The hole in the hedge

The hedge surrounding what used to be "the turkey farm" has grown in the 50 years since we lived next door, so close to what used to be the largest blueberry farm in the Commonwealth (or so we were told). How long has this hole been there? I didn't notice it on the last visit...Now, it's getting rather obsessive.
We whiz by in the car.
The camera is always at the ready, to catch ... what?

Making meringues in the microwave

For eight palm-sized meringues, take an egg white, beat it slightly, and add enough icing sugar to make a stiff fondant (about 35o g) - shape into walnut-sized balls, and put one on either end of a piece of baking parchment. Microwave at full power for 40 seconds or so. Let cool, then remove from the paper.

Here's the before (on the right) and the after -
It's magic! They puff up and spread before your very eyes -ok they deflate when the cooking stops, unlike the ones baked slowly in a low-temperature oven, but if you need meringues quickly, the microwave method is the way to go.

Wristwarmer for a mouse hand?

It all started with a book of "pop out artwear", which contained a spiral bracelet.
I traced the pattern and thought that making it in felt would show off the layering of the felt at the cut edges of the spiral.Though the paper kept the shape crisp and circular, the felt went all floppy, even though it was thick and in double layers. Lesson learned. However, the rope can be knotted into place - I'll use it as a wrist rest on the mouse hand at the computer. Strange how the mouse hand always gets so cold...

Not much quilting getting done

While I'm ensconced here in peaceful Pitt Meadows, other tasks are taking priority - such as going through the photos I've put on my dad's computer in the past few years, taking off the boring old ones -- and finding a few that are calling out to be posted on the blog. They are leading to all sorts of internet explorations - ah, the joys of serendipity!
The sewing machine is set up on the dining table -- probably the darkest part of the house, which is perhaps one of the reasons I haven't been using it all that much. The cover was made from half a metre of prequilted fabric, and the little catch-all used up every last scrap (that's why it's so small).

There's some handstitching on the go, for car journeys etc - stitched shibori, experimenting with length and direction of stitch. I'll pull up the threads, paint it, and use it for covering little handmade books.

Klimt's landscapes

It was a revelation to discover Klimt's landscape work (despite the beautiful drawing, the figurative stuff doesn't appeal to me much). The Orsay museum in Paris has a huge apple tree, of which thisis a detail (the bottom right quarter of the painting). Here's another apple tree -
There's something about a high horizon -
Other landscapes take a longer view -"Original and beautifully crafted" - yes, they are. The one above brings to mind landscapes by Charles Rennie Mackintosh, another artist best known for other work (his unique architectural style) -Mackintosh also did some wonderful flower drawings -
very different from Klimt's loosely-painted floral exuberance -

Happiness is infectious

Good news - you can "catch" happiness from those around you. The BBC carried the story. And now we have numbers to pin down this phenomenon.

Live-in partners who become happy increased the likelihood of their partner being happy by 8% and similar effects were found for siblings living close by (14%) and neighbours (34%).

Close physical proximity seems to be important for the spread of happiness - a person was 42% more likely to be happy if a friend who lives less than half a mile away becomes happy; this effect declines with greater distance.

The cynics and pessimists among us will wonder if happy people are simply less likely to associate with unhappy ones. But the study found that the relationship between people's happiness levels seemed to extend up to three degrees of separation - to the friend of a friend of a friend.

Happiness is good for your health. Cultivate your social network - phone a friend. Smile!
But is happiness really as simple as putting on a happy face? "In a very limited way, yes," says professor of psychology and "face reader" Paul Ekman. "The trick with happiness is that while everybody can smile, most people can't move one crucial muscle around the eyes that must be moved to generate the physiology of happiness. ... In a fake smile, only the zygomatic major muscle, which runs from the cheekbone to the corner of the lips, moves. In a real smile, the eyebrows and the skin between the upper eyelid and the eyebrow come down very slightly."

Translation - thread patterning

Translation - landscape, marks, stitch

A forest in the back yard

When I go "to Canada" I go to visit family. The part of this house on the right was built after the original house, built in 1958, burned down in 1973. Then in in the late 80s my parents added the "granny flat" to the left of the garages. My father personally built not just the original house but all this too - with a little help from his friends and a lot of help from my brother - and my mother has turned each house into a comfortable, welcoming home. My sister and her family live here now; she was born just a month after work started on the original house (and what a frantic month that must have been!). The trees at the rear of the picture (along the road, ie the front of the property) were planted soon after we moved here - that's what 50 years of growth looks like. Much of the back of the property was cleared for greenhouses, but there are a couple of acres of "bush" left, and it's a wonderful place, mostly evergreens (hemlock?) and some birches in the peaty soil.
A path loops near the edges of this little rainforest -
Trees are left to fall and rot -
and to be covered by several types of moss growing lushly along with mushrooms among the fallen leaves -
Good conditions for lichen too -
These aren't huge snails, just fungi -
All around this primitive, magic place, neighbours have cleared the land to various degrees -
and have planted blueberry bushes, row on row -
Among the blueberries and cranberries, and ever-nearer housing developments, there are still a few oases where these wonderful giants can grow in peace.

UFOs

These are both at least five years old, and without this photo I might have forgotten about them altogether. Yet at the time they heralded significant steps forward.

On the left, "Tide Line", started in a workshop with Dijanne Cevaal - in this piecing method, there is no need to exactly match corners - very liberating! It needs binding and a little attention to the applique starfish. It was quilted on my then-new PQ1500, and it was a struggle. My machine quilting has definitely moved on since then - practice, practice!

On the right, "Flash in the Pan", a double bed sized extravaganza, half quilted and needing inspiration for quilting the other half of the blocks. This is a "splinter quilt", my take on the insertion method taught by Alison Schwabe.

London lights

In December's dark days, a little light is always welcome. These have been lit for a while - palm trees at SOAS, near Russell Square -and the British Museum, swathed in colour on a damp evening -

Rust

Cactus gardens

These didn't come home with me.

Little log cabin in the woods

Its on a hill in Maple Ridge, BC. The deck across the back looks into a forest reserve. Plenty of room for one of those enviable huge studios -- and it's currently on the market. Any takers?

Notable dogs

Hegel, Coburg, VIC -Lucy, Pitt Meadows, BC -
Roxy, Vancouver, BC -
But this one, spotted in passing, remains nameless -

Fabric shopping again

When you're on the way to the fabric store, it's frustrating to have to wait for the freight train to pass. Especially when it's 108 cars long, and travelling very slowly -
And here we are at last. The retail park in Coquitlam BC has a kitty-corner arrangement of big fabric stores, so very unlike the UK! Lots of fabric inside, including clearance bargains, manager's specials, 50% discounts... Irresistible -
The lime green flannelette - one length is checks, the other dots - will make great PJs. Other lengths of cotton are for hospital gowns for my mother. It all has to be sewn in the next week or so - and the leftovers will come home in my suitcase.