Of knit and crochet

I started this cardigan more than 2 years ago to wear in Canada. It was so bulky it wouldn't fit in my suitcase, so I didn't end up bringing it to Canada to finish. 

I decided recently to finish it but looking at it I decided that I didn't like the style anymore. So I undid the cardigan and started again with a new pattern. The new cardigan I finished within a week and I'm happy with the fit. I made only one modification to the pattern to extend the front button placket so I can button the whole front.

The finished cardigan.

 Detail of the travelling lines & buttons.

This dress is from Interweave Crochet and I've been working on it for at least 6 months. It was sleeping for a while as I ran out of cotton. The layout is modified from the original to accommodate less squares at the top.

The new cotton was a different shade and so I had to overdye the dress to even out the colour. I first washed the dress and then I used very strong black tea to dye it. It had two attempts in the dye pot and a few days of soaking.

The edges of Singapore

Since visiting Australia in December I've been preoccupied with edges.

Singapore is an island but you rarely see the edges, you have to go search for them and they are largely quite inaccessible. 

I wanted to find a place to see the sun set over the water, to look out of Singapore over the sea.

Sunset over Jurong Island with a gunmetal grey sea. This is about as far south as you can go on mainland Singapore.

Light fading over Tuas Checkpoint. This is as far west as you can go in Singapore. The hills you see in the background are in Malaysia! 

Perhaps I should search for North and East too.

Birds, blurry birds

The bird-paparazzi-ing never stops. Here are some (horribly blurry photos) snapped in Malaysia.

White-Throated Kingfisher.

Might be a Grey Heron.

A Little Heron?

A Grey Heron in flight.

I spy with a Black-Naped Oriole.

Spotted Dove.

 Possibly a Grey Heron.

A Pacific Reef Egret?

My favourite, Rock Pigeons.

I think this is a Purple Heron.

Two Zebra Doves running away.

A preoccupation with light

Back in December (yes, a while ago!) I went to Malaysia for a short holiday. The resort had a golf course, and even though I know nothing about golf, I found the place inspiring. Every afternoon there was a short storm and in the morning the light over the course was amazing.

The rough texture of the road.

The colourful lichen growing on the palm trees.

The morning light through peach curtains with the tree behind.

The tree shadows on the wall in the morning light.

The wet grey colour of the road contrasted with the yellow crossing after a storm.

Dew and misty morning light over the golf course.

The speedbump after the rain.

The late afternoon blue sky with dark cypresses reminded me of van Gogh.

I love the footprints to tell you which side is for pedestrians and which side is for golf buggies!

If I could paint, I'd paint this scene. To the left a storm is brewing and to the right colourful golfers converse seemingly oblivious.

Moss! A rare sight in Singapore!

Earth Meets Sky

My annual journey back home provided much inspiration in terms of colour and texture.  I plan to develop some of these colours in my dyeing work and the textures perhaps in some other projects.

Blue Hydrangeas in the evening garden take on the hue of the sky. The colour seems almost limit-less.

Sunrise over the great desert that is Australia's centre. The glow was so much more orange that my camera could cope with. It was like peach icecream.

The airplane was quiet as everyone else was sleeping. I snuck up the shades to take a picture. Its strange to think of the earth below rotating as we fly over it in the atmosphere. 

A little beetle I met. He was such amazing colours - reds and greens and yellows.

This little pond is a coppery green owing to the mineral content of the water. The pond was full of ducks and little fish.

Recycled brick pathways have always been a favourite of mine. This one was multi-hued red to orange and almost green. The day was warm so the path was radiating heat.

The farm-scape near where I live. The old fields follow the undulations of the land. The new fields follow the circle of the irrigation spray. A multitude of crop colours, mostly veggies or grazing. The white fields are probably poppies grown for medicine.

Sometimes you look out the window on the plane and see strange and beautiful cloud formations. 

The night sky at my parent's house is so dark you can see the stars. Here is Orion's belt.

The Bridestowe Lavender farm was extraordinary. The colour of the lavender complemented the purple of the mountains and the red of the soil. And it smelt wonderful.

Shadow of a woolen lace shawl I saw at the Tasmanian Wool Centre at Ross, Tasmania. I also brought some beautiful handspun undyed black wool there. They also have a wool museum where you can touch different microns of wool and see some of the world record breaking long staples from different sheep.

This yellow lichen never fails to amaze me with its colour. This is growing on a 150 year old gatepost in Oatlands, Tasmania.

The deep dark sky fades to light cloud. I am reminded of Hiroshi Sugimoto's amazingly beautiful scarves for Hermes when I see this. 

The shallows of the bay make strange forms.

Birds I've met recently

The Brahminy Kite hang out for a good half hour just flying around and sitting on a tree branch. While my camera isn't good you can see the distinctive white head it has. Close up it looks like this. 

Its beautiful to watch him circle and follow the breeze. The Swifts sometimes fly at him to shoo him away (probably from eating their chicks) but it doesn't seem to bother him.

We met another Emerald Dove. This one was very relaxed and continued wandering about looking for food even though we were just metres away.

I took lots of photographs but they are all blurry as I was too excited to see the dove! He is very very handsome and colourful.

The same day we saw the Emerald Dove we also saw this group of 5 Laughing Thrush also looking for food amongst the leaf litter. This fellow was curious about me too!

The Laughing Thrush 'chatter' to each other while they forage, I guess to keep track of their family members.

Tasty Things

This is the second time I have made this polenta cake. Its gluten free and uses polenta and ground almonds instead. However it does contain eggs so I can't eat too much at once. This time I used limes instead of lemons and it was lovely. The cake has a lot of butter in it too so its not so healthy but very tasty!

I tried making Macarons for the first time. I was surprised to find out that Macarons are wheat free! They are made with ground almonds, egg white and sugar. It was going well in the oven but they flattened out once I took them out and I didn't get nice little 'feet' on them. They were also much too sticky.

After cooking they went quite flat. Fortunately they tasted quite nice so we ate them anyway. Though once again they have egg whites in them so I had to restrain myself to just eating one or two (dozen!). 

I filled some and then I baked some of them a second time and we just ate them as is. I put lemon rind in the shells so they had some flavor without the filling. For the filling I used white chocolate, coconut cream and lemon. This was an excellent plan as the filling was very good. In fact I think the filling was more successful than the shells!

Fortunately the Creme Brulee turned out perfect. I used the egg yolks left over from making the Macarons. Turns out I can tolerate these quite nicely. I used real vanilla beans to make them and that made them taste MAGNIFICENT. 

 Alas my grill is not hot enough to get nice toffee on the top without burning the brulee. Next time I shall have to get a brulee torch!

I used this recipe from the Guardian to make the Creme Brulee. It really is easy and tastes amazing. I had no idea it was so easy to make so I'll have to make more in the future. The fun part is thinking up different flavors to put in them. Though I think Vanilla Bean is the classic.