire but hopefully I'll get better with practice.


Clover earrings 

Back

I've finally got an internet connection so I'll be able to start posting again. Although not right now...but it's good to be back!