Two years and 11 days

Yes really.  That's how long we've now been Tiree residents.  I was planning a post similar to the last annual update but the weather here has been Wet with a side of sodden.  I also broke my camera mid January and it was away for two weeks for repairs.

But I still have some photos to share!

The tapestry is progressing well.  January saw all twelve panels joined together:


Some rearranging was done to the odd item that didn't look quite right but overall it's amazing.  The border is now being mocked up and the plan is to use words of a song written to look like waves.  There are still bits that need to be embroidered or other bits that need sewing down but considering when I moved here all that was done was some shells, mugs and cakes it's doing well!

There are even thoughts on what to do next.  The main plan is not something so intensive.

The weather truly has been wet.  We're used to getting a puddle in the back garden but the driveway at the front being 2" deep is new:



There's also a puddle near the front olearea (I'm never going to fathom that spelling!):


We have had some dry days though.  One day it was so clear you could see Eigg and Rum and co:





There was also a lovely view from Scarinish to Mull's snowy peaks:


It's currently 2:45am.  When I woke up an hour ago the moon was so bright I just had to go out:




There are hailstones galore piled up out front and more falling, but during the brief dry spell the moon was lovely.

The trike isn't happy with me.  After two years of very good use it was decided to change the chain as well as the rear tyre and rear inner tube.  Jo got a puncture last week so I took advantage of having the trike home during daylight to just do the whole lot.  Poor trike ended up looking like this:


The tyre was only 9 months old:


But why was the pedal missing?  Turns out that a trike being "used to its full potential" as said by the bike place we bought it from slowly deforms.



You see, the chainring starts off with very uniform "spikes" that go into the chain to hold it while force is applied.  Over two years those spikes don't wear down, they flatten.  The side that is pushing against the chain is under enough force that over time the metal widens.  If you don't really notice this the thickened metal starts to wear into the chain and the plates holding each link together get weakened and eventually the weakest snaps.

That happened last year.  I cannibalised a chain to repair it with the plan of a full overhaul come Easter.  So there I was last week; hands black with grease and road dirt trying to get the new chain on.  It sat on the rear wheel sprocket absolutely fine but was refusing to lock into the front chainring.  After arguing with it for ten minutes I fathomed the problem.  The teeth had widened so much that a new chain simply wouldn't fit.

Just for comparison; this is what 2 years does to a chain:

Top is the 2yo rusty, stiff chain.  Bottom is the brand new, shiny, free moving chain.

So, after a Google to remind me how to remove the crank I left our poor trike in the sorry state above and contacted the bike shop.  Turns out the Bakfiets, who make this trike, make the chainring and pedal crank as one piece.  One piece that the bike shop don't keep in stock or have even had to source before.

So poor GB (Grumpy Bastard) as I have nicknamed the trike sat for a few days with no crank or chain.  But when the bike shop had no ETA on the replacement I put him back together.  That lasted a day before the chain snapped again.  More cannibalising; more blackened hands and for now GB is going.

We're just hoping the new part doesn't cost a fortune!  We did some looking of our own and the part needed isn't obviously available.  A replacement that would work comes somewhere in the realm of £150.

So, Bakfiets, while I love how easily maintained your cargo trikes are: consider either making that part easily sourced or making it so the chainring and crank are separate.  Thank you!

That's about it for now.  I'm going to go knit and watch something.

TTFN.

Happy 2014

It's 2014 already.  I would say what happened to 2013 but there's a few thousand photos that tell me that.

No photos taken this year yet, maybe tomorrow.

We had a good Christmas, just the two of us at home with so much food it was only finished 5 days later and that was after entertaining three others!

So what happened?


Well, we were both up at a reasonable time and after the brekkers of fresh bread and slow-cooked ham joint we opened a present each.

I opened an unexpected parcel from the Catalyst team at Infolab and was greeted by something really rather cool.


It's a tree!  But the best part is it contains an Arduino and once the software is written and running on my PC the lights will reflect how Tilley the Turbine is doing.  Green will be excellent power production and red will be poor/off.

We'd spent a couple of hours on Christmas Eve preparing the food so cooking was a leisurely affair and I got to chill while Jo went to church and the house slowly filled with the smell of cooking turkey.  We decided to eat lunch in the living room as the kitchen was far too cold!  This did mean that Madam stickhound spent a good 20 minutes sitting next to Jo swearing to give her his lunch.  Didn't work.

She did get a doggy cracker though!  Bizarrely the packet said "to be opened by adults only"  I did open it for her but only because she didn't understand what to do and as there was no food contained she wasn't fussed about getting into it :p  It included a hat which Madam wore:





For all of five minutes.



Jo's morning pressie was a very punny tshirt from his little sister:


Once we'd put food out of doggy range we got to opening the rest of our pressies.  Some silly, some useful and some random.

I won't bore folks with the list, but it was a good selection and much fun.  It did include some home made multisurface cleaner from our soap making friends.  Took me 2 hours over 2 days, but I completely cleaned 2 years worth of grime off the inside of the oven door!  You can now see the status of your cooking items without opening it.  Just have to clean it every so often so I DON'T have to spend 2 hours and lots of energy on it.

