I can finally post a picture of this purse I made for my friend G.
She lives out in California, and since she sometimes reads this blog and looks at my website (or so she claims... :) I couldn't post it until she had gotten it.
She says she likes it, so that makes me happy. It was a fun one to make, and the first time I've crocheted something without a pattern (except for the square, which came from 200 Crochet Blocks, block #42).
The center of the square is made from the same Paton'sDivine and my poncho, and the outer part is some Sugar & Cream cotton that I had laying around.
I had fun making it, and I'm glad you like it, G.!
Things have been really coming along in just a few days! There are about 10 easily visible sprouts, and about 10-15 you can see if you peer closely at the soil pellet thingies.
In there, we have planted:
bananas
zuchini
pumpkin (Snack Jack & Fairytale)
broccoli raab (a variety called zamboni - we had to!)
leeks
basil
spinach
cilantro
mustard
peppermint
candy lilies
tomatillos
sugar snap peas
parsley (in the fridge right now, as per the growing instructions)
I hope I can keep them alive. I just need to remember to water them...
It's about 6 weeks before the last frost date here in central Ohio, so it's seed starting time! Jeff made a stand for a light, and we planted the seeds on Saturday afternoon.
By this morning, we had our first sprout, a mustard seed.
Several of the others look about to pop, so it should be exciting! We also figured out the dimensions for our raised beds, and we would have gotten the wood for them, but the saw at the hardware store was broken, and we're lazy. :)
We also measured for our porch railings and priced everything out. I really don't relish painting that much wood!
I do not want to be kept alive like some sort of freakshow attraction (not that I have anything against freakshows) if I should fall into a vegetative state or otherwise become unable to enjoy my life.
Let no one say they do not know my wishes on this.
Rain. And lots of it. Which means mud. Which sticks to dogs' fur and then gets tracked all over our house.
At least our dogs are all brownish already, so, unless it's really bad, they don't look too much like mudpuppies. Of course, Indy and Kaylee hate the rain and have to be shoved off the porch to get them to potty. Indy's been known to hold it for 12 hours rather than pee in the rain. (Cordy, of course, doesn't care. Her fur's thick enough that I don't think she ever really gets wet.)
Sigh. Time to break out the dog towels and practice drying off six pairs of paws every time they come inside.
Mom came to visit and we had a good time doing not much of anything. Friday we just kind of hung out, and on Saturday morning, we went shopping. I got new yarn to make a poncho - you can read about that here.
Saturday night, I finally got started on my boss' afghan for her baby - due in May. It's taken me a while to get started, but I already have 11 out of 42 squares done! They don't know if they're having a boy or a girl, but I think I've got my bases covered on colors. :)
Sunday we spent with Jeff's family, celebrating Easter a week early, but the awful headache I had took a lot of the fun out of it. It was so bad I couldn't take Indy to his training class and went to bed early.
Last night, we went ordered flowers, vegetables and herbs for the garden. The vegetables are a new thing, especially what we're choosing to grow. Potatoes are the big kind of scary thing - I have never done anything like that before. We're also going to try sweet potatoes and leeks, along with a couple varieties of pumpkin, sugar snap peas, zuchinni (just one plant!), spinach, mustard, and broccoli raab.
It should be fun to grow some of our own food. Now, if we can only remember to water them...
I also noticed that our forsythia and lilacs have buds on them, as well as the little tree in the sheltered corner by the house. I guess spring really isn't a dream.
Have you seen Shaun of the Dead? If you haven't, you should. If you have and you liked it, you should also check out Spaced, currently showing on Trio.
Its about two friends, Tim (Shaun in Shaun of the Dead) and Daisy, who live together and their ... well, I'd guess you'd call them "wacky adventures." Nothing ever seems to go right with hysterical results. It was originally a show on Britian's Channel 4. The dialogue is just fantastic, and the way it's shot is a lot of fun.
She's had three fevers in three weeks, and she's going to have another one today. She was shivering (but had a normal temp) when we left, and Jeff plans to head home to check on her, since the shivering signals the start of a fever. And she has an ear infection, but that's just a fun little bonus.
It's so awful to not really be able to do anything to help her. Sigh...
Update:
Jeff says she doesn't have a fever. Hopefully the shivers were just a reaction to her ear infection. And that should be feeling a lot better in a day or two. If not, it's off to the vet she goes ... again!
I know that paint looks way different on the walls than it looks on one of those tiny paint chips, but Benjamin Moore's Personal Color Viewer really brings it home!
After flipping through there, I think maybe we'll go with something a little bluer than I had originally planned. I wasn't able to find any green that I really liked. We're leaning toward something like Benjamin Moore's "Florida Keys Blue" at the moment. But I kind of like "Green With Envy," too, and not just because of the name.
So I want to change our living room. It's kind of boring and bland, and there's just not enough storage. It's not a bad size, though there's really a lack of available walls that don't have windows on them.
This is the view from the front door towards the back of the house. Note Spike's cage by the door to the kitchen. It pretty much has to stay there.
From the dining room.
From the door to the kitchen.
From the stairs. The couch is "mine" (though I share it with Kaylee a lot :).
We really like these posters, and as you can tell from the bamboo blinds, were into a kind of tropical look. We'd kind of like to keep that.
Jeff's chair. He wouldn't ever give this up, so it's the one peice of furniture that will definitely have to stay.
I'd like to paint. I was thinking green. I plan to get some paint chips this weekend and see how they look. You can see our other rooms from the living room, so whatever we choose will have to go with a periwinkle dining room/office and a bright yellow kitchen.
We're also planning on installing a gas fireplace, so the big coffee table will probably have to go.
Suggestions? Thoughts? I've been going through design books and magazines, but too many ideas are better than none at all!
I couldn't possibly tell you what I've been doing to keep so busy, but there must be something that explains why I've been neglecting my blog.
Kaylee has had a few more fevers and that's certainly kept us busy. It's hard to do anything when your baby dog is in pain for days. My theory is that she keeps getting fevers because she doesn't want to wear a sweater I crocheted for her. She's such a critic.
Jeff's job is going well, and it's certainly keeping him busy, but not overly so. Certainly the hours are better than his last sojourn into the private sector. Plus, he likes the people he's working with and is enjoying taking clients and potential clients out to lunch. :)
I took a 3-week crochet class to brush up my skills. I find crochet very relaxing and I had forgotten how to do a bunch of stuff, like, say, read a pattern. So far, I've made my mom a poncho for her birthday and Kaylee's coat (which was actually practice for making something else. Maybe Kay's just insulted... :).
Now we're thinking about what we'd like to do to the house come spring. The big project, in my opinion, is to paint the living room, since that's where we spend most of our time. That, and put in a ventless gas fireplace, so we don't have to worry as much if we have an ice storm again next winter. And I want storage. Storage, storage, storage!
I can finally post a picture of this purse I made for my friend G.
