red_swirl

This is how I study: pink cards for the textbook words, green for verbs, yellow for adjectives, white nouns and blue for phrases / anything else. Group 1 verbs are purple pen, group 2 orange pen, green for group 3. Gold pen for i-adjectives, pink for na-adjectives.

Just in case you're learning Japanese and haven't worked out your own format yet ;)

Miss Squiggle was watching me colour green cards blue (I always run out of one colour or another by final exam time) and she decided to help me with a few she'd made herself ... so sweet! As for Miss Moon, she's crawl / sit / crawling and pulling herself up to stand, practising really hard.

I'm always optimistic studying won't completely take over my life, but ...
See you in a few weeks!

Posted by red swirl at 00:36 | Permalink | Comments (0)

And yes, I've finally succumbed to the minimalist white craft blog look (do a little survey of major craft bloggers - most use white or another assertively neutral background). Interestingly, L doesn't like the white look, he prefers brooklyntweed's greens ... is it a guy thing? I say "succumbed" because in real life, I'm much more maximalist ... but I do appreciate that websites need different colour schemes compared to, say homes ... or clothes ... or toys. At least a minimal surround can show of brightly coloured photos...

I really like mulberries. I know they grow like weeds here, I know they're really messy (particularly the black sort, the white is better). But I like their taste. We had a spell of dry weather as the fruits were forming, I was reluctant to water due to the restrictions, so the first ones were rather bitter. I froze them and hopefully with a bit of apple and sugar, they'll make a nice pie. I watered, now the newly ripened ones in the photo taste great ;)

There's a little neighbourhood wattle in the photo and an Uzbek bag, too.

Posted by red swirl at 16:22 | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by red swirl at 02:16 | Permalink | Comments (1)

So far, it's been an easy knit, I really can't say much more ... purling, knitting, ribbing. Lots of ribbing ... about half done.

The only minor challenge has been (hah!) fitting. I've measured a few of my pre-pregnancy jumpers*, and I've taken my current measurements - I'm still breastfeeding Miss Moon, you see. There's about 5cm / 2 inches' difference. I cast on a couple of different sizes whilst mulling this over, but I've now settled on knitting the average of the 2 measurements, assuming zero ease. Hope it works, but I won't know until after Miss Moon turns one ;)

As you can see from the photo, I've been doing a lot of sewing planning, clothes both for me and the kids. Oh, and I finally got some Burda tracing paper, so perhaps I'll be able to show off some sewing in the near future ...

NB: * The word "jumper" seems to have entirely different connotations in the USA. Here (in Australia) it means a hand or machine knit garment, covering the torso. Either short or long sleeves, with few or no buttons, zips or other closures. Would it be called a sweater in the USA, I wonder? Or a pullover ... sounds rather British?

Posted by red swirl at 13:05 | Permalink | Comments (2)