Spring Broken

Day 6
In which I rip on spring and on spring - not so much.

Slayer bells ring, are you listening?
I had a thought for those of you who are still looking for something to knit for the
Buffy Kal.
Amy mentioned that there is a line from one of the episodes of Buffy of wearing cheese, or more like, "I wear the cheese, the cheese doesn't wear me." This brought to mind a sweater I saw in a back issue of Knitters Magazine Fall 2002 called Swiss Cheese. It also has a pattern for socks. Now I don't know if you can still get this issue, however if you can't, I think you could easily substitute a simple pullover sweater pattern and add the holes by randomly casting off a couple of stitches and then casting them on over the hole again in the next row, and for smaller holes yo/ K2 tog. Just a thought.




In the lane snow is glistening.

A beautiful sight? We're happy tonight? Walking in a winter (?) hinterland.


I give you the bridal wreath spirea, white with snow that borders our yard to the north.



How it was.



How it should be.

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Spring is sprung the grass is ris, I wonder where the flowers is?


This is the picture I took of my boulevard garden on April 4th before going to see the Yarn Harlot in St. Paul.


My boulevard garden a week later.


My boulevard garden week three.

And week four.

Berma Shave

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Our Spring Break, Minnesota Weather Breakdown April 2007
Saturday - Day 1 - Rain
Sunday - Day 2 - Rain
Monday - Day 3 - Overcast
Tuesday - Day 4 - Rain then Snow
Wednesday - Day 5 - Cold & Windy
Thursday - Day 6 - Sun but still cold.
Friday - Day 7 - Freezing
Saturday - Day 8 - Still Cold with even colder Wind chill.
Sunday - Day 9 - Sunny but still cold

End Spring Break.

So, not so much love from the Minnesota weather this spring break. So in an effort to comfort ourselves we rounded up some green things around us to cheer us up and bring a little warmth to our chilled hearts.

A custom made letter tile bag for my Scrabble game sewn and embroidered by my mother. She made and gave one to each of her girls last Christmas.
















The hem of the green Jo Sharp sweater, Stellar, that I am knitting for me sister Lynn, eventually.













If you have a child in grade school then you already know that this is a green Tamagachi, which brings my youngest daughter hours of distraction and joy.















This, now green, heirloom headboard that came to us from the farm of my husband's grandfather, Grampa MacDonald. Oh, yes, it's true Ol' MacDonald had a farm.
The headboard is currently being used by my daughter Ani, so if you ever wondered where my daughter lays her head each night, there you go.








A 2cool4school twisted stitch knit cap. I came across this Meg Swansen twisted stitch cap design a couple of years ago and on a whim decided to knit one.

I gave it to Ani because she liked it, she doesn't wear it because, like me, she doesn't really wear knit caps.
Katie found it the other day and came into my room and asked me if she could wear it, I said "sure."

"Is it warm enough to wear it outside?"
"It's wool, it's warm enough."
So she left the room to get her winter gear on to make our daily trek together to the bus stop. She came back into the room wearing her usually gear and her old pink fleece hat that she usually wears.

"I thought you wanted to wear the green hat."
"Oh, yeah"

She leaves and comes back one more time, again without the green hat.

"Aren't you going to wear the green hat?"

"It doesn't fit under my hat, besides I'm not allowed to wear caps in school."

Confused I replied, " You don't need to wear both caps, you can only wear the green one."

"Well" she replied trying to say this so as not to hurt my feelings, "Mom, I really like the cap, it's really cool and everything, but all my friends and classmates don't wear caps like this, they wear caps like these, made of fleece and store bought, and although I know the green cap that you knit is a better cap, I really need to fit in with my friends right now." " I'll just wear it when I'm home."
"I see, so, let me get this right, what you're saying is, the green cap is, " too cool for school"
True story, people, I couldn't have made that up if I tried, I was floored.

The Lizard Ridge Square that I knit in Noro greens and blue and sent to Stephania for her Afghan 4 Afghans blanket that she is making.















And one final picture. A rather green picture of my daughter Ani, playing her Beethoven Romance solo with the High School orchestra at the Concerto Concert back in March.
For reasons that even she doesn't even know why, Ani knew she wanted to play violin when she was in second grade and could hardly wait until fourth grade when she could start playing. Apparently, violin was the instument for her and she has continues to develop her playing skills and intends to continue her music studies into college next fall.
I have heard it from other parents that they were so glad that their child didn't take up the violin, because they didn't think they could stand listening to the high and screachy notes that the violin can produce when first learning the instruments. I myself have never felt that way about her playing even from early on, I didn't mind her practicing of her instrument. (If it did, I don't recall ever having it bother me.) I don't think I could be prouder or happier for Ani and her success playing the violin.
Katie wants to play an instrument next fall. She wants to play violin like her sister, which would be fine, but Ani and I are trying to talk her into trying the cello instead. For a couple of reasons, 1. Ani and I love the sound of a cello, and 2. I want to discourge a rivalry between Katie and Ani, and spare Kate from constantly being compared to her older sister in her violin playing, and 3. because there is a lot of music that is written for violin and cello that they could play together when they are older. If we can't convince her to try cello, then she said she would like to play viola, which also has a very beautiful sound.



Ooooh, look there the flowers is!
Hobbes, you're not thinking about eating Ani's flowers are you?

Who? Me?

What?

I wasn't going to eat them, I just wanted to taste them a little.


If you have any compassion or even the slightest care at all for me or my family please refrain from telling us how warm the weather was at the super, fabulous, exotic location that you and your family went to on your spring break.

The hold on our sanity is rather tenuous right now and I would hate for you to have to bear the burden of knowing that it was all your talk of sunny skies and warm weather that finally snapped the fine and frayed thread is our family's sanity which is currently perilously dangling over the very edge of reason. Seriously, I'm only thinking of you, talk of sand, sun and surf could very well send us careening over that edge and God only knows what could happen, all hell could break loose.
( Hell, hmm, let's think about that for a moment, well, at least it's said to be warm.... No, best not to think about it.)

2 Opinions:

Anonymous said...

No fabulous spring break stories from me. I was here in town too. Although we did go see Blades of Glory, which was a hoot.

Chris said...

Hey, I live in the same metro area you do, so no weather torture from me! Heh, Hobbes is obviously up to no good!