Not a lot to write home about today.

Great BBQ at James & Rebecca's place last night. Shame it ended with one of their kids going off to Emergency with a puncture wound from a nail. Rebecca seemed quite blase about it - I guess with 3 boys, stuff like that is common.

Went out for a bit this morning, got a couple of pairs of sandals from #1 Shoes - a replacement black pair for Becca, and pink ones for me - my jandals make my feet hurt. All the junk shops were closed, so I couldn't check out the pressure cooker Julia said she saw at ... Salvation Army?

Made two plastic shuttles from my $3.00 plastic chopping board, and a new wire heddle. That was quite satisfying. As you can see, functional, but not classy. I have two more like the wooden one with red yarn on order from Wheels & Whorls, plus a hooky thing. And of course I left my new crochet hook at home. Sigh.

I spent the afternoon trying to untangle the knot of white yarn I want to use to warp the loom for Inkle bookmarks. There's still 1 small knot left ... grr. But I've had enough for one day.

Just got back from taking the dogs for a walk along the beach path - everyone had a paddle, of course, and Kama found himself a fish skeleton - at first we thought it was a stick, but he never carries sticks!

About to sit down and hopefully watch an episode of Bones from "Watch Online Series" dot com. Once it finishes loading. Plan B is read a book ...

Christmas Day 2013

So, when is the last time we woke up at nearly midday?

The fact that it was suddenly midnight when we went to bed is irrelevant, lol.

There is only 1 clock in this house - on the stove, in the kitchen.

Bacon and eggs for brunch. Dogs fed. Lovely overcast day.

Must be on holiday!

Oh, that's right ... "Bailey sleeps out in the hall" ... Bailey much prefers to sleep IN the bedroom, beside me - competing with Tara, as she thinks that's HER space.

David comfortably ensconced on the couch, Tara on the couch, Kama on the floor, Bailey with his butt to us. Brunch dishes cleaned by dogs, waiting to go in the dishwasher.

Took a drive over to Beachlands to buy some rubbishbags, then up the road about 5km to get some fresh fruit and veges – strawberries and blueberries – nom!

Then home for a nap. The headache I’d gone to bed with, woken up with, and had stayed with me finally went away with the help of some maxigesic. All three dogs curled up with me.

There's quite a nice view over the gully to the other side:

Weaving – well, its plan 76. Despite all the fancy calculations, that worked out the sett (how wide it would be), the piece I wove was 11cm wide instead of 5cm. Far too wide for a bookmark. It looks quite cool, but not what I want.

I’ve cut off 6 cream warp threads, and 12 ‘spice’ warp threads, leaving 6 cream warps. The warp is 2.00m long, so I’ll make a few bookmarks with that. I’ve wrapped the cut warps around the back loom bar, and will work on them later.

Found the book on Inkle weaving I'd purchased a few weeks ago - it was still in my Downloads folder. 

After dinner (slow roasted beef, yorkshire pudding, kumara, spuds n salad), we took the dogs for a walk along the beach, this time heading south. They all went paddling, and of course Tara had to go in very deep. It was great watching Tara and Kama playing and enjoying themselves.

Mr B’s external hard drive has thrown a tanty and he can’t access data that he wants. He’s very frustrated. I’d bumped the damn thing earlier – hope it wasn’t my fault.

Done a wee bit of work on my CV – bah humbug. My ‘relevant’ job experience is pre-1996 – a lifetime ago.

Feeling like I/we are in limbo. 

I’m on holiday. What’s a holiday, I ask.

Well, I answer, it’s when you don’t go to work, and, just for a change, you don’t stay at home, either.

You go away to someplace else. And, of course, you take your toys with you.

Oh, and of course, you take the dogs with you. And husband. And child. Who bring their own toys.

Today, I finished constructing the weaving loom I’ve been making for the last few weeks. It’s based on an Ashford Table loom. I found detailed plans on line, and rather than buy one (about $250), I thought I’d make one. Of course, in the long run, it’s not much cheaper. But for FIXSUE, it’s so much more fun-er-er! It’s probably cost close to $120, but I’ve had hours of entertainment. It needs a bit more tidying up, but it’s now functional.

This evening I finally got to warp it up (the long-ways threads). I discovered that one I put some tension on it, the strings that I’d put the warp-bars on pulled thru their holes. Hurrumph – plan 75B (there have been a number of cunning plans making this thing, lol).

There’s a dreadfully complicated mathematical equation (well, it seems such to me!). What I WANTED to make were some bookmarks. Bookmarks that were meant to be 5cm wide and 20cm long. Well, they’re 11cm wide. I’m not really sure why, but I think it has to do with the width of the gaps in the heddle (the bit the threads go thru).

So, maybe they won’t be bookmarks. Maybe they’ll be ... something else.

Here’s some pretty pictures:

We're 'holidaying' at a friends house. So, we’ve been down here at Maraetai (well, it’s downhill from where we live!) since about 2.00pm. Our dogs have taken themselves for 3 walks. We THINK we’ve plugged the gaps. Unfortunately they don’t have much respect for fences that are only a couple of feet high, when there’s children laughing and screaming somewhere over the valley. Sigh.

This evening, we took all three dogs (we’re dog-sitting with Bailey, a large golden retriever) for a walk down near the beach. Of course everyone had a quick swim. Soggy doggies.

Projects this weekend – besides weaving, include doing some encaustic painting, and working on my CV. David has applied for a job in Canberra, digitising film and videotape. So far, he’s had an I/V with the recruitment agent, a phone I/V with the prospective boss, and he’s expected to fly to Canberra for a face-to-face and check out the job at the end of January.

We can see potential for me getting a job with them too, as a lot of the work involves taking old cassette tapes and machines apart and putting them back together – which is definitely something I’m good at doing. So I need to tart up my CV, as it’s been nearly 7 years!

We can’t make the TV here work, so I suspect there’ll be more blogging tomorrow.