Warm Texas Welcome

After being home all winter, we hit the road last week to visit our son Aaron and family who live in Fort Worth, Texas. Our grandson is growing into quite a wonderful young man. We also enjoyed getting to know the foreign exchange student living with them. That adventurous young man is from Brazil. We had a good safe road trip. The Texas crew as well as the weather gave us a warm welcome, sunny with highs over the weekend in the mid-80's. Pretty wildflowers, a pink primrose and some type of orange flower, bloomed along southern Oklahoma and northern Texas roadsides. I was so happy to have the sun on my back and face. On Sunday afternoon, we went on a walking tour/ urban scavenger hunt in and around Sundance Square. By following clues on Jacque's phone, we learned a little about Fort Worth while seeing beautiful old buildings/architecture, city parks, and sculptures. At each stop, the tour provided a puzzle to solve and pointed us toward the next stop. My husband and I had never heard of such a thing so I pass this information for anyone else who might be slightly out of touch with new fangled technology. Groupon coupons apply.

I knit a sock during the 1250 miles we drove south and north. I spelled my husband, driving a little on the way down and back but since he prefers to drive, I happily knit. I arrived home with a few inches on the second sock but ripped that out last night. I wondered if the free pattern had some errors. I checked notes on Ravelery last night and discovered my intuition was correct. (Notes on my project page.) I bought this yarn in the Fort Worth yarn store, West 7th Wool, on a previous trip so it seemed fitting to knit with it on this trip.

I am reading No Time To Spare: Thinking about what Matters by the late Ursula K. Le Guin. I am not a fantasy/science fiction reader so I haven't read her fiction. However these short essays and blog posts are thought provoking, quirky, and witty. The subjects range from her ideas about literature and publishing to events between 2010 and 2016. The essay about old age "No Time to Spare," pulled me right into the book. Animal lovers will enjoy the pieces about Pard, her cat. I bought the book at Watermark, an independent bookstore in Wichita, Kansas. When we drive to Texas, we stay in Wichita on the way down so we don't arrive in Fort Worth during late afternoon traffic. This is a good way to spend time browsing Watermark. The Fort Worth traffic part didn't work so well for us this time as we ran into road construction on I-35 but all was well. I was glad to be knitting as we sat still on the highway. Monday we left Fort Worth before sunrise to drive home in one day. Today I am happy to be home where the rhubarb is up and spring thunderstorms are rolling across the prairie. Rain and warm Spring days are welcome. What are you knitting and/or reading these first few days in May?

Linking with Kat and the Unravelers.

Spring

Welcome to Spring in Nebraska. Chilly rain one day and sunshine the next. Earlier this morning, the sky was bright and blue and now it has clouded over. Cooler weather and precipitation, dare I mention a few snowflakes, are forecast for tomorrow. 

Yesterday my husband and I took advantage of a sunny day to drive out to the Platte River Valley in central Nebraska to view the sandhill crane migration. The Platte, a braided river that meanders around sandbars and shifting islands carries snow melt from the Rocky Mountains to the Missouri River. The short stretch near Kearney hosts the annual stopover of these birds. Between mid-March and early April, between 400,000 to 500,000 cranes feed in nearby fields and settle on the river at night. The average wingspan of an adult is between 5.5 to 7.5 feet. 

We arrived mid afternoon, found a safe place to park on a county road, and watched the birds. Now and then they spread their long wings to move about but generally seemed content feeding on leftover corn under a warm sun. After an early dinner in town, we drove back to the State Recreation Area and walked out on a pedestrian bridge that spans the river.

  

Standing on that bridge at sunset is magic. During the day, the birds call softly to each other in the fields but as the sun falls lower in the sky they call more frequently. Before the birds are visible from the bridge, their swelling chorus fill the air. Soon a few lone birds and then small groups begin to fly toward the river. And then ribbons of birds appear overhead, flying up and down the river in search of safe place to rest. They don't land near the bridge because too many of us are standing there with cameras and binoculars. Even so, their ancient music is the beginning of Spring. 

Happy Spring, Happy Easter, Happy Passover.

Linking with Kat and the Unravelers. 

 

   

Hope

March is Women's History Month. I was in college (1969-1973) when my Mom discovered women's history. It was a heady time. She sent my sister and I subscriptions to Ms. Magazine. She was fascinated by the Suffragettes, especially those with ties to Nebraska and Iowa. I still have a news clipping I found in one of her books with a list of these women. She often recommended books written by women, some more widely known than others. She introduced me to Mari Sandoz, a Nebraska author. She gave me books published by small presses written by and about women in the west. Many of them remain on my bookshelf today. Mom was the best as a mother, friend, encourager, life-long learner, registered nurse, and much more.

