Ouf....it's been hot here. Everything has burst into bloom at once. Even the vinca that I cut back so savagely a few weeks ago managed a few blossoms.
This is an invasive species that I'm supposed to kill but we love it. Here, where nothing grows, it is a welcome sight every spring and makes a pretty picture on otherwise bare spots.
My new mini rhododendron made it through the winter and has burst into color up against the house.
I have several clumps of these mystery buds. Every year they get this far and then never fully bloom. Could this be their year? I'll have to wait and see.
My poor camellias have burnt edges from the cold. The dark red one shows the least amount of damage.
My pale pink one looks pretty bad this year as does my darker pink one.
My one big daffodil clump seems very happy. I keep kicking myself for not planting more every fall but I forget. I need to write a big note on the calendar.
But the most exciting thing is that my poor little baby hydrangeas, that I thought had died over the winter, are finally showing signs of life. I almost tossed them.
There are tiny little buds happening in the joints. These were a couple of those cheap plants you get at Walmart in a box for $1.97 and when you open the box there is a tiny stick with some roots on it. I potted these up and they seemed happy enough all last summer but I thought winter might have done them in since they were very slow to react to the warm weather. I'll have to keep an eye on them for sure. Those babies look pretty fragile.
And....for Valerie, here are my concrete critters which I am sad to say have seen better days. The rabbit used to have ears but I made the mistake of picking him up by them.
I also have a kitty along with a cement bird bath base adorning my side yard. If you ask me where these came from I couldn't tell you. They might have been my mom's or my grandmother's. All I know is that they have always looked this bad. Well, maybe not this bad but their slow disintegration is what I find the most charming about them. Sort of like what's happening to me these days. Sigh....
The unseasonable heat really sapped my energy yesterday so the only thing I accomplished was to finish two sides of the outside border on the Big Crazy. Today I should have it all finished and ready for binding. That will have to wait because I have a baby/kitty sitting adventure that starts Tuesday and lasts for a whole week. The next few days will be spent getting projects ready to be mobile since I'll be alone with the kitties for most of those days after the family leaves on a road trip Thursday. Uninterrupted me time for five whole days. Sounds like heaven.
The person who has more yarn than anyone ever should have just got a box of yarn in the mail.
I was so psyched by my new punch needle that I thought I might give this free pattern a try yesterday since we had a day off from the bathroom mess. It's from the Oxford needle company. They make the really good needles. I've printed out the pattern and would have given it a start except for being so darn tired from all the messy work this week and..........
....a night of worry about this little guy. Daughter gave me permission to post this photo of him in the ER Thursday night. He was having some scary tummy troubles and the pediatrician said "ER, now" sending Daughter into a tizzy and giving me a sleepless night waiting by the phone for updates. He's fine but just look at that cute little hospital gown. With this midnight ER run, Daughter has now officially joined the Harried Parent's Club. She's yet to do the ambulance ride but with two boys it's bound to happen sooner or later.
How it ended. Before all the stuff hit the fan around here I managed to finish plying the BFL in the Redwood colorway that was on the Ladybug.
I can't stand to see the Ladybug without a project on her so I went stash diving and came up with this beauty.
Here are the details. I seemed to have misplaced this tag so it's a good thing I took a photo of it. I'll forget all of it by the time it's ready for the handspun stash.
Here's a glamour shot of the braid. I'd love to know how they get them so perfect. I've tried and failed many, many times.
This is as far as I've gotten with it this week. It's ready to go but I'm not. Too tired.
Yesterday was another day of unbelievable messes in the bathroom. Chiseling up all that cement board that was under the tile was an awful job. We got it down to the original linoleum and I had to stop for a moment and think of the first owners who were probably very excited about this harvest gold bathroom in their brand spanking new house. It must be a wonderful feeling to have all that newness around you and know that the only thing you had to do with it was to pick out the colors.
We even got a look at the original linoleum. This place was a 1980's house of horrors when we moved in thirty years ago. Burnt orange shag carpet, heavy gold drapes and a turquoise kitchen.
It was my day to do the dirty work. The Mister does the up stuff and I do the down. Breaking up tile isn't terrible but it is tiring. What was even more tiring was listening to The Mister fret all day. We usually do all this stuff on our own but this time we are under a deadline seeing that the plumbing guys are coming next Thursday. He's been in a tizzy all week about getting stuff done and I was tired of hearing it. He gave up drinking when he had his hip and knee done but it was time for some help so I bought him some of his old favorite. A shot (or two) a day keeps the divorce lawyers away.
