Tag Archives: Knitted

Tea Cosy, specimen 14

This is the fourteenth and final tea cosy I have to show you.  This one was for J, and she keeps chooks, thus the three on top.  The colouring is also slightly different from the previous chook one I made for our mutual friend C.  J has the most divine garden and house filled with antique bits and pieces and every corner is a picture to gladden the heart of a photography freak.  She has things like old farming boots, filled with plants and sitting on an old rusty iron table in a leafy corner of the garden; a discarded bike leans casually under a tree; an ornate gate leans against another tree, forming the backrest to a bench; the verandah is hung with quaint birdcages, paint a-peeling, some with bird ornaments perched inside.  There is even a rusty jalopy parked in one corner, getting overgrown…  She has pet alpacas!  I regret deeply I didn’t have my camera when I visited…
She took this picture for me of the cosy with one of her antique finds, a tea caddy.  She sent me about six pictures of the cosy, each with cuter and cuter accessories alongside and it was tough for me to narrow the picture choice down to just one! but here it is.
The base is again the base for RolyPoly, from Wild Tea Cosies by Loani Prior, but the chooks are my own design.

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Riverside situation

Little adventure this morning.  Lately I’m in the habit of combining my two early morning tasks of dog-walking with taking my photo, if I’m planning to take one that day, that is.  I have my camera, tripod and the shoes I’m planning to wear the remainder of that day in a backpack, I take Sienna with me and stop somewhere picturesque and set up for a few minutes.  Well today, I’m out on this tiny jetty and it’s quite windy, I’ve got the tripod shored up between a pillar and the backpack to prevent it from blowing over (yeah, it was windy enough that that was a real risk!) and next thing I know, whoosh! my tripod bag is now floating in the river about five metres away.  Bob bob bob, it goes, taunting me,  out of reach.  I look at it with despair.  Should I abandon modesty and wade out to it?  No, the river is over thigh deep at that point…  Sienna is no bloomin’ good at all, she may look pretty but that’s as far as her usefulness goes.  Fetch, she does not do…  I look about for a handy young man jogging in his shorts who may gallantly help me out, but I’ve chosen my time well and there is absolutely no-bloomin’-one in sight AT ALL.  No canoe-ers.  I’ve got the foreshore to myself.  Usually this is a plus as I’m shy about taking my own photo if anyone’s about, but this time I could really do with a helpful man… (couldn’t we all…?!, joking, I’ve got my own man, but he’s gone to work early, dammit)
So I hightail it home, dragging Sienna, not allowing her to sniff or socialise, and luckily my eldest two are still around, and my daughter, never shy of an adventurous stunt, immediately dons bathers and we drive back down, she swims out, it’s about twenty metres out by now, and rescues the tripod bag…
As the song goes, thank goodness for little girls…
As a anticlimactic afterthought, my hat.  It’s newish, well on its maiden voyage anyhow (like my tripod bag).  I bought a single ball of this yummy wool at anny blat at their shop in Paris when we were there six years ago.  I finally made this beanie last year from my own design, just cast onto four double-ended needles and made it up as I went along.  I’m going to make myself wear hats more often.  I wish they were more in fashion.

Details:
Skirt; Vogue 7303, fabric handwoven by my Mum
Top; refashioned from husband’s old workshirt, my own design
Scarf; Country Road
Shoes; Timberland, bought in Rome
Cloche; annyblat yarn, my own design

 

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Tea Cosy, specimen 13

Here is the tea cosy I made for a friend, S, for her birthday last year.  It is made using the pattern Harlequin Flower, with a few minor modifications, from the book Wild Tea Cosies, by Loani Prior.
I just love the soft feminine pretty colours of this tea cosy, and the whole style and shape of this pattern.  The little crocheted bell flowers were a tiny amount of crochet that I can cope with; crochet is not my forte, for sure and I struggle with each stitch…
If I was going to make any more tea cosies (and I’m not, I’ve only got one more to show you and then that’s it with the tea cosies!!) then I would choose this pattern, as I think it’s really cute and looks adorable on the teapot.