This morning before writing, I decided to learn a little more about Women's History Month. In 1987, the Women's History Project petitioned Congress to designate March as Women's History Month. Each year Women's History Month has a theme. The 2018 theme is "Nevertheless She Persisted: Honoring Women Who Fight All Forms of Discrimination Against Women." At this time there is an effort to raise money to build a Women's History Museum on the Mall in Washington, D.C. Currently more women than ever are running for public office in the United States. And so the effort to represent women continues. As Emily Dickinson wrote, "Hope is a thing with feathers."

Spring's arrival is slow. In the wee hours of the new season, a flurry of wet snow fell. The goldfinches sport the first hint of their brillant summer yellow. Daffodils in my yard are up about three inches and the iris spears are green. I poked the compost for just a whiff of rich soil. The sandhill cranes are feeding along the Platte River in Nebraska.

My knitting has turned to small simple projects. I have the proverbial pair of socks on the needles. On a recent gray day, I cast on fingerless mitts in River, my favorite color in this yarn. Tomorrow I see the ophthalmologist for a new glasses prescription. When the glasses arrive in seven to ten days, I will be able to read with ease. I am grateful the cataracts in both my eyes have been successfully removed and replaced with new lenses. Literally, the possibility exists for seeing the world through new eyes.

Joining Kat and others for Wednesdays Unraveled.

Familiar Lessons

Yesterday we had a taste of Spring. The day was warm enough to walk in shirt sleeves and so I did. Earlier this week, we attended the funeral of an acquaintance who died suddenly. I decided grocery shopping could wait ninety minutes. At the edge of town, I walked on a trail and sat on a bench facing the sun. Later I carried my knitting to the deck. The sun was lower in the sky as the robins and finches sang to each other. I'm sure the dust continued to accumulate in the house but the warm day was too fine not to be outdoors.

On the deck, I bound off the Kindness Shawl. It was a well fought game of yarn chicken. I knew I might not have enough to finish the bind off but decided to try. I ran short so I cut the tails from the cast on and one other place where I had removed a knot in the skein. I used those two little pieces to finish. I confess I tied knots after pulling the ends to the back. That corner is not going to win any prizes but I did finish the shawl without tinking back two long rows. I think I won the game but a sudsy bath and blocking will tell the story. If the ends unravel, I will not.

This shawl will be a donation or a gift.  I am not crazy about the tonal variations and color in this yarn. Both looked better to me in the skein than in the shawl. The yarn has a nice hand and the pattern is easy to follow. It just doesn't seem to be a good match for me. Perhaps someone else will enjoy it. The lesson here is not to persevere when a little voice in my head raises questions. How many times do I need to be reminded that not all projects need to be finished? The yarn would have made great socks.

Today the sky is partly cloudy and the day is not as warm. No matter, my Texas grandson and his mother are in town and we are meeting them for pizza this evening. That will be sunshine enough for this day.

Shawl Notes

During this gray cool weather, I completed knitting the body and sleeves of the travel cardigan. Next comes wet blocking, then picking up stitches and knitting the
v-neck and button bands. I need to shop for buttons before I tackle the finish work. In the meantime, I pulled out the Schoonheld Shawl. I worked on it a couple of evenings last week and couldn't find a rhythm in the stitches. I made mistakes in the simple lace pattern. Friday evening I tinked back the same few rows twice before setting it aside and picking up a book. Saturday morning, I ripped out the shawl.

Pashima is luxury yarn and I've admired the well written pattern for quite some time. However this combination was a mismatch. Lately process matters as much or more to me than product. Perhaps this shift is part of growing older. Sweaters often require brain power and finishing fortitude. Cowls are fun to knit while mittens retain a classic construction. Socks are full of whimsy, warmth, and fun. Shawls speak to me of peace. They don't have to fit perfectly. The pattern can be simple, complicated, or somewhere in between. They also make lovely gifts for a special sister, friend, or maybe even a stranger.

