An exciting week!

Hello!

I had a rather strange week with lots of good and bad excitement. Looking back I can't quite believe it happened in less than a week!

Last Saturday our car started to make very strange noises when starting. If it started that is. No good sign at all! The car isn't that old (5 years) and well maintained. I took it to the garage about three weeks ago to get it checked because it made some high pitched noises and the gear was weird too. They assured me that there was nothing wrong. At all. 

On Sunday we realized the car warranty guarantee would run out on Wednesday.

On Monday I called the garage and made an appointment on Tuesday at 7:40 am. At around 10 am I got a call from them telling me that  the starter broke, it would cost over 3500 € and they weren't sure the guarantee would cover it. Ouch! At 4 pm we got the call it would be covered but you can imagine the hours in between... Lots of worrying.

In order to get to work the next days I had to take public transport which involved three different types of transportation plus a lot of walking. On Thursday, a bomb was found near the station in Dortmund where I had to get off (a dud bomb from WW2), so I basically left work running to get home via public transport before the evacuation started... Why? Because I needed to get off at that station in order to not be stranded at work and I had other appointments in Dortmund later that day. Oh and did I mention I had to pick up my now fixed car from the garage which was pretty close to the evacuation side?!

What a week! It worked out fine in the end but there was a lot of stress and I am tired. Stress makes my fatigue flare which is really annoying (I get fatigue from my autoimmune sickness too but a different kind than Michelle).

On the other hand it was a week full of excitement too. I haven't been to Australia since Michelle's wedding in 2011 - a very long time Michelle and I haven't seen each other in person and I haven't been in my favourite town, Sydney (we talked about the times we saw each other in person here). Plus my boyfriend hasn't meet Michelle's family yet and hasn't seen Down Under. So we planned to go there sometime later this year or in 2016. It was all very hypothetical though.

Well, on Tuesday I looked up flights just for the fun of it and saw a brilliant offer from Singapore Airline. And what shall I say... We booked! So we will be in Australia for four weeks this winter. Michelle thought I was kidding for about half a day when I told her btw... :P I am soo excited even though it's still over ten months away. The little giraffe Michelle gave me for my birthday in 2013 is very anxious to see her relatives in Australia again too and begs me to take her with me. I think I will. :D

Oh and I also managed to sneak in some crochet this week. Not as I hoped I would but some... I finally finished the blanket for my dad and will post it soon. Also I made another Granny Star Blanket, this time in reverse colours. And I worked a bit on the blanket for my Granny. Hm, I just realized I actually got more done than I thought!

Have a wonderful weekend!

Take care

Anne

Resolutions for 2015 and Crafty Skills to learn this year!

Hello you lot!

Happy New Year! May it be a wonderful, healthy and crafty 2015! 

Did you have nice celebrations for New Year ('s Eve)? The boyfriend and I celebrated with good friends. We had awesome Raclette and at midnight we didn't even have to leave the flat to see tons of firework (the benefits of living on the 5th floor). The fireworks lasted til 1:30 am and started long before midnight. Some people have far too much money to invest it in that many fireworks!

I do have some resolutions for 2015... Fingers crossed they will work out for me!

No 1: Dawanda is like like Etsy and a big thing in Germany. I have some blankets and little other things which I would like to put out on the market. Not sure they will sell but it seems worth the try (as I will be able to buy more yarn that way). It is on my top 5 resolution list because I plan to open this shop since over a year and haven't dared so far!

No 2: Life seems to run past me every now and than. Plus I have the feeling  I am forgetting things. Thus I figured I should give a daily planner another try. I bought this printable planner from Thyme is Honey. It covers lots of things - hopefully it will work for me! Do you use a planner?

No 3: I am not as fit as I wish to be and this has to be changed. Whenever I am fit, I feel more energetic and I long for that feeling! Therefore I want to go to the gym again! Unforntunatly, this resolution hasn't worked out yet, as I am sick (AGAIN!). Hopefully soon though!

No 4: We got a blender from the In-Laws for christmas and it's perfect for smoothie making. According to the internet green smoothies are rather healthy. I don't believe in all the magic prescriped to them, but more greens and fruits can't hurt either. Plus it's a nice breakfast for someone who usually forgets breakfast!

No 5: We own far too much stuff! And stuff is the right word... as it is stuff which just clutters the flat and is never used! We already started to give things to charity last year and it feels good to have less things in the flat. There is still lots and it will be a journey to downsize/declutter the household in 2015!

Of course there are lots of crafty things I want to learn  in 2015 too! For once, I finally want  to be able to use the sewing maschine beyond straight lines. I have seen so many dresses on the internet which I love and I really want to make them! So I ordered Love at First Stitch from Tilly Walnes.The book hasn't arrived yet but hopefully it will be in the mailbox next week!

Some weeks ago I bought a used cricut explorer. The Cricut is a cutting maschine and I am excited to see what it can do! It arrived just before we left for Stockholm and so far, I didn't have the chance to try it... I am really looking forward to it though!

What are your plans for 2015?

Hope your day is full of smilies and love!

A beautiful Sunday and a yarn disaster

Hello all!

