Category Archives: plants

samples 3

My new favourite pattern.

Leaves

Or is it this way up?

Scales; tiles; shingles

I love it either way. The photos really don’t do justice to the colours of this beautiful Portuguese yarn, a warm natural and a complex heath green.

Meme 35 laceweight singles from Portugal

But hopefully you get the picture.

The shade cards for the yarn I’d like to use for my colourwork idea arrived and I have poring over them…

Blues

So many to choose from that it is kind of baffling. I’m finding the process similar to creating a garden- far easier if you have a some parameters to work within because a blank canvas can be overwhelming. I do have some clear parameters but the process is definitely making me define where I want to go with this- questions like, how willing and confident am I to trust my own sense of colour and pattern? Do I have the diligence to work carefully and consistently through the process and can I broaden my vision to see what will really work, rather than just get distracted or disabled by the glut of choices? And, if this is something I want to produce to sell, how much do I follow my own colour choices and how much should fashions in colour influence me? This process is such a great thing for me because I can be a bit of a dreamer! So, now to make the final choices… ; )

autumn walk

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We went walking out at Werribee Gorge this morning. This was my first visit to the gorge in many years and I was reminded of what an incredibly beautiful place it is. Recognized in the 1880’s for its geological importance, the area was reserved as a public park and for the preservation of geological features in 1907 (quite early in Australia’s land conservation movement)- not only for it’s beauty but because five hundred million years of geological history (from ancient folded sea-bed sediments to glacial material to relatively recent lava flows) were slowly revealed by the cutting action of the Werribee River… and are still on show for all to see.

Gorge face

Cave

Tiny wee beach

In the 1930’s, the Water Commission installed a concrete channel on the northern side of the river, to capture stormwater runoff to supply water to the neighbouring township of Bacchus Marsh. No longer in use but still capturing rain, it looks just like a rill from a 1930’s garden, a slightly surreal but lovely sight in a natural landscape like this!

Rill ang gorge

Although it is said that there is no dramatic and visible change in our vegetation from season to season, what I saw today- the overall feel of the landscape- completely changed my opinion on that.

The dominant colours were rust and grey.

Lichen on Dodonea

Sweet little herb- anyone know what this is?

Seedheads, Dodonea viscosa

Shedding Red Ironbark

Grasses were also on show. Anyone who loves Piet Oudolf‘s work would recognize the potential of these beauties for use in landscape design.

Sun-bleached Themeda triandra

Seedheads twisting, Stipa sp.

And we met a lovely little moth.

My, what handsome antennae you have!

Beautiful place. You should visit it.

flax and linen

new things

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A new year (I am always a little behind) and several new explorations begun- including this place here which I hope will be a way of keeping focused on the rest of them…

The first is a little difficult to show here but possibly the most important- health! I am jiggling things around to try to get my energy and fitness levels up and some clarity in my outlook. At times, I have found these things intangible and temporary and am hoping that working actively with people in the know will help me to ground myself in the daily activities needed to bring them about. I anticipate that I will be asked to do unexpected things, but I think my health and happiness will stem from such things as being out in this:

On the Mousa ferry, Shetland

and amongst these:

Grass of Parnassus, Loch Katrine hills

growing and eating wholesome food:

Plump florence fennel from the garden

and through other my explorations: mucking around with some lovely textures in the hands and on the machine, and hoping to take steps towards doing more:

Harlequin scarf

recycling beautiful tweed into beautiful, warm things:

Harris tweed #376195

playing apothecary and making soap from, among other things, the milk of these little beauties:

Handsome goats, Daylesford

and, of course, spending time with loved ones:

Walking and laughing

I look forward to it all!