I thought I'd summarise 2013 in craft terms.  So I present all the things I knit/crocheted during 2013:





 






















(I actually made 12 of these, but posting all those is just silly)


(ditto the 26 of these)

Finally, these are the Christmas presents I was asked to knit:

My MIL wanted a tea cosy, she specified "Tiree colours" and after seeing my jumper she said she wanted sheep.  I went with sheep at sunset:


With pom-pom!  It was a nice simple knit and I got to try "steeking" where you reinforce some stitches and then CUT YOUR KNITTING!  It's quite the scary idea but once you're done the exhilaration is amazing.

Younger sister in law wanted a bobble hat in burgundy and white.



I didn't have any suitable white but I did have a nice natural cream that really sets off the burgundy.
No Tiree colours this time, but those "bunnies" could conceivably be hares.

So that's a tiny summary of 2013.  Want to see the rest?  Just read the previous posts on here.

Happy 2014 to all who read this blog and may the new year bring new joy.

TTFN

Overnight kitchen madness

It's been noted last week that I was rather "run down".  That was an understatement to be honest, I was on the verge of crashing.

Yesterday Jo was home all day due to illness; other than waking up at 8am to phone him in sick I slept from 8:30pm Wednesday night to 8:49pm Thursday night.  Yep, near 24 hours of sleep!  It wasn't even poor sleep, it was outright needed dead-to-the-world sleep.

So, after getting up I chatted to Jo about what we were going to make to give to friends.  Cue me boiling sugar and melting chocolate into the wee hours.

I made chocolate truffle mix (low carb diet friendly!)

I made tablet:


And I (hopefully) made fudge:


It's a Delia recipe but I think it needed to get a bit hotter.  We shall see once it's cooled.

In other news I have new specs!



Yep, they're blue.  You see, while a UK specs making firm will have to charge you £300 to get your specs coloured there's a US firm that do it for a lot less so long as you only want either blue, green or yellow.  Fortunately for me; my "disability" (I use that term loosely) is sorted by blue tint.

These arrived on Tuesday and while I'm not quite brave enough to wear them in public yet, I wear them at home and they are FANTASTIC!  For the first time in my memory I can read without the text changing thickness or moving or going fuzzy.  I spent 3 hours reading things on my computer on Wednesday morning and instead of having the usual headache and tired feeling I was fine and the information had gone in.  I can also count squares on a knitting chart more reliably and follow the lines easier.

I cannot express how much of a difference this has made.  Finally I can read books to the point where I want to stop rather than my head aches.

Hurrah for Meares and Irlen for discovering this mental issue and hurrah for optical firms providing the service.  Long may it continue!

Well, this is probably the final update before Christmas and perhaps new year; so Merry Christmas and a wonderful new year to all from myself, Jo, Pippa the dog and Rumble, Nushu and Fred the ferrets.

TTFN

*corncrakes*

Oops!

It's not that I'm not busy, it's just that it's mundane life stuff.  Combined with the winter weather being here and so me not really getting out and about and the blog goes quiet.

So, random pictures from the past month:


We've had some lovely mornings




Friday was the Lunch Club Christmas lunch and our friday group were invited.  The Cobbled Cow put on a fantastic meal with crackers and pass the parcel.



Marg is probably going to murder me for this; but she looked so good!





Yep, that's a full body Rudolph outfit/onesie.  The nose contains a squeaker.  There were lots of "will you leave my tail alone!" exclamations during the meal :p

I've designed a cushion cover.







It's called "Lamb below the waves" and is inspired by Tiree's nickname "Land below the waves".  I'm not selling the pattern but I am selling the covers with or without stuffers.

The Woolly Ferret is slowly gaining interest.  I've got some new yarn to update it with this week.

Oh, we had a Christmas sale!

Good grief, really must update more often.

So, yes, 30th November was the Tiree Christmas Fayre.  I didn't want to go all out and get a whole table; partly because I wasn't sure I'd have enough stock and partly because if nothing sold that'd be me £12 out of pocket and a bit sad.  So, I chatted to Amanda of Grommity and we shared.  She made good sales with her keyrings; prints and sold a painting too!



I sold a little over half the baubles; a couple of hair elastics and lots of yarn.  Considering I only had sock yarn on sale  I was most impressed!

No, the cushions didn't sell; it's not quite sunk into the Public Mind that hand crafted doesn't nescessarily mean "made poorly by hobbyists" so the idea of paying over £40 for a cushion is still a little baulk worthy.  Still, that's a bargain when you consider the yarn alone cost £15

What else?  Oh, we lost internet for a good portion of the day a couple of weeks back and I was feeling slightly energetic.  I have a thing for knitting socks (you might have noticed) but I really cannot stand knitting them from the cuff down; it usually involves picking up gusset stitches and I always end up with huge holes.

But I really like a pattern that has Escher's lizards on it.  So I spent about 4 hours crunching numbers; knitting a swatch (a rarity for me!); measuring and working out how to reverse a pattern.



After some utterly daft mistakes I had success!





And that is as far as it's gotten because I have been doing Christmas knitting; had a week lost due to cold and been doing more stuff for the shop.

Hmm, considering I didn't think I had much to blog about, this isn't exactly a short post!

Finally, I shall leave you with some socks I knit for an island friend:



(I did wash them before sending them!)

TTFN