From time to time I wonder how many shawls a knitter really needs to knit. I have several large sturdy shawls scattered around the house and I wear them often. In the fall and spring, I often tie an asymmetrical shawl around my neck when I run errands, go out for coffee, book group, or church. Recently I wore one on the first day of spring when I attended the funeral of a highly respected colleague, beloved by her family and friends. That afternoon on my walk, I noticed catkins on the birch tree, yellow forsythia on the bottom of a bush, and white fringe in the top of pear trees. Sometimes one needs a shawl, preferably in yarn of some combination of merino, silk, alpaca, or cashmere.

Saturday evening I began knitting the Soft Sunday Shawl. The knitting is delicious and I am making good progress.

Welcome Spring

Spring, ever so welcome and a bit early, has arrived. The first week in March I stepped out on the deck and heard hundreds of sandhill cranes flying overhead. Two weeks later, my husband and I drove out to central Nebraska. During the afternoon we rolled down the windows and drove county roads to watch the birds in the fields. The fields were brown and the March sky filled with blustery gray clouds. Crane watching isn't a cherry blossom festival but a spectacle of natural color and season. In the fields, the cranes bounce up and down, fly a short distance, and then parachute down to another feeding spot. All the time, they call to each other with sounds that haven't changed for thousands of years.

After dinner, we dressed in layers and walked out onto a pedestrian bridge over the Platte. While light left the sky and the smell of cold wet grasses rose from the riverbanks, we chatted with two women from Colorado and listened to a father and children from Chicago spot two deer. At sunset, the cranes flew up and down the river searching for their evening roost. They kept their distance from bald eagles in a tree on a nearby sandbar. They were also wary of the humans gawking from the bridge. Still we viewed extended wings and red masks through binoculars as we listened to their ancient cries. The Rowe Sanctuary  website posts excellent photos and information about the cranes. Crane Music: A Natural History of American Cranes by Paul A. Johnsgard, a noted ornithologist, is another good resource. Most springs, I reread a section that begins,  "In the heart of North America, there is a river . . .  There is a season in North America . . . There is a bird in North America . . . "  And so, once again spring begins.

The temperatures bounce up and down from just below freezing to a warm 81. On a cold gloomy day last week, I made a list of spring cleaning chores. Saturday was warm so I worked outdoors. I stirred the compost bins. Then I gave the bird feeder a soak in a bucket of water while pulling weeds from the vegetable garden and raised bed. I finished the afternoon by potting up some pansies for the front porch. Flowering trees in my neighborhood are in full bloom. The blooms are early this year but they are gorgeous. Fresh air blowing through the house is glorious.

My knitting projects have also turned to spring. I threw caution and a cowl-in-progress to the spring winds. Instead I pulled out two skeins of rose colored yarn that I have been saving for something, evidently a Frozen Silver Shawl. Alternating garter and textured stitches is a peaceful knit. In the process, I learned a new stitch - Diamond Pattern- which looks like a trellis to me. The instructions are very clear and the stitch isn't difficult.  I have also been knitting up some dish/wash cloths. Over this last winter and holiday season, I had given my stack away. I enjoy giving them to new Moms, someone going through a rough patch, to say thank you, or just to brighten a day. A few new dish cloths in my kitchen would be a breath of fresh air. Perhaps they will motivate me as I move through my inside Spring cleaning chores.


What about you? How do you welcome Spring?

Turning Toward Spring

Spring brings me renewed energy. I am working on inside projects before outdoor gardening season begins. Although it is tempting to clean out perennial and herb beds, I wait until the first week or so in April leaving weeds and last year's growth to protect plants from fluctuating temperatures. Ten days ago, temperatures reached 80 degrees but yesterday afternoon rain turned to sleet and the roofs were covered with frost this morning.

Recently, I finished two knitted projects created without a pattern. Although I will never be a designer, it is nice to know enough to make my own simple projects. I finished a sweet little shawl out of yarn I purchased at least five years ago. I knit a garter stitch triangle, increasing on the edges and spine until I had the number of stitches (including edges, center stitches, plus a multiple of the 18 stitches) necessary to repeat seven motifs on each side.

I have also been working on baby knits. The little green antler cardigan is done all but sewing on the buttons and being photographed. I made a hat and mittens for a niece expecting a baby in July. I referred to Ann Budd's Handy Book of Patterns and Stephanie Purl-McPhee's Knitting Rules for a general idea on size. The idea for the purled row in the stripes comes from Susan B. Anderson's Itty Bitty Hats. I have knit three or four variations of this striped beanie in different yarn weights for other children in the family.

I find my writing also reflects the season outside my window.  I am almost finished with a small group of poems created during the winter from writing prompts. I am looking forward to new knits and new thoughts in the colors of Spring. The season turns ever so slowly. I am taking notes on its arrival. 

