Another week has whizzed by, though it didn’t feel like it at the time! In this heat, I am gasping for some cloudy, rainy, cool days, but we are still experiencing hot sun, 30 plus degrees (90+F), dry and smoky air.

A new wildfire started just a couple of days ago (photo above is from the day it started, viewed from our house). In the first day, it grew to 100 hectares, overnight it grew to 1000, and now I think it’s around 1500. It’s on the southern edge of a town south of us, and thankfully not heading towards the main residential area but into the forest. However the town south of that one is now threatened. Some people have been evacuated, others on notice to be ready just in case.

The crazy thing is that the vast majority of these fires are human caused. A discarded cigarette butt is often the reason and one moment’s carelessness is all it takes.

So what’s been going on in my crochet world? I did work on the Everything is Cool and Groovyghan a little bit. (I blogged about this on July 21st and showed you a photo of the progress.) Well, I’m just not enjoying the next part of the CAL. It requires a bunch of fiddling with little rectangular bits that stand up on their own and get filled in on the next row. Not feeling it!

(A quick evening shot – the brown and green rows are the latest ones and I don’t like them.)

The three bags/baskets of DK are going down to my craft room tonight along with this WIP so that I can put it in time out while I consider its fate.

I have been loving this WIP, however…

The yarn is Katia Polaris which a kind Raveler sent me a little while ago. I only have one skein and decided to start out with 3 stitches and work Tunisian Simple Stitch, increasing at the beginning of every alternate row, until the yarn runs out. The colours are very vibrant and I always find this stitch very meditative.

Today I started playing with some Phildar Phil Techno that a friend gave me ages ago. After experimenting with knitting needles and crochet hooks without success, and asking for ideas on a Facebook crochet group, I am using a 5mm crochet hook and some Red Heart with Love to actually crochet around the thick rubber ‘yarn’ to make a coaster or hot pad. So far it’s going well.

I am off to the kitchen now to help clean up. Tai Chi Man has been busy, taking out the old range hood (cooker hood) which is a dated colour, rusty and inefficient. Of course, with an old house, fitting a new appliance to an existing space is always going to be a challenge and this one is no different. He has been adding bits of wood to the opening and messing about with wires and has run out of time as far as fitting in the new hood.

I’m glad he is such a Mr Fixit and has oodles of experiences at DIY and installations. I’m sure it’s saved us thousands of dollars over the years.

If you’re in North America, I hope you enjoyed your Labour Day. Roll on fall/autumn!