Along the canal

We took a walk this morning down to the chemist to stock up on basics, and came back along the canal. It was much more sheltered walking back, but unfortunately just as I was trying to take photos of the buds in trees the wind picked up even there, and they are blurred. No such problems with one of the houseboats tied up along the bank. It was the painted bit on the roof that caught my eye - I thought maybe it was a chimney and even as we walked I wondered how the decorative paint could withstand the heat; looking at the photo I see it's not a chimney at all. Recently when I was in the off-licence I got chatting to the guy serving me - he was telling me that he and his partner lived in a houseboat moored at the next lock upstream from our one. Like me, he was a reader, but with very limited space he had transferred a large part of his library to Kindle.

I really enjoyed the felted penguins I made at Christmas (thanks, Di), so when ALDI had some kits on offer a couple of months ago, C and I drove over to the nearest store and I bought most of them.  I think I passed on the flamingos, the legs were very peculiar looking. The kits are harder than the penguins in that there's no polystyrene form to base them round, they're entirely felt. And the instructions are minimalist, to say the least. I had started the koala at the time, and got no further than the body. It's been on my bedside table ever since, and I decided it was time to finish it off before I lost not only the instructions but anything else.  I'm quite pleased with him, though I think he could do with claws. 

He's sitting on one of a pair of socks I'm currently knitting. I've just finished a tunic which I also need to take a photo of - but I think I might have to model it to show it off properly as the photo I took flat on the ground doesn't look great...

Adding a card I finished off last night, using one of the images I stamped with milk for the technique challenge on SCS. It took a bit of experimenting, in the end I had the iron turned up as high as I could, and ironed it for longer than I thought I should. It was fascinating watching the images develop from being invisible. It brought back memories of standing in the darkroom beside my dad, watching him develop and print photos. Let's dream of a better tomorrow while we go through this time.