Planting Cotton

My little cotton seedlings need to be planted today. I hope they don't shrivel up from the extreme heat we are having here this weekend. It's predicted to be 101 today! This is unseasonably hot for May.

Maybe I will start another batch of seedlings just in case these die. I plant a dozen or so cotton plants in spring and by fall have a nice little crop to harvest and spin. Since I don't have a big yard, I have to squeeze them in where I can. They need some sun which is a challenge in my yard. I get mostly shade. We lost a large tree last year from an unexpected frost so I am going to plant these little guys under the new tree. It doesn't provide much shade yet. I'll keep you up-to-date on their progress.

Dogs on Thursday

Almost forgot to post a Thursday picture of Sadie. Here she is in front of the azaleas which seem to be blooming a little late this year.

Unscheduled Dye Day

This is the yarn I have been busy spinning. It's from a batt I blended with white, black, and salmon-colored merino and a few bits of silk waste thrown in. Originally, I thought I would spin it for some gloves or maybe, what else, socks. As I was spinning, though, I realized that I was spinning this very thin and rethought my plan. Perhaps if I spin another spool with just the salmon color and I spin it thickly or thick and thin and then ply it with this, it could be very interesting. Or maybe I could spin another spool of the salmon merino and one of the black and three-ply it. Of course, there wasn't any more salmon merino left. So this prompted an unscheduled dye afternoon.

I searched through my dyes and found one called cyclamen that had the shade color sample on the label. That looked close so I dyed about 4 oz. of merino. The really bright pink merino in the picture is how it turned out. It's a great color, but the wrong color. The only other color I had that I thought might come close is called tomato. When I mixed it up , it looked like it would be too red, but to my surprise, it turned out about as close to the original as I could expect to get. I'm really pleased with it. Now I just have to decide what I want to do with this yarn after I am done, so that I can decide how to finish spinning it.

Culling the Herd

Each day I try to put away, find a new place for, or discard something that was moved in preparation for the recent remodeling. It's a slow process and somewhat overwhelming. There just isn't enough storage space in this house. Besides, I have convinced myself that simplifying is good. I don't need to take care of so much "stuff". I used to be a saver, but I am becoming more ruthless in my culling abilities.

Of course, this in no way applies to anything fiber-related. What? Do you think I have lost my mind? I find I am especially good at deciding to get rid of stuff that belongs to other people in the house or at least stuff that is more important to those people (uh-hum, husband).

This morning I was about to discard an old book from the '50s that had belonged to my mother-in-law, when it opened up revealing this little bookmark. You gotta love birds and giraffes in turtle-neck sweaters, especially if you are a knitter! Okay, so this is a keeper. The book goes, the bookmark stays. Hey, it's small. I can stick it in a knitting book, right?

Project Linus Blanket

When I realized I had used the same yarn and color for both Bailey's and Sadie's sweaters, I decided to use the leftovers to knit a blanket for Project Linus. I thought, "this is great, use up what I have and donate to a good cause." Well, the best laid plans...I underestimated the amount I had and needed to go buy another skein.

Project Linus is an organization with hundreds of chapters across the United States. Their mission is to benefit children in trauma situations or who are seriously ill by providing them with blankets that are handmade by volunteers. They have distributed over 2 million blankets since the organization began in 1995. Blankets can be knitted, crocheted, sewn, or quilted. If you would like to donate to this worthwhile organization, you can find your local chapter listed on their website under Chapter Listings. There are also links on the site for free patterns that you may use. This one is the Wheat Ears Baby Afghan.

Not Cable Socks

I finished knitting the Not Cable Socks in STR Ravenscroft this morning. These are for my daughter and she has been waiting a long time for them. I kept pushing them aside for other projects. If you look closely, you can see the faint green striping in this yarn. I am going to wash them before I give them to her because of the bleeding. My fingers still look a bit grey and I have washing my hands a few times since finishing them this morning. The pattern actually called for knitting the pattern ribbing down into the foot, but as I have mentioned before, I am a rather lazy knitter and seldom do patterns into the foot of the socks. If they are going to be in shoes, this just seems unnecessary and the plain knitting goes so much faster.

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers. This yummy bouquet of chocolate-covered strawberries came from my wonderful daughter. And they are delicious!

We decided to celebrate yesterday because she wanted to take her grandmother and me out to lunch. I thought it would be less crowded. I was wrong! I guess a lot of other people had the same idea. We headed out to Cheesecake Factory, but when we got there, there were a million people waiting outside. (Perhaps I exaggerate just a little.) We noticed BJ's wasn't as crowded, so we went there. I think Cheesecake Factory would have been tastier, but it was still a pleasant lunch. We had a great time. It was really nice for just the girls to go out together.

The dogs woke me up right before 6 a.m. today to go outside. My 20-year-old son popped out of his room to wish me a Happy Mother's Day and inform me that this is the 100th anniversary of Mother's Day. He sweetly apologized for being without money to get me anything. I told him that I didn't expect anything, but I also mentioned it would be nice if he cleaned his bathroom.

I wish I could just spend the day relaxing, but there are still things that need to be put away from the big floor remodel. Hopefully, I can get some knitting done. I'd like to finish the black socks.