I’d like to show you all the few things I’ve knit, but I gave most of them away and without photos. But I have a new macro lens for our camera, and I have been taking photos in our garden. We are in stages moving to a lawn-free garden since green lawns in California make little sense even when we don’t have a drought. With our garden we are trying to attract bees and hummingbirds, and they seem to like it!
I am not afraid of bees, so I just sit still with my camera, and snap away. We have several different species visiting our flowers as soon as the sun is up.
I am knitting too! I have about 70 zillion WIPs right now, but I am nearing the finish on one that is turning out quite well. I saw a sample of Aranami by olgajazzy at Yarns on First in Napa last summer, and I was smitten. The sample was knit in Cascade 220 fingering, and the store had all the shades from white to black to knit the shawl.
I am almost done with the darkest grey, and then I have the black to knit. I like grey so much that for once I actually went with the color scheme on the pattern. This is a fun, easy modular project, but it is not for the knitter who hates weaving in ends.
Well, I hear the call of the needles and string, so I am off to knit a few rows.
Happy Knitting!
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Anyway, for Christmas Valentine’s Day I knit M a hat.
That’s the Jacques Cousteau pattern knit in Knitpicks Gloss DK because all manly men like 30% silk fiber in their hats. Doesn’t M look like he’s ready to head out to sea?
I like the decrease pattern on this hat, which almost made it worth the 8 inches of 3×2 ribbing. I changed the decreases to those of ker2’s on Ravelry. They worked well.
My raised bed for greens did really well this winter! At the very left is mache, which I would not grow again. It was supposed to be nutty tasting. It tasted like leaves and didn’t grow that well. From right to left: arugula, oakleaf and salad bowl leaf lettuce, romaine, watercress (did not do well) and the mache. I am definitely growing the arugula, oakleaf and romaine again next year.
And we have had a small harvest of broccoli rabe. It’s OK, but next year I think I’ll go with snow peas and sugar snap peas. The Felco harvesting shears are fantastic. My parents gave them to me for my birthday (Thanks, Mom and Dad!), and I love them for cutting flowers and the lettuces and such.
And speaking of flowers, it’s spring here in Northern California! February is a very good reason for living in California, unless of course you are a native Californian, and then February is still winter because the calendar says so, and high temperatures are often only in the 50s. But the flowers are starting to bloom, and that means Spring!
Not our daffodils, but I plan to put some in this coming autumn. Tulips don’t do well here (they need weeks of cold) but daffodils are fine.
Flowering quince in a neighbor’s yard. I may have to look into this.Beautiful flowers–plant, not so much.
Calendula from my own backyard. I have these in a pot, but I may move some of them around, although I hear they will “naturalize.” That may or may not be a good thing. M kind of likes a tidy garden.