Making My Own

Recently on an early March afternoon, I read one of my favorite Margaret Wise Brown books, "A Home for a Bunny" to my grandson. "Spring said the robin. Spring said the frog. Spring said the bunny." I don't know anyone who isn't happy to see Spring. All winter I knit with gray, sage green, and shades of blue, so while winter lingered in my neighborhood, I ordered one skein of brightly dyed yarn to knit some cheerful socks. Sometimes you just have to make your own Spring color.

A few days later, I went to the grocery store for a few items, including a lemon. The bright yellow fruit was so inviting, I bought enough to fill a small glass bowl. I made lemon muffins and some lemon flavored simple syrup for lemonade. On one warm afternoon, I made some fresh lemonade and enjoyed it on the deck in the sunshine.

Indoors, I am learning to make books. I checked out some references from the public library and then searched the internet. At Christmas, my daughter gave me a book on bookmaking and I was off on a new adventure. I began by making two small books with blank pages. In the first project, I used the cover of a book I bought at an antique mall for seventy cents. I also improvised some bookmaking supplies from my embroidery, sewing, and quilting days. Instead of ordering book binding tape, I reinforced the spine with a piece of fabric backed with iron-on interfacing. When I made the second book, I cut the cover and spine from cardboard leftover from framing a piece of embroidery. I covered the board with cotton quilting fabric. I substituted a strip of linen left over from an embroidered sampler for mull, the speciality fabric glued to the spine of folded papers before they are attached to the cover.

Next, I made two chap books of my poems. I purchased some watercolor paper for covers. I used pearl cotton embroidery floss and a tapestry needle to sew the books together with the pamphlet stitch. One of my daughter's photos became the cover art. I finished the book with a contrasting strip of 1/8 inch ribbon. The book contains a title page, a dedication, the poems, and a copyright statement, all exactly the way I want them to look. While publishing and marketing my writing is intimidating, making my own books intrigues me. After all there was a time when books were made one at a time by hand.

Whether the subject is books, socks, lemonade, or spring, sometimes you just have to make your own.

February Color and Light

January and February is a good time for comfort knitting. I knit a scarf from Shepherd's Wool in a pattern called Danger. While I knitted, temperatures dipped below freezing and remained bitterly cold. In fact, the weather was so cold, I completed the bind-off, wove in the beginning and ending ends, and wore the scarf without washing and blocking. For some reason, the name "Danger" reminds me of the "here be dragons" phrase cartographers of the early 1500's used to indicate danger. As I walked on bitter cold days with the scarf wrapped around my face, I thought, "here be danger." Still on those cold days, the neighborhood is quiet and there is a certain kind of beauty in the contrast of snow and bare tree trunks. As I came home to soup bubbling in the crock pot or carrots and squash roasting in the oven, I savored the peace of winter days. Soon enough lawnmowers and other power tools will disturb the quiet.    

Yesterday was unseasonably warm so I drove out to a trail bordering a wooded area for a walk. Even though I walked in a fleece jacket without hat or scarf, the grasses and adjacent wooded area looked like winter. Songbirds were not visible. Instead I saw only a hawk riding thermals in the wind and two big crows perched in tall elms. On the last leg of my walk, I found this wispy feather attached to the twig of a bush. I wish I knew what kind of bird shed this tiny feather with the splotch of gray along the shaft. After a walk through a monochromatic landscape, the feather made me smile.

February marks the month when the light begins to increase. The change is quite subtle, nevertheless the color of the sunny sky seems different to me. The days of slightly increasing light offer the hope of Spring. I hear more bird song too. I recently read that birds don't migrate based on temperatures but on the changes in light.

Last night I put another inch on the "Current" cardigan I cast on last summer. The yarn is a soft sage green. Knitting an adult sweater from fingering yarn with miles of stockinette stitches is a bit like slugging through winter. I wanted to make sure the sweater was worth my time so I put the body stitches on waste yarn, tried it on, and decided I like the fit. Tomorrow the forecast is for cold and snow but yesterday after my walk, I planted basil and chamomile seeds. The basil seeds came free in the mail. I don't know if they will germinate but I decided to plant them in pots and tend them from the kitchen counter. Any extra green color is welcome. I wish you enough color and light to see your way through the remaining days of February.

Birds of a Feather

Spring weather has been cool with rain and even snow into late April and early May. The temperatures are too cool for planting tomatoes but good for knitting.  I finished this baby sweater and am knitting a hat to match.

