Knitting Socks

Time to finally knit up the yarn (wool) I dyed last year. Only took a year to get to this stage...LOL
This is what it looked like after the first session...then I decided I wanted more blue and definitely darker, so I dyed it again. I used food colouring and basically used all the blue I had and was much happier with the result.

I used Sock-Ease by Lion Brand. Colour way 'Marshmallow' which is near white.

Doing my version of TAAT (TwoAtATime)- two sets of needles, two balls of yarn. Works for me...

Also I divided the fresh skein of yarn into two, by weighing it, and then dyed the yarn side by side by dipping the strings together. So although the 2 balls are similar, they are not the same and that is exactly what I was going for. It is interesting to see how it is striping and how different it looks.

After about 1.5" of k2p2 ribbing I did about 3.5" of double moss stitch. I wanted a texture, without a pattern and I am very happy with the way it is looking.

Turning the heels

I like the look of the gusset and the reinforced heel area. It also makes a bit of a cushion under the heel.

Unfortunately my camera panics at the sight of all this blue...

I am very pleased with how these turned out and how the fit so well. I think I'll keep to the same formula for the next pair, maybe just changing up the pattern stitch area.

This last picture is also pretty close to accurate on the colour.

I knitted along with Jana from Purl Together, following her on YouTube.

Puzzle Challenge - Scherenschnitt

I was so excited when I pulled this one out of the gift packaging it was carefully wrapped in. It had travelled far, was a complete surprise and so much appreciated.

Then I got to looking at it closely and thought ' Oh my!' I knew this would not be the easiest of jigsaws to assemble. And I was right, BUT I did underestimate how much I would enjoy doing this!
Which is of course a very pleasant discovery and I'm glad to say this is going into the collection to stay. It's a keeper for sure.

I did get help from my son who loves to find out 'where does this one go?'

He doesn't usually join me doing puzzles, but he cannot resist helping out with a request like that! I made ample use of his assistance with this one.

Towards the end I was faced with a pile of pieces with squiggly lines going nowhere in particular, at which point I decided to sort the pieces by shapes and that helped me to wrap it up much quicker than expected.

All done and very satisfying.

I particularly liked these musicians

These critters....

...and of course these chickens!

I found the puzzle quality to be good, the box is sturdy and the pieces smooth with a matt finish.

Thank you again my Friend...you know who you are...

Puzzling - The Four Seasons

Just before Christmas I was hunting for a gift for a family member, when I, very fortunately, came across this beautiful puzzle :  The Four Seasons, by Cobble Hill.  I had put it on my wish list for the future and was so thrilled to find it in a local store, and at a special price to boot. Bought myself a Christmas treat there and then!

I did sort out the edge pieces first, but soon realized there are too few that show details from the image itself and too little difference between the shades of pale tan. It seemed unnecessarily complicated to insist on completing it first.

Instead I launched straight into starting with items I could identify the pieces of. That was easier said than done too, as there's a lot of red and loads of green. Because I don't sort pieces, but dig through the box, it made getting going with this 2000 piece puzzle a lot slower. However I loved the look of the pieces! They look like little gems! So digging through them and looking closely at each one was rather a pleasure!

Of course I started with things I particularly like. Like snowmen, crabs and Christmas goodies, followed closely by flowers....and that covers almost everything in this image!

Coming along nicely now...

And all done! Absolutely love this image!

And some close-ups - This bowl of lovely Christmassy goodies

The beautiful colours of this crab, that to me yells 'summer'!

And of course the snowman. This one has birds too. Doubling the cute factor for me!

I enjoyed this puzzle from start to finish. As always the Cobble Hill quality is outstanding. The linen finish of the pieces feel so luxurious. The colours are deep, saturated, rich.
The box is beautiful and sturdy and they stack in a way that you can always easily spot a particular puzzle regardless of how the boxes are stacked. Each puzzle is identified by a clear image, full or partial, on the each side of the box.

I already look forward to doing this one again. It was such a pleasure and the final result so beautiful!
Thank you Cobble Hill for another first class puzzling experience!

Ruby Geranium - Puzzling

What a lovely image for a puzzle! I am very fond of hummingbirds and liked this picture very much. Although I purchased it last year, I only got round to doing it recently. It is called 'Ruby Geranium' and I found this one on Amazon. I could only locate one copy there, and none on the Cobble Hill website itself. Whether it is still available I couldn't tell.

It was an enjoyable build for sure even if the red got tricky at times. Being a Cobble Hill the quality was good, I love the linen finish of the pieces, the beautiful saturated colours and the random cut of the pieces. I did notice that the cut on this is different from the more recent Cobble Hills I've done, but I liked it just as much.

After building the outer edge I started on the inside areas by picking out the easy to find bits, and assembling that as far as possible.

I don't usually sort the pieces into trays to work from just because it is not practical to do in the space where I puzzle, however I do a 'general sorting' when there are large areas of similar colours that looks something like this -

Once I have separate piles I will take one colour pile at a time and assemble from there.
In this case I started with the green pile and at the bottom of the image working my way up, before starting on the reds, again working from the bottom up. It is always so nice to discover pieces for other areas, such as the birds, while assembling a leaf or flower!

And a couple of close-ups on those adorable feisty little birds.

These images also show the difference in the random cut, compared to the image of the American Goldfinch in the bottom image ( Sunflowers and Goldfinches - see the post HERE)

Definitely a keeper puzzle that will become one to do repeatedly over the years. I'm glad to add it to my stock of bird themed puzzles and it is a good addition to my  Cobble Hill Collection

Just Adding Colour...

