Celebrating SPRING!?!

April 14, Mundelein, Illinois

April 16, Cambridge, Minnesota

April 16, Bellevue, Washington

Our rain looks very, very good today!

Guess who's officially 8 months old?  Happy Spring, however it looks!

Off the Needles and More~~~

This week I was inspired to work on two somewhat neglected projects.  Now each one is half done.  The sock was started  for the Loopy Ewe Spring Challenge (I should know better!), using a pattern called 9 to 5.  It was supposed to be done by March 31, I think.  Oh well.  The Mitt was a January Mystery pattern and is now called Epiphany Mitts.  Now to do the other halves.  But first I am going to tackle a really long time UFO, the 2010 Advent scarf!  We'll see how that goes.

Stella  is busy "reading" and getting ready to move.

Who me?

Oh, and we found a great hangar and place for the Sunbonnet Sue quilt!

Meanwhile, outside, signs of spring appear daily.

The flowering plum and forsythia are looking  pretty good,

and this pink camellia, just outside the living room window,  is filled with buds once again. 

I'd forgotten all about this little guy.  It's a pasque flower, I think, and disappeared without a trace when summer arrived.  Don't you just love surprises like that?   Now I have to go check out what that is that's sprouting in the lower left corner, and then get back to that Advent scarf. Have a great weekend! Check out what others are knitting at Patchwork Times. You won't be sorry!

The Battle of the Bootie

Have you ever had a fight with a pattern?  I just did, and then in the midst of it, I ran out of yarn.   My inherent stubborness plus the time I'd invested kept me going, and in the process I learned a few things.  Just because a pattern costs money doesn't necessarily mean it's well written or that it's been proofread!  I've had great luck though with most patterns, purchased or free, so I can't really complain.  It was a good reminder however.  Had I known about and  used the feature on Ravelry that shows comments from other knitters about  a particular project, I would have known that others found the directions difficult also.  If you ever run out of yarn on a project and it hasn't been years since the yarn was purchased, get in touch with the yarn shop where you purchased the yarn.  Chances are they may still have yarn of the same dye lot.  (Better yet, buy an extra ball the first time!)  I've lucked out twice thanks to keeping track on Ravelry where I buy my yarn.  So what do these devilish booties look like? Ta Da!

Here they are thanks to the good service from the Black Sheep yarn shop in Encinitas, CA, which got the necessary yardage here in record time. They'll fit Stella some day. (Yep, the sizing seems off, too.)

I finally finished these socks this past week also.  That yarn was fun!  This is the Simple Skyp pattern minus the Skyp stitch which didn't show up well with this yarn.  One of these days I'll finish socks with the whole pattern! Have a happy week!

Fiber Is Good for You! Don't You Agree?

Last week after reading "Get Your Daily Dose of Fiber" on Ravelry and then reading Mere's post about decorating her tree, I dug through our old photos to find pictures of "yarnbombing" in our area.  Since I've not much in the way of stitching or knitting this week to show, here they are:

This was in downtown Seattle near Pioneer Square.

Suzanne Tidwell, a local fiber artist, beautified these abandoned stumps in Sammamish. This was the spring version.

These trees in a Kirkland park wore their "sweaters" for quite a while. I think these huge pieces were done on a knitting machine.

A yarnie side trip to Darn. Knit. Anyway. in Stillwater, MN, during a family reunion added to my yarnbombing collection.  If you Google "yarnbombing," you'll see lots of other examples from other cities.

Meanwhile, back in Washinton, this was featured in a local shopping center and then, according to Tidwell's blog, moved to a museum.

We haven't seen any more lately but probably we haven't looked carefully.  How about you? Have you seen  evidence of "yarn bombing" in your town?  Incidentally, I'm not crazy about that term, but I've also seen "yarn guerillas" which seems worse.  I'd much prefer "yarn art"!  I'll bet these projects, however they're done, made a serious dent in someone's stash! Check out Patchwork Times for other knitters' projects.

Off to the Beach!

The pink lace is longer, the shawlette is dry, and I finished the Keppi hat, but that's about it for this week's stitching. Check out what others are knitting at Patchwork Times

We had a couple of nice days weatherwise which got me out in the yard to do a bit of work.  Aren't these pretty? The sunshine encouraged them to bloom.

Then on Friday we headed to the Oregon Coast for a long weekend.  We saw lots of signs of spring on the way there, but the weather didn't hold.  It was windy and chilly most of the time, but we had fun anyway.

The resident goose was quite entertaining but

just a bit intimidating up close and quite different looking from other geese we've encountered.

Skunk cabbage was blooming among the grasses.

We love the view from our favorite unit at Little Creek Cove. ( Note the blue sky!  It didn't stick around long.)

Of course the sun came out on the day we left after a rip-snorting storm during the night.  You can see how wet the sand is, but someone was already enjoying the beach. We were amazed at how the winter winds and rains had flattened out the dunes that we'd walked on last September!

Here's what it looked like then. Quite a difference, eh?  Well, back to work; there's lots of catching up to do.

Off the Needles and Back On Again

Well, I bit the bullet and am finished with the Downton Abbey Shawlette. It looks so different from what I imagined and should be very warm as it's quite long. 

This hat is finished, too.  It's going to a friend who's having another chemo treatment tomorrow. I hope it cheers her up!

Some how this project hopped onto my needles. It's another shawlette and has a very interesting construction.  The edging is knitted first and then the rest of the 271 stitches are picked up on the edge.   We'll see how that goes, eh?

Mama Kingfisher is the star of block 7, and you'll be happy to know that block six is all done, too.  If you wish to see what other folks are knitting, tune in at Patchwork Times; you won't be sorry!  I'm off to fold laundry.

Off the Needles and Out into the Garden

Not too long ago while shopping at Joanne's, I found this new yarn called Keppi that comes with a pom pom!  So instead of knitting on those long rows of my shawl, I dug though my stash, found it and started a hat.  It's coming along even though the shawl isn't. (If you want to see what others are knitting, check out PatchworkTimes .)

The sun came out this week, and the roses got their pruning.  While outside I discovered this lenten rose, much to my delight.  I've tried many times to get one of these plants going, and finally it looks like my persistence has paid off! Hurrah! 

Earlier this week we spotted some sure signs of spring right out our bedroom window.  This plant, which started out as a mere twig years ago,  is now quite tall and easily seen from our second story.  Don't you just love pussy willows?

But the most exciting occurance of the week was this blossom right in our own kitchen!  Last year this orchid came home with us from the UW orchid sale.  It was in full bloom then and the flowers lasted for months.  When that was done, I trimmed both stalks; one dried up and the other one produced a new shoot that had 3 buds.  It took forever, but one of the three buds finally opened this week.  One dried up and as you can see, that appears will be the fate of the third bud also.  For now we'll just continue to enjoy this survivor and the only time so far that we've ever had an orchid rebloom.