Pretty New Yarn

I ordered this batt from Butterfly Girl Designs and spun it up this weekend. The colorway is called Blueberry Lime Surprise and it's 50% merino, 50% bamboo and a bit of sparkly angelina for good measure. It's so soft and dreamy! I feel like it should be called mermaid hair or something.


I am starting to make some arm warmers with it, because it's about the only thing I could think of that I might possibly wear anytime in the next several months.

I went to the sock club at Crazy Girl Yarn and bought some Noro Kureyon sock yarn!!! It's so pretty! (scratchy, sure, but so, so pretty!) I can't wait to make something with it!

Unknown sprout and lightbulbs

Ok, so here is the unknown sprout today.

I know it's not basil, lettuce, oregano, cilantro, marigolds, chives, tomatoes, carrots.... the only thing it can be are beans or peppers. I really really hope it's peppers. Or something I didn't plant, like pineapple.
I also have lots of new sprouts this morning that I didn't have yesterday morning. Like in one place I have about a thousand lettuce sprouts. I guess I got a little seed happy. Oops! I also have a ton of marigold sprouts, which is exciting because those are ones that didn't sprout indoors. It's also how I know the unknown sprout isn't marigolds.

So, when we replaced all the lightbulbs in our house with compact fluorescents, Sean put all the old lightbulbs in a vase on an end table in the hallway. I thought it was sort of silly and didn't do anything about it. After a bit of a lightbulb disaster on Saturday, though, I got a bit annoyed about the lightbulb vase and thought it was really dumb and who in their right mind has a vase full of light bulbs?

Meta Home in Old Capital Mall, that's who. We saw this display in the window last night, and it cracked me up enough to take a picture of it.
The lightbulb vase stays.

Things that grow

I haven't really been knitting, just spinning more of the green yarn. I think I will use the green yarn to make the Urban Aran Cardigan. I also decided what I think i want to do with the alpaca! I think I will make it a 2 ply yarn and make the Apres Surf Hoodie from the new Interweave Knits! I will probably dye it a really pale shade of something using food coloring or kool-aid. Such ambition I have, considering the only thing I have knit in months is a pair of socks.

Instead of knitting I have been watching things grow! Here are some tulips that I was so excited to bloom!

Only it turns out they are actually poppies! Pretty!

(edit: I was kind of nervous posting that because figured someone would say they aren't poppies and make it obvious that I have no idea about flowers. Here is a handy hint though: don't google images of poppies. Apparently there are a lot of naked people named Poppy. Fyi.)

Anyway, here are some blue flowers that are in the same little area of our patio as the red flowers.


Since it's actually letting me upload pictures (knock on wood) I think I'll add some more pictures of dirt with teeny bits of green in it.
Here are my tomato plants! They are the only plants big enough to be mildly interesting. To me, I mean.

This particular pile of dirt is also fascinating to me, because one of the random unidentified dirt clods that fell into the sink is sprouting! See! The tiny thing down in the lower left corner! Please tell me you can see it. (Yes, I realize that you can't see it. I am ok with that, because I know it's there.) A special bonus prize will go to the first person who can correctly identify what the sprout is turning into. Your choices are: lettuce, beans, marigolds, bell peppers, jalapenos or habaneros. Or maybe basil. Or oregano. I don't think it's either of those last two, though.


And I'd be remiss if I didn't include a picture of the cat, so here he is helping garden by hiding in the barbeque cover.

I made a garden!

I made a garden!!! In plastic tubs!! Too bad it's going to be frosty tonight and the whole garden is going to die. That's a bit lame.

My gardening methods are very precise. I've been growing seeds inside for like a month, and only about half of the seeds I planted ended up actually sprouting. At one point the little plastic container holding the seedlings blew off the window sill when the window was left open in a thunderstorm and all the seedlings and unsprouted dirt clods fell into the sink. I have no idea which unsprouted dirt clod was which, so when I planted the seedlings, I just buried the unsprouted dirt clods in the plastic tub in the corner, in the hope that it's just taking a little longer than expected for whatever is in there to grow. I labeled the tub in the corner "habaneros and jalapenos." Might be marigolds though. Shrug. I also poured the entire seed pack of carrots in a couple of very close together rows in one tub. I love carrots. I am hoping they all grow together into a very very wide mega carrot. This is going to be the best garden ever! Here's a picture of my half-stained deck, some plastic tubs of dirt and a barbeque (grill, to you midwesterners).


Awhile ago I mentioned that I had made a light box for taking pictures that look like hats are suspended in midair and whatnot. To make it, I cut three sides and the top out of a cardboard box, taped some tracing paper over the cutouts, put a long piece of white poster board along the back and bottom and put it next to a window and a desk lamp. I think the resulting pictures are pretty good, and kitty thinks the resulting box is a fantastic place to hang out.


Therefore, I figured it would be a good idea to take some pictures of him. They make me giggle, so you have to look at them, too.

Green Yarn

Here's some yarn I made! It even looks like yarn, huh?

I am trying to decide what I want to do with it. I really want to spin enough yarn to make an Urban Aran Cardigan or something similar. I've got 2 lbs of this green wool, and 1.5 lbs of alpaca, and I can't really decide if I want to make enough yarn to make a sweater out of both of them, or just use the wool to practice spinning. I am wavering between thinking that the green would make a really good color for a sweater and thinking that it would also be really goo wool to learn different spinning techniques with. I am definitely going to make enough yarn for a sweater with the alpaca. I am just not sure what kind of yarn I am going to make with it. Fat yarn? Thin yarn? Lots of plies yarn? Bumpy core spun yarn (like lion brand homestyle)? So this yarn is just sitting around not being used, and so is the spinning wheel until I make up my mind.

Until then, I am working on my Lizard Ridge again. Who knew that I would actually work on one of my random UFO's? Craziness.

Earthquake

Um, am I still in California or what? Hooray for being awake at 4:30 because the whole world is shaking. Come on now, wait for daytime so I can enjoy it.

Spring and spinning wheels!

Look! It's springtime! Granted, there is snow on the flower, but whatever.


Here's my spinning wheel! I've had it for a couple of weeks now and I love love love it! It's pretty, too!


It came with 2 lbs of green wool, so I have lots and lots to work with. Here's some green yarn I made and I plied together. It was just practice, though. I've gotten lots better since this.


My mom came to visit last week and for my birthday she gave me a ton of alpaca fiber!! It's so soft and wonderful!



Kitty likes it too. He thinks that it's a new friend.