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Tea Cosy, specimen 12

Here is the tea cosy I made for my friend K for her birthday last year.  It is the last of the Roly Poly’s I made from the excellent book, “Wild Tea Cosies” by Loani Prior.
My friend K is the most highly organised lady I know.  She is also thoughtful, caring and considerate, and a really good true friend, in fact she’s one of those people that others are naturally drawn to and want to be her friend.
Photographed in her beautiful sleek stainless steel kitchen in it’s usual spot… 

Geez.  I may be going crazy here, but every, like every time I proofread my blog post before, and, er, frequently after posting too, I have written “form’ for “from”.  It’s like a conspiracy.  I swear.  A sly, devious, computer keyboard conspiracy designed to do my head in.  It’s getting to be kind of hilarious, in a slightly insane way….
oh, happy Valentine’s Day, all!  I hope everyone enjoys time with a special someone….  
We’re going on a romantic candlelit picnic down by the foreshore this evening, so I’ll post pics of my outfit tomorrow…

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Tea Cosy, specimen 11

This is the tea cosy I knitted for my friend A for her birthday.  It’s actually the very first tea cosy I made out of all of them and I love its little bobbles.  It’s made from Jo Sharp wool; and from memory.  I saw an example very like this one in a Jo Sharp knitting book and made this cosy pretty much from what I could remember of it.  On a side note here, something that really bugs me is how yarn manufacturers bring out these veeeery expensive pattern books for sale which usually, often, contain about fifteen or twenty patterns.  How ridiculous is that?  You might only want to make one, or possibly two of the patterns in the book (how much knitting is the average person capable of, really), and you have to pay $50 for a whole bunch of patterns you’re not even remotely interested in.  It would be so much more sensible if the patterns could be available singly, on a pamphlet and you could then just purchase the ones you want.  That’s my opinion, anyway.  What do others think?
Anyhow, getting back to this cosy; my friend A is a very classic and tasteful dresser and I’ve always thought of these subdued sophisticated shades as being her kind of colours.

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Teal dress and, er, white lacy thing

I apologise in advance for the appearance of a yet another white lacy number.  I actually made this about a year ago and don’t wear it very much, especially not since I became aware of and then started feeling embarrassed about the glut of white lacy clothes in my wardrobe….
I wish I could say I made this teal dress, but it was a birthday gift from my darling husband who wanted to buy me some clothes so I wouldn’t suffer from the creative burden of having to sew my own, without perhaps considering how much I love said burden….  like an addict loves the drug that enslaves them.  My friend D first coined this metaphor as it applies to creative types and I relate, really I do.  No sooner am I putting the finishing touches onto one project than already my brain is feverishly planning the next sartorial experiment… and I’m really making an effort to slow down and plan more carefully for economy, practicality and versatility!
I do adore this dress, like I do nearly all Metalicus for its spectacular ease of wear combined with intense beautiful colours.  With varying degrees of success I’ve tried at times to reproduce some of my favourite items but the difficulty is, as always, getting hold of fabric…. The usual seamstress’ complaint.  This dress is from the wool range, and amazingly it’s incredibly cool to wear in summer.
The bag I made about two years ago and first posted about here.
Details:
Dress; Metalicus
Top; my own design, white cut-out embroidered linen
Bag; my own design, cream wool
Shoes; Sandler, op shop
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Tea Cosy, specimen 10

Here is the tea cosy I made for my sister-in-law A for her birthday last year, photographed in her kitchen amongst some of her adorable knick-knacks.  She has their house full of beautiful things, so wherever you look is yet another beautiful vignette of lovely objects arranged just so.  I think if she chose she could have been an interior designer, or a photographic stylist as she really has the “eye”.  I chose these warm earthy colours for her cosy as they are very indicative of her warm, earthy personality; she has a big heart and a caring, friendly demeanour that impels people to warm to her immediately.  The pattern is a Roly Poly, from the book “Wild Tea Cosies” by Loani Prior.
The little blue milk jug at the back is also made by a family member, but I’m not sure now which one.  My father, my aunt and my brother have all made beautiful pottery pieces, which are treasured by all of us, so it is the work of one of them, must make it my mission to find out.

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Tea Cosy, specimen 9

Here is the tea cosy I made for my mother-in-law for her birthday last year.  She loves the beach and spends a lot of time walking and swimming on the beach, so I took the soft blues and browns of the seaside for inspiration. This tea cosy is my own design, just cast on what seemed like a good number of stitches and started knitting, winging the design.  I love the bobbly yarn I found for the top-knot, it reminds me of that coastal grass that we call “pussy-tails” in WA because the flowers look tiny miniature fluffy cat-tails.

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