More pretties....

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...are out on the gardening blog, for your viewing pleasure.

Happy Weekend!

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Happy Graduation Day!

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Yesterday, I felt energized enough by the relatively cooler weather to stroll the garden, watering and weeding here and there, and taking pictures of what's blooming.

Here's one crop:

Black-eyed Susans
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More of yesterday's flower photos can be found on my gardening blog, here. Stop on by!

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Today, I was out and about the entire day, chauffering relatives for the nephew's graduation, followed by a huge family dinner at Maggiano's (yum!).

Moment of truth, as seen on the Siegel Center's jumbotron
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We got the boy all grad-jee-ated. Life is good!

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A new tenant?

( ^ click for big)
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[If interested, I've posted a few more pictures taken in my garden today out on my gardening blog, here.]

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Mary's Excellent Adventure - Part 4: The Spoils

"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered.
An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered."
- G.K. Chesterton

This is the final chapter of my excellent adventure, where I share "long-awaited" (ha!) pictures of my MS&W 2007 loot, for those who might be interested.

Without further ado, here we go:

MS&W merchandise
(like I need another t-shirt or tote bag)
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Typewriter key earrings -- my initials
(next year I'll buy a "K" - for my middle initial and nickname)
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yarn, needles and patterns
(as usual - a predominance of blue-green yarns)
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More details on the yarns:

70/30% Merino/Angora handspun
from Jamie Harmon, Jericho, VT
incredibly soft, blooms gorgeously when knit
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Ellyn Cooper's Yarn Sonnets
"Homespun" -- 50/50% Wool/Silk
&
"Fantasia" -- 75/25% Cotton/Nylon
both in her new "Aquatide" colorway
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Also purchased at Ellyn Cooper's booth:

cute Umahlinda U.S. size 10 straight knitting needles
(I hardly knit with straights anymore, so these will be for decor)
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[Edited to add: they also sell gorgeous buttons at the Ellyn Cooper booth. Last year I bought some, and didn't even work my way inside the booth to look at her yarns, silly me.]

Malabrigo aquarella in Solis (09)
purchased from Uncommon Threads' booth
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4-ply (DK weight) 100% cashmere in baby colors
purchased from:

I'm seriously considering joining their Square of the Month club:

to ultimately make one of these:

Great American Aran Afghans
in 4-, 8- and 12-ply cashmere
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They have no website, apparently, so if interested in their club, email them at huntvalleycashmere@yahoo.com.

The two patterns I purchased are Vermont Fiber Designs Cable & Garter Stitch Turtleneck from The Mannings' booth, and a cabled scarf and fingerless mitts pattern called "Creme Freche", from Uncommon Threads. That pattern calls for Snuggle, (an alpaca/wool/acrylic blend), but I've got some Misti Alpaca chunky in the stash that I think will substitute nicely.

And that is all!

As I walked around the fairgrounds this weekend, I had plenty of time to contemplate my yarn-buying habits versus what I actually end up knitting. As you can plainly see, I continue to be drawn to yarns in blue-green colorways, because I love those colors the absolute most. And yet I rarely seem to finish or even start projects for myself, before the ever-present Knitting Projects For Others, whether they be family or charity, jump to the front of the queue. And so, all the pretty yarns I buy for myself end up marinating in the stash. And that's perfectly fine, for now.

There are 25 people in my family -- including my parents, my siblings, their spouses, and a dozen nieces and nephews. I want to knit everyone at least one thing, so that no one feels slighted, and then after that, I'm promising myself that 2008 will be all about me. All. About. Me. Socks for me, a sweater for me, mitts for me, and perhaps finishing the dozen other UFOs I've already started for me.

There is, however, a plus-side to the knitting-for-others. I tend to pick small items and worsted or heavier yarns for those projects, and so they're finished relatively quickly and this slow knitter gets a fairly instantaneous feeling of accomplishment. Apparently, there's a good deal of product knitter within my process-knitting heart.

I've been a knitter for 20 months now, so I still consider myself new at this hobby. I'm evolving, my tastes are changing, my skills are (hopefully) improving, and I hope my knitting journey will continue for my entire (hopefully long) life.

So, I'm not going to fret (at least for now) about the contradiction between the stash I own (and love) versus the projects that are actually getting knit right now.

I do wish I had a yarn room, though, where I could easily view and be inspired by all the pretty skeins. Definitely in my next house....

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Finally, I just had to report that I think these guys are going to fledge sometime this week:

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Where I distract you with pictures of irises...

