Cross making

Remember this?

Or maybe not!  I didn’t use the picture in my blog post about the Fonck Museum in Vina del Mar, Chile, after all (for what I think are pretty obvious reasons) but it was one of the exhibits which caught my eye.  As I’m trying very hard indeed to put the finishing touches to my travel journal, I wanted to reproduce the Andean cross design from this weaving on a page and thought I’d simply draw it straight into the book.

Hah!

In my little pocket notebook, I’d drawn a simple version of it quickly during one of the on board lectures, noting the name “chakana” and referencing a photograph of inca fields in the Sacred Valley (which I can no longer find).  But the woven design was a little more developed and needed a little more thought.

A ruler, even?  I spent a while happily drawing with pencil and ruler before I reached the repeat pattern part and floundered a little.  Why had I not thought to use squared paper?

Rather than spend time finding a larger pad of squared paper, I grabbed the closest one to hand and soon found that it’s not as easy as it looks.  Getting the proportions correct meant starting with a four by four square in the centre and, if I was going to begin again, better get a larger sheet, eh?

I didn’t get very far here, either!  Somehow, in the second row, I was into half squares – huh? 

Oh, come ON!

Whose idea was this, anyway?

I then did what any sane person would have done to begin with.

I did a google image search for “Andean Cross”.

Following that link took me to this fascinating page which was far more interesting than trying to complete my journal.

Especially since, further down the page I spotted this design, which looked familiar.

That’s probably because I’d spent ages trying to draw that one in my sketchbook in a different museum a few days later, having already discovered that these “simple” designs are anything but.

Oh well, I’ll finish my journal another day…

Small disaster–nobody hurt

I’ve not always kept a travel journal but I have always collected ephemera.  When we first got the long haul travel bug, I’d create collages of this and that and we’d put them in IKEA frames to hang in our stairwell.  It’s an awkward place to take photographs and one spot in the house that just doesn’t feature in any I’ve taken.  So, I don’t have a record of how it was before disaster struck.

We didn’t hear anything.

We have no idea when it happened.

But yesterday morning, my Hero went downstairs to find a row of three large frames had fallen from the wall.  Being the Hero he is too, he’d cleared it all up by the time I appeared.

Each of the (cheap, insubstantial) frames is damaged and there’s a small, postage stamp-sized piece of plaster missing.

So what happened?  We have no idea but can only think that the top frame slipped and fell straight down the wall taking the others with it.

The more pressing problem is, do I fix a temporary repair to the three frames and take my time to create something new and fresh for that wall? 

Or do I begin on a new series of travel-related hangings and use the cobwebby box of fourteen stretched canvases I bought several years ago for this very purpose?

Sweet thoughts from home

Mothering Sunday – of course I made a Strawberry Pavlova: m-i-l Bettine’s favourite.  Not that it stayed around long enough to be photographed! 

Though I would have loved to have had the chance to give flowers and a hug to my Mum, it was comforting to be reassured of my own status as cherished Mummy (gorgeous flowers from my boy) and to remember happy times.

There were plenty of those to choose from.

Almost forgot!

I can’t believe it’s just two weeks today that we were in Montevideo, Uruguay.  Though we had booked a tour including some beer tasting, by the time we got there we’d had enough of being in a group and threw our tickets in to go it alone.  The ship was berthed in a pretty central location so we could simply stroll into town and go exploring.

Anyway, I mentioned my Manos de Uruguay purchases in passing, but thought it was time to reveal the details.

I chose four skeins of the Maxima merino yarn, thinking that it’d make a great cowl or a scarf.  It’s very soft and I love the colours.   I’m thinking of another “Hitchhiker” perhaps, though it might be a good idea to finish the first one before I begin another

The silk blend I chose is a beautiful blend of very wearable colours.  I always have to stop myself from buying the brightest, most eye catching yarn because it’s not always my choice to wear when finished.  But this is different.  It would also make a beautiful Hitchhiker, but I think it would be better in something which makes the most of the lovely drape.  A shawl, maybe?  This one might be an appropriate choice?

Anyway, that purchase, just two weeks ago today has come through on our credit card statement: four of Maxima (cost here around £14 a ball) and four Silk Blend (around £9.50), total paid = £31.

Worth a trip to Montevideo, wouldn’t you say?

Seasons

Did some weather announcer claim that it’s Spring?

At 10.42 am this morning I looked out of the window.  Ooooer!

I needn’t have worried.  An hour later, it looked like this.

Phew.