Starting the New Year

Happy New Year to you all!  I'm starting this year with a feeling of positivity that it will be a good year ....... and by that I mean to say that it needs to be an improvement on the past 2 years which have been quite dramatic and draining to our family in numerous ways!  So here is to the beginning of positivity for 2016!!  I have some hopes and goals of my own for this year, but I'll save those for a future post and fill you in on the past couple of weeks instead.........  I signed up and completed a test knit for a poncho "Wednesdays Child" by Laura Aylor. 
 It's made using 10ply / worsted yarn and I chose to use Luxury, a Bendigo Woollen Mills Yarn in the colour Denim.  It was a quick and easy knit and I can see this being perfect to throw over my head when going out to do chores during winter, or going walking and so forth.  The splits at the elbows certainly make it more user friendly than a lot of other ponchos I've tried!  I think I may make another of these!  I went down to my daughters place to spend a day and a night and got it finished while there, so I was able to get her to take me down to these cute little bathing boxes on Brighton Beach (just close to where she lives) and get some great photos!  This was my first time seeing these in real life ...... they are soo cute!!  They are all privately owned and kept locked up until the owners are down on the beach to use them.
I really enjoyed spending the day with Stace and having a sleep over at her and her partners unit ..... I managed to get some good shopping done at one of the large shopping centres (all the bits I haven't been able to buy up here!), and we also managed to get in a movie, go out for dinner and had breakfast at the pancake parlour before I had to hop on the train to head back home.

The train ride from Melbourne to Wangaratta in around 3 hrs so it was nice to sit back and do a bit of reading and also make a start on a beanie. 
Once back home again the sewing machine was kept busy while I made up a couple of library bags and a paint smock for 2 of the grandies up in Townsville, after I got a phone call from DIL asking if I could make them up (well, no guesses that was a big YES!!) ...... our youngest grandie starts school this year!  How time flies by.  I was able to pick out some materials from my stash,  then took a photo of them all, got on the phone to them and they got to choose 2 fabrics each (1 design for each side of the bag).   I have to say I was pretty happy that I had spent those couple of days over Christmas reclaiming my little cabin! 

....... and I do seem to have a number of sewing projects on the go ............ in various tins and tubs.....hmmmmm,  its a very busy little cabin!!   A big thankyou to Qin from France who sent me a signature hexie for my country scents table cloth that I'm making.  This is the first hexie that has arrived as yet. 

I do feel like I'm already running behind, given its now the 12th day of January and I'd hoped to get the first post of the New Year written within the first couple of days........ My calendar is already filling up, and as usual work just seems to take up that extra chunk of time I need here at home right now (currently I work 3 days one week and 4 the other, but with travel of 45km each way,  I'm gone from just after 7am and don't get back home till between 5 and 6pm - later if I have to stop at the shops for groceries).  Perhaps I just need to get myself a little more organised (like I always was until a couple of years ago - but then, I've not had such length of travel time to and from work before either ....... more food for thought for another time and post.