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...in hopes you'll temporarily forget about the promised finished object picture.



Oh, and did you see the moon tonight?


Latest finished object picture & specs coming Tuesday afternoon.

I promise.

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Bitch-slapping Mother Nature on Earth Day

*Oh, no....

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Complete story and pictures on my gardening blog, here.

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Workin' in the garden all weekend...

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...and here are a few of my pretties:

Azalea 'Tradition'
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wild Oxalis
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Forget-Me-Nots
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And this last one is for Sheddy:

Scilla campanulata
wood hyacinth
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Better get back to it....

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Happy Friday!

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Something pretty for your weekend pleasure:

Scilla campanulata
wood hyacinth
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A good problem to have.

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That good problem being: on such a beautiful day, how should I spend my time?

Knitting?

Or gardening?


I did both.

:-)

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Somethin' purty to look at...

...since I'll be gone and the blog quiet this weekend:

Spring blooms - despite the drought

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(Collage made here.)

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Pink stuff

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Because 6 UFOs are not enough, (apparently), I've started another one. This one has a very good chance of being finished in a timely manner, however, because it is a fast knit, I have a deadline, and it's for a worthy cause.

This weekend I bought the yarn and cast on for my friend Syd's "Think Pink" knit-along project. I'm knitting the "Heart" scarf from Knitty's Breast Cancer Awareness Fall 2004 surprise issue, which should look like this when finished:

I've finished two pattern repeats so far, and I'm hoping the wonky appearance will go away once blocked. We'll see how it looks after a few more repeats -- if it's still wonky, it may get frogged.

Can blocking de-wonkify this knitting? Is frogging the only other option? Stay tuned for the next exciting episode!

The pattern calls for an alpaca yarn, and if I had had my wits about me last weekend while ogling all the pretty colors in the Tess booth, I might have found some nice pink bulky alpaca with which to knit this. Since I was (and am) witless, I had to buy some bulky wool at my LYS, who is currently all about summer-weight yarns and has hardly any bulky yarns in sight. Here's hoping 200 yards is enough, because I don't know if they have any more of this colorway. I think this scarf knitted with alpaca would be softer and more drapey, but again, I'm hoping blocking will help that. It's a fun little pattern to knit, except for row 3 which has two knit-4-togethers -- yuck! That's probably not too terrible with laceweight yarn, but with fat yarn, (Crystal Palace "Iceland", 2.5 spi), and fat needles, (US size 15), it's a challenge! So for me, row 3 is always the row to dread and the hurdle to surpass.

Also being donated to the "Think Pink" project are two woven scarves currently in my possession:

The scarf on the left I won in a raffle at the Spring Fiber Festival -- it was made by Mill Creek Studio in Rural Retreat, VA, (no website - comment or email me if you want contact info). It's woven mohair with a little novelty something woven in as well. The scarf on the right is woven rayon and I bought that from a weaver I met in St. Louis when I was on a project there. She was friends with some girls on the client site and invited us to a Christmas party where she showed off her basement weaving studio, which was just a feast for the eyes, with all the colored fibers. I've had this scarf for several years but have rarely worn it, because being hot-natured, I just rarely wear scarves. Here's hoping that both of these scarves go to good homes.

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Finally, here's another pink thing in my world:

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To see more pink things like this, go here.

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What the...?

Where did this come from?

I'm just mad about Saffron...

...or at least the source of saffron:


These cheery little day-brighteners have been popping up in my garden for the past week. They are autumn crocuses I planted at least five years ago and have forgotten about, because they don't seem to come up every year. They sure have this year, though, despite the terrible drought we had in late summer, and despite my terrible neglect.

As you may or may not know, autumn crocuses (and not their spring counterparts) are the one-and-only source of the coveted spice saffron, which is why it is so expensive. Saffron is actually made of the stamens of autumn crocuses - those orange string-like things in the middle of the flower. Every year I think maybe I should go collect all those stamens, but I just can't make myself deface such a happy little flower. So I let them wither away. I'm probably throwing away a good $100 a year by not collecting them. Oh well. Perhaps I'd be more apt to collect them if I were more of a cook and was really into that spice. I think I've only eaten something seasoned with saffron once in my life, and I don't recall that I could detect anything particularly special. Of course, I don't have the most sophisticated of palates, either.

And speaking of neglect, there's a few more pictures of these happy autumn surprises on my much-neglected gardening blog.