String Theories

Oh, relax, this has nothing to do with math.

I've been crocheting for many years, although I got obsessive about it only a few years ago. Still, there continue to be new things to learn. This pattern, in a book of afghan's called Vanna's Afghans All Through The House, was my first experience with the afghan stitch, also known as Tunisian crochet. Yes, Vanna. Yes, her. FYI, she's an avid crocheter, has put out a few pattern books, and even has her own line of yarn. I haven't checked the etymology, but I'm presuming (rightly or wrongly) some kind of association with Tunisia (the stitch, not Vanna), probably in the same way that the word afghan has anything to do with Afghanistan, which is to say only vaguely if at all. But I digress. Go read this earlier post if you are curious.

And now I'm learning something again. This photo shows the first few rows of a new sweater I'm working on which uses a stitch called broomstick or peacock lace. You should be able to click on the photo to get a better idea. In case you are curious. Just saying. The effect does look a lot like bristles on an upside down broom, or the "eye" on the end of a peacock feather. This is the first time I've worked with this stitch, and like the Tunisian crochet, it combines elements of both crochet and knitting. Working backwards along the chain, you use a crochet hook to pull up loops of yarn which are cast onto a fat knitting needle as you go. (In case you are wondering, it's a #19, 15mm wooden needle.)
The broomstick effect is created after you slide the needle out from the loops (this required a great leap of faith for me) and then gather clusters of loops with a series of double crochets. I have no idea what might have inspired anyone to do this, who did it first, or when or where. It's like wondering who first considered putting cinnamon and apples together. Or chocolate and peanut butter. How do people come up with this stuff?

Enablers

Well, the economy is in the tank, and everyone is watching their pennies, cutting back where they can, making choices about just what is really necessary in their lives.

Apparently, I've decided that anything which feeds my yarn addiction is a necessity. Thus did I, in recent months, purchase two back issues of Interweave Crochet, a set of bamboo crochet hooks (because I can't afford the rosewood hooks, that's why), and yet more yarn.

The scarf in the photo over there on your right is the result of two of those purchases. The pattern is called La Mer and was designed by Cheryl Means. I spotted a picture of it while browsing patterns and decided that I had to make it. The pattern was printed in the Summer 2008 issue of Interweave Crochet so, of course, I had to buy the back issue to get the pattern. Then I had to find just the right yarn to show off the pattern and came home from a trip to my local yarn store with a few skeins of Jojoland™ Melody Superwash. And since the pattern indicated a beaded fringe, I made a stop the next day at Michaels for some gorgeous glass beads to go with the yarn. But ultimately it was worth it, I think, because I love the final product. It's going to be a belated birthday gift for my niece.

I had also done another scarf, pictured on the left, with some left over Simply Shetland Silk & Lambswool. No extra cost there, but two scarves in a row left me feeling a little itchy for a new challenge.

I've had this pattern for a sweater using the broomstick stitch which I got about a year ago - uh, the pattern, not the stitch. But I had not done this stitch before and the pattern emphasized that a really well draping yarn was required to get the look of the garment just right so I've been holding off on it. I think it's time. I found the right yarn, but it didn't come cheap. However, as the owner of my local yarn store says "yarn doesn't go bad"; and if the sweater is a bust, I figure I can always make another, really, REALLY nice scarf ... or three or four.

Okay, clearly I have a yarn addiction. But it's keeping me out of pool halls and away from the evils of drink. Sort of.

In the Garden

I've been busy outside the last few weekends. There's still a lot I want to do, and I'll likely be putting in annuals and maybe a few new perennials for several weeks to come. It's an ongoing process every years. But here's a peak at what I've been up to so far this spring (spring? It's like 90 degress F out there today!)

For starters, I took out the old timbers that used to surround my small veggie patch. While some were still not too bad, others were badly rotted. Well, they were there when I moved into the house 15 years ago (15? where did the time go?) In their place I installed a composite "timber" system. Note that both timber and system are not to be taken seriously. However, the composite stuff is light weight enough for me to handle myself and won't rot on me possibly ever.





And the system involves parts! Spikes and corner joints and end cap thingies, oh my!








This is the set up I was thinking of initially, but I soon realized that the awkward angles were going to present maintenance issues. I've got spare "timbers" and eventually I'll run it longer alongside the fence. But for now I've settled on this.






But probably you'd like to see something prettier now. After all, I did use the word garden:


The blooming stuff are pansies and snapdragons, annuals which I put it for their instand impact. Oh, and some kind of spiky blue thing which I forget the name of. I put in some perennials last year, but those are just green leafy things for now.


And this is the bleeding heart I put in last year which more than just green and leafy. It's quite healthy and blooming like crazy.

And these are violas, as are those tiny green dots sprinkled across the rest of the bed. I started with one lone plant about 10-12 years ago, but it seeded like crazy, with each generation begatting some more. I don't really mind as the effect is so pretty. They won't be flowering for much longer though. Most of the seedlings will get rooted up to make way for more plants, and some of the bigger plants I'll attempt to transplant to that back corner. We'll see how that goes.


I liked the look of this annual vine. We'll see how it holds up, but it does add a nice splash of color. And finally, we have the lilac bush. I've been very excited at how well this has done. I just planted last year so I wasn't expecting a whole lot just yet. And now it's loaded with flowers and has quite a bit more height as well. I need to read up on trimming and training so I can get it to fill in a bit more, but I'm going to go very slowly on that so as not to ruin what appears to be a good thing.

