Cruising along

Little madam is 2 months old now and has grown heaps - 5 cm longer and 1.26kg up from her birth measurements. She has discovered her voice and the power of smiling at people to get them to interact and frequently has long 'conversations'. We are just cruising along, still rather riding the high from her birth. She is just beautiful and generally such an easy-going little soul over all. In a weird way, parenting two is easier than one as she seems to balance him out really.

Laurent has hit a bit of a rough patch, either due to a cold, a major growth spurt (holy dooley, this kid sprouted overnight!) and/or finally seeing some adjustment from her arrival. He swings from being the most unbelievably sweet, gorgeous, considerate, helpful little person to feeling incredibly frustrated and crying over things that normally wouldn't make him blink.

He's going well with his toilet learning again though and his vocabulary has had another explosion as well lately. (Not all for the better though, if you grasp my meaning! Shame on mummy!) Nic also has him pronouncing things very snobbishly ie 'herbs' etc. It's all good though - I've got him breaking out with 'mate' and 'onya' to annoy the crap out of Nic in return... so he switches from very prim and proper to ocker when asking you to "pass the herbs, mate"! (I am so going to hell for manipulating my child's vocab to annoy my husbands sensibilities!)

In the meantime it is well and truly winter here and building the fire is a morning essential. Despite it being a season where not much is growing or changing in the garden, it's exciting in it's own way as there's much dreaming, scheming, planning and preparing to do so come spring everything will be ready to burst into life. We feed the soils... incorporating lots of nutrient rich organic matter and letting it settle in. Later we'll mulch. Improving the soil has been an issue since we moved in being on heavy clay lime, badly compacted, with almost no topsoil. It just chokes the plants - the clay is impenetrable to roots, suffocates them and repels water like it's teflon coated. The lawns and paddocks are still works in progress - I need to rent an aerator for the lawn and maybe hire a slasher or something for the paddocks? I have more research to do there. My smaller garden beds are turning into lovely loamy rich soil though and our new (recycled!) 3 bay compost built just after Lily was born is nearly full up! I've also got plans to put in new beds in the front garden and in the rear and plant heritage variety apple trees I've pre-ordered for July/August.

We are still waiting on purchasing the second car now that Nic has taken mine. Waking at 5:30am to haul a 3.5 year old and a 2 month old out into the freezing cold to drop him off, then resettling, than doing in reverse at night is just too much for most days! It's doing my head in though, as there have been times when I have literally not seen or talked to another human being aside from Laurent, Lily and Nic for a full week and given Nic's hours I only see him about 2 hrs in the evening. Most days we're fine as there is enough to us busy but I'm very much looking forward to having a car again and being able to see people again all the same!

I feel like it's a bit of a winter period for me as well, hibernating and letting my thoughts age before they are brought out. There is growth and change but like the roots of a plant it's mostly happening underneath and unseen. Every time I go to write what is on my mind at the moment though I stall or it's all just fragmentary thought stream. Spring feels like it has so much potential though and I'm kind of enjoying the feeling.

At any rate this is all to say that I'm still here, just more quietly and spending my time enjoying Laurent and Lily, watching the sheep grow woolly while the lambs are growing strong, the birds are all settling into winter. Even our Jasper has matured into a lovely cat and starting to settle from his kittenish ways.

In the meantime planning my garden and indulging rather heavily in knitting and felting. Felting wise I've been doing fulling (felting my knitting) like this Aussie which I also hand-dyed and will embroider shortly. This is the first one I dyed instead of skeins of yarn and I forgot to turn it to get the best depth to the colour, hence the red of the merle being darker in some areas than others.

and needle felting which is awesome! The 'leaf' bits of this little lily of the valley I knitted are needle felted. This one is obviously awaiting dye, as I want a few more pieces before I pull out the dyes and make a big mess.

Lace continues to devil me, cables intimidate me but I love the flow of the yarn under my fingers and I am getting better and learning new techniques although I'm sure my work is still clumsy and noviceish to experienced knitters but I'm proud of it none the less! For a treat I bought some yummy yarns I liked at Spotlight which are just for ME. Aren't they purdy?
from bottom left:

• white Moda Vera Kicky, a silky acrylic 8 ply
  
• bottom right - greens colourway of MV Milliefoglie which is a very soft, self striping yarn whose colourways look like different yarns joined in
• top right MV Picchio a worsted weight 70% Merino Fine superwash, 30% silk with long gradiant colourways (going to become a mistake rib neck warmer)
  
• top left the blue and lime number... from Lincraft though I can't recall the name
• and last MV Monsoon, also worsted weight and made of soya with a metalic twist in a natural/rusty/amythest colourway... soooo soffttttt... it's hard to resist snuggling it!