It was a long messy morning for The Mister. All I really did was pick up the pieces of the old fiberglass shower and toss them out the window. While I was waiting around I got the Gummiberry twins up to the heel. Today we'll be moving out the rest of the stuff and chiseling up the floor tile. I usually enjoy a good ripping out but I'm just not that into it right now. I think I've got a case of spring fever. The only thing that sounds good to me right now is a nap.
I only finished four more flower blocks and a bit of border this week on the Garden of Joy.
The first little piggy is finished and is getting landscaped.
Dear Jane is progressing slowly. It's terribly fiddly and I have to be in the mood.
I've started sewing down some of the little bits and bobs on The Patchwork of the Crosses blocks. They are also a bit fiddly but not Dear Jane level fiddly, thank goodness.
As for the bathroom, we didn't get around to it at all yesterday. Pup had some odd behavior over the weekend that needed looking at by the vet so we did that instead. $250 later we've got some meds for a UTI. Getting those in her twice a day for a week is not going to be fun. Even chicken nuggets didn't help.
This came down the driveway late Friday afternoon so I thought I would do a re-cap of my "auxiliary" crafting projects since I probably won't be getting around to them for a while. Starting today we will be ripping out a bathroom.
My "auxiliuary" crafts are the ones I get around to once in a while when I get some unexpected free time. The threading of the latest dishtowel is one of those. It's been slow going since I've had some heddle mix ups. First I didn't have the right number of them and then I had some misaligned. Rookie stuff there.
Spiral Chicken is enjoying her new frame more than I have been. I did get some ground under her feet done. The new frame is great. I just wish I had more time and more room for it.
Speaking of new, I bought a very pricey punch needle last week. I am determined to figure out how to do this and I thought a better tool might help. It really does. I'm just playing around with it now. I'll start an actual project with it when we finish up the bathroom remodel. I doubt I'll get much stabbing done until then.
And.....the new needlepoint project is already looking much better than my old one. I can finally see why needlepoint is so popular. It really is pretty mindless when you get the rhythm going. We are tearing out the old shower today and chiseling up the tile so expect a lot of that in future posts. After a day of it, there's little time or energy for anything else.
I've got only three more blocks to finish on The Big Crazy. I've been trying to do two a day.
I'm starting to assemble The Patchwork of the Crosses quilt but I'm far from finishing the hand piecing.
This is what an finished block actually is supposed to look like. There's a lot more that has to be sewn down.
That means I have to make all those pieces first so I'm back to paper piecing. For color placement, I'll have to make a bunch of them before I dare start sewing them down. I've already had a point meeting issue that lead to some serious seam ripping. I don't need anymore surprises.
My downstairs craft table has something new on it.
It's also got this newly stained wood in front of it. We are finally finishing the transition pieces for the new flooring while we are waiting for the delivery of our new shower unit. They called to say it will be here any day now and we haven't done much to get ready for its installation.
We've got a bathroom floor to tear out along with the old shower unit. We have to start with the hole in the ceiling. That's where the leaky pipe is and that has to be fixed first. The plumber is going to do it but we had to tear out some support beams we put up to keep the rotted floor from crashing down into the lower level.
I can't move around much in my room right now but I did get the last of my paper hexie quilt glued down. My poor craft room will be ground zero for construction once again but this time, since we are paying someone else to do the work, it might not be forever.
Plying has begun on the BFL that's on the Ladybug. I'm chain plying it to keep the colors together. I'm pretty sure it will become another pair of Thermal Mitts when it's finished.
Speaking of Thermal Mitts, the thumb is in progress on the one I'm working on now. It would have been finished it I'd just had a few more minutes to work on it but The Mister was in need of assistance with the giant hole we have in the ceiling. More on that tomorrow.
My absolute favorite fluffy project is still the Pi Shawl. I've been carrying it around with me everywhere I go. I even took it for a walk by the water the other day which would be my first knit walking project of the year. I love watching my wonky handspun change color every so often in the sunlight. EZ was right. Pi Shawls are perfect travel knitting. You really can't get more mindless than this.
And....I have to thank Sandflies for finding me another ball of Palette in the discontinued Sunlight colorway. She had a ball in her stash and was willing to give it up along with a bag of Lindor chocolate. Both are much appreciated. Thanks so much! I'm still not sure why KnitPicks would discontinue such a useful color. All of their yellows are so similar now that they almost useless for colorwork. I also have to say that I HATE the new KnitPicks and Connecting Threads websites. I've gotten so frustrated with them that I've gone off to find things elsewhere.
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