Riccarton House

Today we went to Riccarton House; also known as Deans Bush.  It's one of the original wooden houses in Christchurch, I didn't get any photo's of the house today though because it was the Farmers Market and impossible to get an unobstructed photo.   I did however get quite a few in the bush area which is one of the few remaining areas of native bush in Christchurch.   We all enjoyed the walk, though Ian did disappear and it took a while to find him.  He'd gone to the entrance of the grounds to wait for us; though he shouldn't have run off in the first place.   Our thanks to the people who helped us look.
George bought himself a thing of chocolate fudge; he ate 2 pieces; his uncle (my brother) and Thomas got one piece each; he gave one piece to Ian who fell in love and then stole the rest while we were all working on the kids play hut.  Ian is not getting computer time today and owes George $5.

I've picked some of the photo's I took today in the bush to show you, then there's some spinning and crochet to show off as well.

The family in the dappled forest

There was obviously a fire here at some point; there's a nasty smell of smoke and the tree next to this is showing damage most of the way up its trunk.  I suspect it was either a silly cigarette or deliberately lit as I don't see how a fire would start here spontaneously.

Such a cool looking root, covered in moss.

George being George

Ian just before he disappeared; so innocent looking.   He's lucky he's cute sometimes.

Don't forget to look up!

This just looks wrong in there, but the moss is trying to reclaim it.

Tortured root system, really rather amazing.

I did some crochet yesterday and today; George needed a hat and I'd frogged the green one.   It was way too small and the yarn was appalling to work with.   I've biffed that and instead I popped into my stash and came up with 2 balls of Shepherd Felted Lambswool which is a bulky felted single yarn.   It behaved so much better than the green stuff and it's his favourite colour too!
I present:

I should have straightened it first

He likes it though, even if it's crooked.

Looks lovely and warm; perfect for Arthurs Pass.

Hoping to get some plying done later after some work, this is what I'll be plying:

Merino/Silk for the two on left and right, Alpaca/Silk/Mohair for the front one; yum.

And after that I'll start spinning the singles for the guild challenge and get back to Ian's mittens.

Lovely mohair, hand dyed by me

Ian's mittens so far, well mitten is more accurate; too wide but there's no way he'll stand for me ripping them back to try again so they'll be wider than planned.

Oh, and I've bought some yarn, it's coming from Canada and will be leaving in a few days; whoops.   I've been trying to be good, but sometimes I slip.  I've also ordered a pair of leather boots, but those I need to replace the pair I've been wearing for over 10 years now.