More glass and wood...

We had some good sunshine today, and I managed to take the photo I had envisaged when my aunt gave me the little Coddington lens.

The wooden monk also came from my grandmother. I'm pretty sure that once upon a time something must have been inlaid in the cross in the Bible on the lectern, but not ever while it was in my posesssion. I also always felt that the wooden base was a much less attractive wood than the rest of it, although it does have a lovely grain.

These little glass animals are tiny - they came from a Russian stall at a Christmas fair in Paris a few years ago. They're not even as big as the top joint of my little finger.

Mother's Day...

Truth to tell, it's not a day my mother ever encouraged us to celebrate, as being way too commercial. But C always gives at least a card to his mother. She got an early delivery of this one as he won't be around to visit her this weekend. So I made the box to look pretty too - I hope she got extra mileage from having the box on display until it was time to take the card out.

A Glass Act

The current SCS photo challenge is glass. I have another photo I want to take - the last time I visited my aunt she gave me a little Coddington lens which had belonged to my grandmother; apparently gardeners used to use them to inspect their plants for little bugs. But the weather this week hasn't been cooperative - we've gone from sunshine to windy, colder days with more grey sky. Great drying weather for clothes, not so great when you want consistent bright light.
These are the photos I did use.

Antique Venetian glass beads - with a little historical interest as they were given to my grandmother by Lady Gregory. My aunt gave me these about twenty-five years ago, and although I don't wear a lot of chunky jewellery, I wear these a lot. The little perfume bottle has been around forever, I have no idea of its origin.

Modern Venetian glass - the little sweets, each one with the artist's name engraved on it, and my sweet little flying pig all the way from NJ to celebrate National Pig Day, and the message that while pigs may not really fly, we can achieve some of our ambitions and dreams.

This glass bowl came from the widow of a teaching colleague of my dad's. She used to have two, a pale blue one and this one, but she'd given the blue one away before she moved into a nursing home, I think. When my mum and were clearing her room out after she died I got a few things, and this is one of them. But in several sessions of trying over a couple of years, I have still to get a good photo that show the detailed engraving in the actual fish and the markings of weeds and bubbles on the bowl, and doesn't have too many background reflections in the silver. This is the not-very-good best of many, many attempts.

Wooden it be Good

A couple of my photos from the wood photo challenge on SCS.

The little fruit dish and fruit come from Greece - Crete, I think, though at this stage I can't be sure. The little dish is about as tall as the first joint of my thumb. I've no recollection at all where the little chalice came from - it lives in one of my thimble racks.

Needles and Pins...

Instead of "wood" photos today,  now that I know my latest knitting arrived safely at its destination I can upload a couple of photos of that...
I haven't bought speciality wool for a long time - I  buy most of my wool mail-order from Scotland - and there was quite an array when I went into This is Knit to look for something really nice.
This is what I found:

 I was disappointed that there wasn't more of the light green in it - a lot showed on the ball of wool, but with space-died yarns you get what you get.

I also had fun with this - the design was from a book of Crewel techniques. My normal scissors fob design is just 2 1/2" square, so I had to reduce the parrot by over half and change some of the stitches to suit the smaller project. The silk was left over from a dragonfly embroidery I did for my sister, and guided me into choosing the blue in the bird instead of the green I was originally going to use.

Happy Birthday, Lorraine :D.

p.s. - the mandarins were still there this morning.

Shades of Grey

I've been a bit remiss in posting some of my photos for the Splitcoast photo challenges.
Last week was Shades of Grey, and of course it was a bright, sunny week. At one stage over the weekend C even broke out the suntan lotion - hard to believe, but true.

I had two grey trees -  holly and birch.

And a gravel path. I remember seeing the black retaining mesh before it was laid down, I had no idea what it was for.

And some silver/grey kegs - taken on one of the greyer days in the week.

I'll be back with some wood photos tomorrow, all being well. We're up and down to the North several times this week, which is great for my current knitting project - a baby shawl - but is making for a slightly hectic-feeling week.

Bathing Bird

These shots are also from Thursday morning. It never ceases to amaze me how birds, who spend so much of their time in the water, still bathe themselves!

After that, I just had to put a gull on a card I made on Friday.

Low Tide = Birds

The tide was exceptionally low in the river yesterday. I was able to get a good bird's eye view of this mallard and her mate on  a bank just below the bridge.

I was nearly at Frank Sherwin bridge, keeping an eye out for the heron (not there!) when I spotted a glimpse of colour across on the far side of the river. I've never seen a Mandarin Duck in the Liffey before. I do believe that once when I was little we saw them in Stephen's Green, and I hear they are there now - I'll have to take a trip southside and have a look. He was with a hen mandarin, but I couldn't get a good photo of her. I really need a longer zoom or a converter...

I was lucky enough to see, but not lucky enough to get a good photo, a swan flying up the river just level with my face.

Triumph of hope over adversity

I was putting some bottles out into the bin yesterday waiting for a trip to the recycling centre, and spotted some daffodils on the patio. These were bulbs that had been in a container last year, and when I emptied the soil out the bulbs got left sitting in a pot. Somewhere along the way they must have been knocked over, and despite the lack of soil (and lack of light too, as they were in a narrow passage between the back of the house and the raised grass area, they still managed to make a brave attempt at blooming.

Happy Spring

Today was somewhat nicer weather than yesterday, so I took a quick walk in Farmleigh, and enjoyed the surprising warmth!

The first violets I've seen

And some more blues in the mix

Even a few tulips

And a busy buzzing bumble bee