Time to catch up on some colouring pages...I always a few books by my side so that even a few minutes can be translated into a refreshing colourful little jaunt!

These pages are from 'Tally Ho!' by  Lizzie Mary Cullen. I really like her drawing style and liked the idea of English/British images in the book. I enjoy it when colouring pages have little items to find or identify on the pages and this one has little items tucked into the drawing that relate to the quote. I enjoy looking for those!

There's a few books in the series, but I thought this one would give me plenty to colour.

I was particularly keen to do these 'Canterbury Tales' pages. I took my time and enjoyed the journey. No pun intended!

This was the first page to colour as we had  visited the Isle of Wight and Osborne House, just prior to me getting this book. It seemed the 'right' place to start in a book about the UK.

I don't agree with the sentiment of the 'saying' or quote on this one, but I did want to colour the picture....

Tally Ho by Lizzie Mary Cullen  The current price on Amazon Canada is insane, but this is what the book looks like. The price on ABE Books is much better.

World Puzzle Days

Long silence here from me. It's been good-busy around here.
My year kicked off with participating in the World Puzzle Days Challenge. Günther (who organises this giant effort) found me a sponsor so I was able to puzzle along.
Initially I thought I would commit to doing 3 x 1000 puzzles over the two months of the challenge, then committed to 6000 pieces total and managed to do 12 x 1000 pieces.
Every year a 'secret symbol' is selected that has to feature on all puzzles, at the start, mid-way and final pictures of assembled puzzles are also submitted. Sadly people cannot even build puzzles for a fun challenge, without cheating.... This year we had to feature a salt shaker.

And here is my line-up of puzzles!

Title - Bird Watchers
Brand - Cobble Hill
1000 Pieces

Such a lovely image. Not the easiest of puzzles and not the best choice when you are trying to assemble as many puzzles as possible, but I really wanted to do it again...so I did! This beauty was a gift from a friend a few years ago and this was my second time assembling it.

  

Followed by a free puzzle I was given by a local fellow puzzler

Title - Church
Brand - BigBen by MB
1000 Pieces

I really enjoyed doing this one and it was a quickie! Just take a look at the details of this hitching post!

Title - Camden's Independence Day Parade - my first Heronim, borrowed from a friend who collects Heronim puzzles 

Brand - Mega Puzzles

1000 Pieces

Next I took on the challenge of a Thomas Kinkade puzzle I received for Christmas...

Title - Spirit of Christmas

Brand - Ceaco

1000 Pieces

Really pretty,but quite the stinker! It will prove to be a fun regular holiday challenger!

Next up - this was not as pretty as I had thought. I had traded it from a local puzzler...and promptly traded it again after finishing it. It is so nice to have a local trading group!

It was interesting to do though and very quick.

Title - Grandma's Attic

Brand - Ravensburger

1000 Pieces

Here's another colourful one - borrowed from another puzzler in our local group...It went much quicker than I expected and was a riot of colour in our grey January winter.

Title - Hummingbird Garden

Brand - Buffalo

1000 Pieces

I do enjoy pictures where I can tell by the individual pieces what they are a part of or where they belong. This is another of that type of puzzle and was really quick to do, which was just what I needed for a WPD challenge!

Title - McKenna's General Store

Brand - FX Schmid

1000 Pieces

Sometimes I needed to take a mid-way picture when the light was bad or at night...

Next up another favourite - a new puzzle and instant favourite of mine. I look forward to doing it again.

Title - Undersea Quilt Garden

Brand - Bits & Pieces

1000 Pieces

I think these old style illustrations are just beautiful! The puzzle wasn't difficult, just very enjoyable.

I had planned to do many more Cobble Hill puzzles, but then all these borrowed ones pushed in and I decided to do them first so I can return them to their owners. However I did have to add this fun traded one in here. I'm so pleased to have this in my collection. It's a little tricky to get going, but is a good nice challenge.

Title - Ice Cream

Brand - Cobble Hill

1000 Pieces

Yummy ice cream, yummy details, yummy puzzle pieces!

Another favourite puzzle style with me is Dowdle. I was given a couple of his puzzles some years ago and enjoyed them, so when a local puzzler offered me this one to build I grabbed the opportunity. Just sorry I could not trade it! It was a great build!

Title - Vancouver

Brand - Dowdle

1000 Pieces

All those delightful details!

Another borrowed puzzle -  also from my friend who collects Heronim puzzles. These images were the quickest of all to do.

Title - Brown Derby

Brand - Mega Puzzles

1000 Pieces

And finally - another Heronim that I got locally from a fellow 'trader' and passed on to my friend to add to her collection. This was quite pretty and I enjoyed doing it!

Title - Checking in at the Grand Peacock

Brand - Sure-Lox

1000 Pieces

So will I be taking part in the World Puzzle Days Challenge again next year? I don't know. I enjoyed it, but I did miss doing some of the other things I like to do. Such as reading! Feeling like I need to do my part for the challenge meant that I put everything else on ice and only did jigsaws for two months.

But by next year I may be ready to jump in and play along again, provided there is a sponsor for me. I understand there needs to be payment to participate, but I'd rather buy a puzzle for the fee and puzzle at my own pace.

So the verdict will stay out until closer to sign-up time for WPD 2021!

And yes...I'm still puzzling...just finished a beautiful Cobble Hill last night. Post coming soon.