And that completes the tour of my back yard. Y'all come back now, ya hear?

For the Birds

If you have wandered over here because you can't figure out where the CherryBombs have got to, things are in disarray because we seem to have sprung a leak over there, or maybe stopped up the plumbing or something. We don't really know what it is we did. We were rather hard on the old place, what with the pole swinging, guacamole stains and lurkers in the attic. And while our landlord, Bryan, has been quite patient with us, we are considering *gulp* venturing out on our very own, with like a mortgage and everything. Hey, the bail fund is flush at the moment. Anyway, please wander over to our Potential New Home and see what you think.

If you find, when you're there, that your comments aren't popping up immediately, it's because we've left BCB in charge and she gets distracted easily. But be patient and eventually she'll be back to let you in. Unless she doesn't recognize you or thinks you might be a member of the Chipper Spam Monkey band. It's not that she's discriminating, she just likes having that kind of power.

In the meantime, I appear to be the way station for wandering CBs and lurkers so I'll give you something else to look at for now.

Here's an updated picture of my lilac bush which you can see is greening and budding up nicely. Actually, it's even leafier now than when I took this picture, but right now it's raining outside so you'll have to make do with this.

And here we have a picture of Mrs. Mourning Dove in her new place. At least I think that's Mrs. I think she's got eggs now. Stay tuned for updates.

And in other news, here's a picture of me standing in front of this big White House in DC. And I didn't even have to climb the fence or anything, even though they are quite strict about tresspassing there considering the tentants are pretty new to the neighborhood.

Any Port in a Storm

GP says she sent and email to Bryan and I did as well. As far as I can figure out, it is something that would have to be fixed by the host. As Bryan may well have other (not actually better, but possibly other) things going on, we may need temporary digs for a bit, and here's as good a place to hang out as any. Or we could play musical blogs and take turns or whatever.

Got Buds

My lilac bush is budding! And my daffodils are standing tall, if not yet blooming. Also, I spotted Mr. and Mrs. Mourning Dove while I was out in the yard last weekend, and I do believe they are planning to start a family.

I love these first signs of spring. Although winter is relatively mild in my area, the dreary sameness of the landscape starts to grate on my nerves after a while and I find myself wondering if green grass and leaves on trees is a thing of the past, a story old-timers will sit around boring kids with. "When I was your age, we had real seasons. And there were four of them. Every single year. It was interesting. Not like it is today with all this sameness day after day. You young'ns don't even know what real seasons are like!" So at the first sign that life is, indeed, returning to my corner of the planet, I'm out there buying mulch and prepping the flower beds.

Saturday, while the ground was still soft from recent rains and the sun could get through the bare tree branches, I raked the front yard and put down some grass seed. My yard is patchy yet, but the grass I seeded last year made it through the winter and even stayed reasonably green. I figure if I do this twice a year for a while, I'm going to have a gorgeous yard in a decade or so. Even patchy, it looks better than the neighbors', ha!

Sunday was all about the back yard, and that's when I spotted the lilac buds. And the daffodil stalks; mine bloom a little later than the neighbor's, for some reason. And the doves. The whole time I was clearing out the flower bed, Mrs. Dove was eye-balling me from her perch on the edge of a lawn chair. The chair is stored under the raised deck, hanging from some hooks, and is the same place she made her nest last year so seeing her there again was pretty ... well, ominous, actually. There's no friction on the surface of that chair and last year the nest went tumbling in the first big storm. I'm going to keep an eye on it, and if she is really going to build there again (I did warn her) I'm going to have to jury rig something to make sure it stays in place.

My kingdom is very small, but it's all mine and I try to rule wisely.

Audible Affection

You know, I almost titled this post "I *heart* Audible" and then I remembered that saccarine makes me queasy. I am, however, really fond of Audible.com.

I love books and I love crochet. With audio books, I can have the best of both worlds. Audio books also provide distraction from mind numbing but necessary chores. When the whole iPod rage first started, I couldn't figure out what the big deal was. I mean, I like music but I don't feel the compulsion to be plugged in 24/7. Then I discovered that audible content wasn't just about music. It was possible to download books, too! Now, I've been a fan of audio books for a long time and I've cheered on the revolution that took what was basically an assist for the deaf and turned into an assett for the average person. What used to be a small shelf in the bookstore has become a staple of publication. All the latest and greatest bestsellers come out in audio format. Taking it another step and allowing people to purchase downloadable content is, well, comparable to the invention of the wheel. Sure, you could technically move things from one place to the other before ... but now it's really portable.

So, I like MP3 and other format players, and I like audiobooks, and it follows that I like vendors who bring them together. My favorite? Audible.com. The array of content available on their site boggles the mind. But their customer service is the real reason I stick with them.

I got this email the other day which was a promotional deal. Anyone can purchase audio content from Audible.com, but members get special offers and certain perks. I dont' want to bore you with the details; suffice it to say that I contacted Audible.com because I thought something about the email was confusing. I wasn't complaining, my intent was to point out an issue that they might want to fix in the future. For my efforts I was rewarded with the equivalent of a $25 coupon to my account.

Now that's a company that wants to keep their customers happy. Is there any question why I'm so loyal to them?