ConnieLene – KnitDesigner

Funky Fashionable Feather and Fan Fingerless gloves are back on etsy

left and right foot graph

3 Beret pattern options

Kiwi Cape

So sorry to all those lovely people who have followed up on my patterns and my knitting progress. We have been more than a little busy here on our little wee lifestyle block (2.2 acres) in Miranda, Waikato, New Zealand.

Dinner when we were camping at new home

Since we arrived in September from the Netherlands we have had our hot water cylinder blow up and flood and damage the floor. We have had to do various electrical work to fix or make legal what was done here and we have added another water tank as all our water is gathered from the house and garage roof tops. We have also started several vegetable gardens and begun establishing fencing for a few sheep or a couple of cattle. We have lost a bit of the driveway and are filling sand around the tank to reduce the issue of the side of the bank risking collapse. We have also had rather difficult neighbour issues to deal with – which we feel are now solved but it certainly added to our stress for many weeks. We have retired here to live the good life and have fun stuff to do every day and we are doing that.

We are now eating cucumbers, tomatoes, celery, lettuce, herbs, courgettes, bok choy, radishes, spring onions, and more and that Best Beloved is floundering with our local electrician. What a great guy – he comes to sort out our electrical issues and now he and Best Beloved are floundering together. They brought in 8 flounder and 2 Kahawai this morning. Kahawai Information here

We have planted potatoes, kumura, cabbages, beetroot, and many many trees. Today we will put in 2 red currant bushes and 2 hazel nuts. We are also planting to reduce the risk of wind damage as the property is very very wind swept and our plants are young and tender. Best Beloved has counted 42 olives on one of our tiny trees – so all the Good Life stuff is happening.

I am just not knitting yet.

I still haven’t unpacked everything from the Netherlands and in the evenings I am just too shattered to even pick up the needles – besides I don’t have a knitting chair.

So all in good time – I will knit again and I have patterns to complete and stories to write – so SORRY SORRY for now that there is no knitting news.

and

A Happy New Year to you all.

Things are settling here a bit. The internet is very flaky indeed as is my knitting progress. Withdrawal from yarn and needles is very very difficult and I am becoming scratchier (is that really a word?) by the day.

SO something has to change

I am going to sort out the boxes, yarns, needles, etc and get knitting

and just maybe we can even sort out the internet – but that seems a more difficult prospect after 2.5 months without proper service.

Hope so.

I am knitting a baby blanket in simple garter stitch which I can do in the car, talking with my very frail mother in law etc. Feels so good after so many weeks without any yarn in hand and desperately taking photos of yarn shops and knits on the bicycle trip from Haarlem, the Netherlands to Untersiggenthal in Switzerland via Germany and France and then home to New Zealand.

Feels so good.

I will give the blanket to the Kaitaia maternity unit for a new mum and baby there, which is what my Best Beloveds mother has been doing for years and years.