Tangled

Happy New Year! A few days late but still. The best thing about the new year so far is the sweet sound of a properly flushing toilet. The flush broke just before Christmas, straight after the toilet leak from upstairs funnily enough (ha ha) and has been dealt with by bucket ever since. The plumber came yesterday and did a great job, also replacing our kitchen tap with a brand new one which means that cold water is now available without the help of a pair of pliers! 

Here are some tangled pictures from the old and the new year. 

I took advantage of the sunny Sunday last week to cut down the fennel and take it to the tip. It is a pleasant job chopping fennel as it smells so good. It is also easy to snap and pile into large bags to transport, and has no unpleasant properties such as prickliness or whippiness.

A painting by my friend (we stayed with her and her family on new year's eve). I just love it and it does fit very well into the theme of tangled. 

A ball of yarn produced on my new yarn winder. I had no idea what one of these was until visiting my friend's studio, and immediately ordered one. I have a lot of cones of thin yarn bought from charity shops and they are a pain to crochet from, and involve me hand winding a ball if I want to double the thickness. No more!

The dragon tree on the window sill. The way the leaves crossed and made neat rectangular shadows caught my eye.

Hyacinth roots in the bulb glass also on the windowsill. 

My first ever attempt at darning. I used the wooden mushroom I have had for ages. The blue socks are hand knitted and  from Skye, and were expensive so now I feel good about having prolonged their life. The pink ones are from TK MAXX and less pricey but still worth saving.

The ends left from my current crochet project. 

The colours are so pretty and look almost better as ends than as the work itself.

A rocket from new year. We went up to our friends in the midlands-friends from college who we don't see very often and it was lovely! Back to work tomorrow. Trying to stay positive about that!

Things I Made in 2013

I thought it would be fun to look back and find out exactly what I had made this year. I looked on my blog and on tumblr and found quite a lot! I was pleasantly surprised and decided to make these mosaics as a reminder for myself. 

Crocheted Sadie, felt doll, heart bunting for school and felt bookmark.

 Papier maché tiger with my class, cardboard room from an Amazon box. Talking of boxes, I ordered a cat toy for my Mum's cat, a brilliant long wand with feathers that my cats all love. Packaged it is about 45cmx10cm but came in a box which could have held a pair of boots, filled with perforated brown paper packing material. Cassie loves the box and the packing material (a small section of it for her to slide on, the rest kept for later art endeavours)

 Felt eggs, 120 of them, for school, crochet swatches.

 Boxing in for the bathroom, crocheted Humpty Dumpty, crocheted cats (not sure if they were even this year but I think they were and I did make them!), felt horse, crocheted slippers.

 Underground fabric doll, pictures of toys, crocheted mat made from old t-shirts. 

 Crocheted skull bunting, finished when I was in America. Sandy face on Dungeness beach, drawing for the mad tea party.

 Strictly I didn't make the marble hearth, but I did a lot of work to get it to that state so I count it. Baby Bellingham hat, decorated small bookshelf, crocheted cover for G-Plan stool.

 Some things were quicker to make than others-like the Ken ring and the sugar faces. The felted ring and the crocodile took much longer!

 Felted picture, Twinkle Star, green playdough, Ravana doll and clothes for the monkey, clothes for my peg doll boot fair find.

 Crocheted hats, crocheted bowls, skinny sparkly doll.

Christmas cards, a Christmas pudding, present tags, my Mojo and a sock cow. Sock cow was a kit present from my brother which I made on Christmas day.

Christmas Day Walk

Maidstone is the nearest town to where my Mum lives. It is where I was born and went to school from 14. After lunch yesterday we went to look at the rising flood waters resulting from all the rain we have had in the last few days. It was pretty dramatically high! Although there are not houses along this stretch of the river, there are lots of businesses, car parks, and busy roads. The river had burst its banks and risen to the bottom of the High St, across the busy main road into town. The police had stopped allowing people to cross the bridge as the water was right to the arches underneath.

The appropriately named Pudding Lane-for Christmas I mean. 

Lions outside the museum.

Interesting window coverings on the now closed library. 

Sorry no entrance!

Police landrover which drove into the flood waters for no apparent reason, then reversed, turned and drove out again.

Watch out! The meal, it's ahead!

Another appropriate sign, and I like the blue enamel. 

This building always has water next to it. I just like the building!

Greenwich Park on Christmas Eve

After a brief trip to the shops to spend a £10 voucher which ran out on the 24th, I decided to have a quick look at the park to see what damage the high winds of the night before had done. There were some trees like this one and lots of small branches lying around but I could not see any major damage which is good.

 With roots like these, where fairies surely must live, it is hard to see this tree falling down, even if its top layers are a bit battered.

 Not a fairy, but a fluffy, white chested squirrel, looking very sweet under this yew. He was not a particularly tame squirrel, so ran away quite quickly. After this picture, I wandered about enjoying the fresh air and picking up pine cones, seed pods and pine twigs. I met a dog walker and had a brief conversation with her about her old dog's jacket which was currently in the wash as it had got soaked the day before. She wished me a merry Christmas, and me her, before we walked on.

 The weather turned to squally rain all of a sudden and I headed back to the car. But then I decided to take a look at the view over London before going home to wrap presents.

 A tree maintenance person's van reversed to go and maintain some more trees, and I looked down over the river.

 Then this happened. The sun came out as I walked into the trees behind the cafe. There were crows, squirrels, pigeons and parakeets all flying around and calling.

 Then a rainbow appeared. It was all so magical. 

 Because of the bare branches I could clearly see the parakeets even when they landed. There were a pair flying around from tree to tree, with me chasing them to take pictures. The light made their green feathers flash so brightly.

 They looked the best as they were flying, with their wings spread out and catching the sun. I only had my phone but these are still the clearest pictures I have got of these birds yet.

                       

   

A brief but perfect walk.