Summer is here! It's still called spring but since I have sunburn it must be summer already... :-) Let us hope the beautiful weather stays and it won't get cold again this summer (and let us hope I buy sunscreen soon).

Today started with voting. As most of your probably know, the elections for the European Parliament are going on until this evening. Some countries already voted and today it's Germanys turn. I hope a lot of people vote but I have a bad feeling. So many people don't get the significance of elections - makes me cry! I never missed an election in all my life and I will try never to do so. 

After the whole voting thing we took a walk and had coffee at a nearby farmer's café. So good! The bees and bumblebees certainly liked the weather (and flowers too). It was hard to get them onto a photo because they just jump from flower to flower in a split second! I reckon they were a bit high on pollen.

My capsicum is growing! I am so excited!! :-) I wonder if it will become a red or a green one...

 

Rest of the day was spent blissfully on the balcony with  fresh bread and eggplant dip (see this post for the recipes). Oh and yarn of course. Lots of yarn. I am working on a corner to corner blanket for a friend who will have a baby this fall. 

Disaster struck very close to the end of the blanket. Only two rows to finish and... no more yarn! Oh no! This is some yarn I ordered online some month ago and one can buy it in 500 gram packs only. Well, I don't need 500 grams! I need about 10 grams. Sigh! I contacted the seller to see if they could sell me one 100 gram ball. Fingers crossed. 

How did you spend your sunday?

Take care

Anne

Goodbye 2013! Welcome 2014

Happy New Year!!

 

Somehow I can't believe it's 2014 already. On the other hand, lots of things went on in 2013. I finished my teacher traineeship from hell, we move to Dortmund and I found a lovely new job. Also, I really got into crocheting and started to do more things than blankets! In 2013 I realize that crochet is my kind of yoga... And intent to keep it up in 2014 and get even busier!

 

I realized that I had far too much stuff lying around in the bathroom – so I threw some out and others got a new home. How convieniend to have a crochet hook and some zpagetti yarn lying around… I whipped up this darling in less then 30 minutes. The pattern is fairly easy:

 

Easy Zpagetti-Basket

 

Use any color of Zapgetti Yarn and a 12 hook.

 

Start with a magic circle and chain two (Counting as one DC*).

Rd 1: 11 DC in the circle. Close with a slip stich in chain 2. ( 12 Stiches).  

Rd 2: Chain two and make one more DC in the same stich. 2 DC in each stich around.  Close with a slip stich in chain 2. (24 Stiches)

Rd 3: 2. Rd 2: Chain two and make one more DC in the same stich. 2 DC in each stich around.  Close with a slip stich in chain 2. (48 Stiches).

RD 4: Chain 2. DC in the back loop of each stich around. Close with a slip stich in chain 2.

RD 5-8: Chain 2. DC in each stich around. Close with a slip stich in chain. Fasten off.

 

* I always use two chains instead of three for a DC-subsitute. I like it better this way. With three chains, the „hole“ looks too big for my eyes…

 

I made several of these baskets for christmas – they are lovely gift bowls. For some I changes the color for the last row (no photo unfortunatly) and I weaves some zpagetti straw through the top loops and finished with a bow. The possibilites are endless!

 

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Apropo christmas: I am a very lucky girl and got a lot of presents! A new camera for example – don’t the pictures look far more awesome now?! My parents gave me a yarn color set among other things. The one Lucy from Attic24 used. Unfortunatly the yarn hasn’t arrived yet. Sigh. Hopefully soon! We also have a new housemate:

 

We moved to middle Germany from the nothern part last year and we miss the seagurls. So my parents gave us a wooden one. I love it!

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New Years Eve came fast! On Monday I realized that there were only two days of 2013 left… Woah! Still, we managed to whip up a wonderful new years eve dinner. We had raclette and of course there was too much food… We will be able to live of it for several more days!

 

 

 

 

We had a quite night in with lots of good food and wine. Yummy! Of course we also had to watch „Dinner for one“ which is a German tradition (even though the short movie is in English). Wouldn’t be New Years Eve without it…

 

At midnight we just had to step on the balcony to see lots of wonderful fireworks. Man – there where tons of it at the sky! People must have spent a fortune on all this firework. We on the other hand didn’t buy anything. Didn’t need to after all…

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2014 greeted us with brilliant weather! Lots of sun, little clouds and nice temperature (6 ° C). How lucky are we?!

We took a talk around our part of Dortmund. Lots of people think Dortmund is a dirty, industrial town with little green. They are very wrong! And I have to confess – I was one of these people when we moved here but I really start to love the city!

 

 

 

Some relics from 2013.

 

 

 

The river is getting recultivate at the moment. It already starts to bloom!

 

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The first projects for 2014 are already set:

We will join the gym tomorrow for one. Phew, it’s about time.

Also, we bought these lovely chairs via Ebay small advertisements yesterday. 5 chairs for 25 € total! We plan to sand them down and put press oil and wax on them. Perhaps paint them too. We’re not sure about that yet…

 

 

 

 

Other than that my plans for 2014 are:

 

Be happy,

Enjoy life.

Take it slower.

Laugh.

Crochet.

 

Sounds doable, doesn’t it? :-)

 

I reckon this yummy cake is a good start…. Mmmhhh. Smells and tastes so good! I used this recipe.