                                                                   

I also cast on Piper's Journey, a crescent shawl with a simple border attached to a body of garter stitch.  I am knitting it in sport weight "Chickadee" yarn by Quince and Company. The yarn is 100% wool and has a lovely hand. 

Quince and Company, located in Maine, spins and dyes American wool and linen "sourced from overseas earth friendly suppliers" in a restored mill. Although they use minimal recyclable packaging, ink, and paper in products, their design aesthetic is sophisticated and beautiful. Cleverly, they named yarn lines after birds: chickadee, finch, tern, sparrow, lark, and owl.  For all of these reasons, I think their yarn company is worth supporting.

In other Spring aviary news, a robin is working on a nest in the clump birch outside my window. She is building on the southeast side of the tree where a strong limb meets one of the tree trunks.The tree will shelter her nest from the north and west wind while the house will protect it from the south.  This morning a pair of young cardinals call to each other and a chickadee searches for insects in the bark. A bluejay flew in to inspect the nest and a starling contributed one twig. Maybe this nest is a community building project. I'll be interested to see if the robin can maintain her claim on the nest.

                                                                                                                                                                 Meanwhile, a group of starlings continues to tut- tut on the ground underneath the tree. They keep their beady eyes on the small space in front of them, pecking at the ground for no good reason and then occasionally gobbling up earthworms before glancing around to see if their neighbor needs food.  Following each other in shiny black suits, they remind me of groups of U.S. Senators sticking together as they totter around opening and closing their throats in self-importance. In the evening the starlings roost together in the birch, cackling noisily and soiling the ground below them. Perhaps the robin's nest, just under another limb, is protected from the starlings' mess. I wish the American robin the best of luck as she attempts to build a home and rear a family during this precarious Spring.   

Spring Irony

I've finished my version of the  Deephaven Cowl and mismatched mittens from Prairie Silk Yarn by Brown Sheep Company. I modified the cowl pattern so both edges are the same. Working late into several evenings while listening to an audio book, I lost track of rows knitted on the second mitten. Although I tried three times, I made mismatched mittens. The thumb construction, made by knitting a piece of waste yarn into the hand which are later unraveled and picked up to make the thumb, left holes which I cinched up with needle and yarn. This may or may not be due to the pattern design. Still, I felt like my workmanship on the mittens was inferior. I planned to wear both pieces next winter and then the temperature dropped and snow fell.

 After trying on the mittens, I took them off and looked at the way my thumb grows from the top of my wrist.  The curve of my hand tells me a gusset made by increasing stitches just above the cuff makes more sense than knitting the thumb from an opening created by knitting stitches with waste yarn. I think the mitten would fit better and it wouldn't pull the cable sideways. Many mitten patterns use the waste yarn method so adjusting the position of  thumb stitches might improve the fit. The cable design in this pattern is the same on both mittens. Since I prefer cables to mirror each other, I'll pay more attention to cable twists in the future. However the mittens are serviceable and warm and there are no knitting police, I declared the mittens finished and counted them as a lesson learned.    

     

Life is full of irony, including spring weather and knitting. While the cowl pattern, was designed to be asymmetrical, I modified the pattern to make it symmetrical. The mittens were intended to be symmetrical but due to my errors ended up asymmetrical. For now, this yarn and I are finished. The two leftover skeins are in the basket of yarn scraps waiting for another day. Perhaps because I went to a funeral last week, life seems too short to reknit a mitten four times.  Even though the daffodils are drooping after April cold and snow, the rhubarb is up. I have a baby sweater that needs buttons, and a lovely garter stitch shawl on the needles.  Forward into Spring!

Butterflies and Robins in the Winter

Two days ago we had heavy snowfall and I am grateful for the moisture.  I love the peace of January but by March I'm ready for warmth and color. Today, the sky is blue and a stiff March wind is blowing.  I think it is a Spring chinook that will help melt seven inches of snow. Whenever I feel winter weary, I think of my great grandmothers and how relieved they must have been when the year turned toward Spring.

Right before this last snowfall, I spotted crocus and daffodils coming up in my yard. This group of robins, huddled in the neighbor's apple tree, makes me hopeful. Perhaps best of all,  I made some yarn butterflies for a baby sweater.  My daughter and her husband are expecting their second child in August.  Butterflies and robins in February, wind and snow in March, and a new grandchild in August are sure signs of a changing season.