New Blog; New Book

Am I excited!!! My new book Sock Innovations by Cookie A just arrived. What a gem. Well written directions. I immediately got started on a pair of socks--difficult choice, I want to make them all NOW. Then I discovered that I don't like knitting socks with stitch patterns in them. All my previous socks, the almost-100 pairs, have been plain-knit self-patterning socks; mindless, watching TV, quick turnabout, sense of accomplishment.

But I LOVE the socks, and I think my girls are also ready for something more exotic, so I shall persevere. (Of course, for the first pair I had to choose a pattern that could not be easily memorized). Will keep you posted. I don't mind charted patterns at all, and I love lace knitting, so I don't expect difficulties. Will have to keep a plain sock going at the same time for when I watch "House" and " Bones".

Am I excited again!!! My other blog "Weed it and Reap" is up and running. The reason for this move is that it is (or will be sometime soon) spring, and our greenhouse, then the garden, will occupy so much of my time that I will not likely have much knitting news to share. So, in order not to bore the non-gardening knitters, or the non-knitting gardeners, I decided to garden on one blog and knit on another. The site needs some work, but it's available.

Printing off the income tax tonight; assembling tonight; UGGH! writing the cheques tonight. ANOTHER THING OFF MY LIST OF THINGS TO DO!

New things on my to-do list? Alterations on a wedding gown, a flower girl dress, a mother-of-the bride dress and 3 bridesmaids' dresses. Wedding on May 23.

Till next time: We are "Just Mum" to our children. To our grandchildren we are possessed of magic, having lived in a time before time began. (M.R.G.)

More on You're Never too Old to Learn

When I publish a post, I get a message "Bad Request" so i save it in drafts and publish it from there, but it didn't save all of it, so I must complete it now.

3. When you change font for emphasis, change back when you're finished emphasizing.

4 . I managed to upload all the pictures in my first April 20 post with only 2 gliches--one on the part of "blogger" and my accidental delete. WOW!!

You're Never too Old to Learn

What did I learn from the booboos in the latest post?



1. Don't mess with the basic font color. If you have a dark background it automatically defaults to white: don't hit black.



2. Don't admit to being a teacher, and overlook a spelling error in the blog.



3.

Time to Catch Up

Spring is trying to come to our parts:

IN THE GREENHOUSE: (Purple Spider Osteospermum)

ON THE FARM. (This is where I uploaded a picture for 16 minutes, and with one click, accidentally highlighted it, didn't notice, and deleted it).

(Canada Geese and more wool)

GARDEN JOURNAL: here is my garden today. A real 60'x80' "carte blanche". I hear the rototiller chomping at the bit: "Sigrun, time to plant the sticks!", it's calling me. (will explain stick planting when it happens.) It only looks like the garden is under water. It's drying nicely. Will keep posting regularly about the garden for anyone interested, particularly my 2 new gardening blogger friends.

How would you like this perennial flower bed?

I'm always late cleaning my flower beds. I didn't clean them last fall because of the damage to the greenhouses (see further on).

Actually, I hardly ever clean them in the fall, only this yearI had an excuse.

I feel so fortunate: I just came across Grandma's ( my late mother-in-law's) McCall's Needlecraft Magazines from Winter 1945-46 to 1952. I scanned the cover of the oldest one. (disappointing here). Note the cost (35 cents-can't read ut). I love retro garments. Will post some of my favorites later.

What's happening in my crazy life?

a. The Cowardly Lion's head was picked up on Tuesday Morning. Can't show you pictures because the show is not open yet. If the Theatre sends me a photo I will post it.

b. It's income tax time (our deadline is April 30) finished my Mom's, finished the quarterly sales tax report.

c. The large large man's alpaca sweater--knitting is finished, assembly not. I think I will write the pattern top-down. I'm pondering about short-rowing over the back and sleeves, so the front neckline will be quite low to accommodate a shirt collar and tie.

d. Half the petunias are transplanted; we're 700 sq. ft. short of space because we didn't have time to finish rebuilding the lean-to greenhouse that blew down in a severe windstorm in October. (Severe damage--2 greenhouses repaired before the severe cold in Dec.) Thinking we would get it finished, I didn't reduce my planting plans. Yesterday DH gave me the news-minus 700 sq. ft. DH unpacked the wintered-over perennials, and we will be moving the wintered-over trees and shrubs out of storage. Hope they all survived. The new orders come next week.

e. Next Tuesday, I'm getting my winter tires off. You can blame me if more snow comes. But I promiseI won't wash my winter jacket nor will I pack away the mitts and boots (till at least July).

f. Regretfully told the school that I'm not available for substitute teaching till fall. :( Too busy.

I think this is my 10th post. And I'm thinking that this is kind of like having pen pals when I was a kid--only you don't have to wait as long for the mail. And it's kind of disappointing when you don't hear from them for a while, and you wonder if they got the letter (i.e. read the blog), and you're dying to meet them in person.

Till next time: If the old will remember, the young will listen. (Chief Dan George)

Happy Easter

Happy Easter to all my fellow bloggers. No time for pictures. No time for stories. Thousands of petunias waiting to be planted, and Easter dinner on Sunday for 22 people. God bless you all. And I just got a commision to hook the head of the Cowardly Lion for Edmonton's theatre production of "THE WIZARD OF OZ"-deadline --to be picked up on Tuesday.

Spring May be Here

We're finally expecting some nice weather this week. That's good, because we had a lot of greenhouse damage during a severe windstorm on Oct. 25. Managed to get 2 greenhouses repaired by the end of November, then the severe cold hit. We're running out of room, so we're working hard on plants and greenhouse repair.

Finally, a finished project. This is my first completed lace shawl. I enjoy knitting lace, but don't enjoy knitting finest yarn on large needles. But I love the product so I will certainly do more. This plum-colored shawl is from the Victorian Lace Today book, and I used Jamieson and Smith's 2 ply laceweight.

I'm still plodding along on the large, large alpaca man's cardigan. 1/2 sleeve and a front to go. Hope to be done by Easter. I've never done so much ripping in my life, because I get the basket-weave pattern offset one stitch and don't notice it till 2-3 inches later. But I'm happy with how the sweater is turning out. I'll make sure the next few alpaca sweaters have a simpler pattern. This is when I wish there were no copyright issues. Since my friend is selling the sweaters, I have to make all original designs, so it's worth the time investment for the first one, because then I can just follow my own patterns, then it's mindless knitting.

My next shawl project has been on the needles for a long time. This one's a Cobweb lace shawl, a very fine thread-like 1-ply Shetland lace yarn. When the shawl is done, it will be very large, but should be able to be pulled through a wedding ring. It's not that I 'm not enjoying working on it, but other projects always come up that are higher priority. The picture shows a 2mm needle to the right of the cobweb thread.

Till next time: Upstretched arms make grandmas put off rheumatism till tomorrow. (Julie B. Jones)

Good news, crazy news. We're planning a big family dinner for Easter Sunday. I don't really enjoy the everyday cooking, but I love to put on a spread for family gatherings. Because it's such a busy time, I had the menu all planned, the shopping all done. On Saturday I got news that we can expect another 8 to come on my sister-in -law's side (I did invite them). With having taken a substitute teaching job on Wednesday, my week is going to be insane: greenhouse, cleaning, cooking, teaching, shopping and, maybe a tiny bit of knitting.