dolls and pirates

Just a quick post, weirdly sweltering heat in melbourne in March! What is going on here?
So yesterday we visited Anna and Katie who were selling their delightful wares in Offshoot pop up shop in High St Northcote.
I am a happy collector of Anna's dolls, and just HAD to take this little lady home with me. Don't you love her dress style! And her piggies are something, aren't they!

 Here she is with Anna's other dolls who have made it into the family. A happy bunch among the thyme!

And here is a pirate ship Mr P requested first thing yesterday morning, made from a rocket popsicle box. Ahhhaaaaar!

yarn along

Joining Ginny from Small Things in a yarn along.
Everyone in this house seems to be reading Anna Branford's latest Violet Mackerel gem, Violet Mackerel's Possible Friend! Chicken 2 says it's the best one yet! Yay Anna!
Not only do the "Violet" books make us all chuckle out loud quite often, the illustrations are full of knitting! You see Violet's mother is a voracious knitter, so hand knits abound in every book! Love it!
Aside from this,  I find myself constantly marvelling at how an adult could be so spot on with writing the inner dialogue of a small child! She captures the innocent logic, the vivid imaginations and bemusing, fragile insecurities which go completely unnoticed most of the time by the adults around.
What Anna does is illustrate how children are so present to the world. I start yearning I could be so attentive to everything around me. 
I totally LOVE Violet and so do my two big girl chickens.

And on the needles, a Griffin hoodie vest (designed by Tikki), in the most divine Noro Silk Garden (colour 341). The question is , will I be able to go back to knitting with anything else!

Needles and Hooks and the Launch of a Local

In Class 5 in Steiner/Waldorf schools in Australia, the children start crochet. (Rudolf Steiner actually indicated that it should begin in Class 2, but in Australia, we knit English style, with the yarn held in the right hand. If you knit European style, with the yarn held in the left, transitioning to crochet is much easier. Therefore, in Australia, we wait until Class 5) After years of knitting, they are ready for a new challenge, and in my experience they really love it!
They often make a bag, and in my daughter's case, a backpack for school. My daughter then decided to make a little one for her little brother! Sweet!
I've started another one in rainbow colours. Double crochet all the way with 16ply wool and a 7mm crochet hook.

 We have had busy hands around here, having launched a project involving sixteen 11/12 year olds and twenty-three skeins of Peace Fleece . we are making a blanket for a beloved teacher of six years, but sssshhhh, it's a secret.

 There's a bit of fair isle, intarsia and one colour patterns. Lovely!

And on my needles is a special cowl just for me me me!!!

The pattern is the Dovetail Cowl by Carina Spencer, and I'm knitting it with some divine yarn from Tanis Fibre Arts 

Orange Label Cashmere Silk and Merino

Worsted weight

Colour: Sand (It's very silver, with a tiny but very strong speck of yellow occasionally)

And finally, I am very, very  excited to have in my possession the newly released US edition of Melbourne writer Anna Branford's most splendid book, Violet Mackerel's Brilliant Plot!!!
What I like about the illustrator for this edition, Elanna Allen, is the fact that there are loads of knitted stitches in her drawings!

Here's Anna herself with the delightful little tome in hand!

Congratulations Anna!!

May many many American children enjoy discovering your delicious little free thinker, Violet!