Knitting and Spring

Just needs a loop and a button closure for the front and it will be finished. This pattern was a fun one that I'll definitely be making again. The only change I would made would be to cast off 4 stitches under the arm, before putting the sleeve stitches on 'hold' while completing the rest of the body. That way, when I return to complete the sleeves, the stitches under the arm won't have stretched and I can simply pick up the 4 stitches from the cast offs and continue on. Other than that, this knit was a complete pleasure. The pattern doesn't call for quite as deep a 'V' in the neckline, but somehow I'd missed the 'At the same time' ... and continued increasing at the front, when I should have stopped already. I decided to carry on and it turned out fine. The only thing is that the fronts now overlap slightly, instead of simply meeting, but considering little 'pot bellies', I would think that could be an advantage!

I made another Foliage hat, but in the Pink Frost shade of Malabrigo and gifted it prior to taking a picture. Also made the Beaufort hat shown here, in the same exact shade of cream (I used Rowan All Season's Cotton) but it too was gifted to a very worthy recipient.

Both of these hats went to a young woman named Megan. About 8 weeks ago, her boyfriend and his friends were on their way to the airport for a trip to Hawaii. They were run off the road by a man suffering from 'road-rage'. The boys got out of the vehicle and were struggling to get it back on the road, when the guy turned around and deliberately ran his truck over Megan's boyfriend, Silas, killing him. It was all over the news, so you may have already heard about it.

Four weeks later, Megan was in the US shopping for the day (she lives right near the border) and suddenly complained of headaches, nausea and then fell unconscious to the floor. Turns out she was suffering from an aneurism in her brain. She was flown back to Vancouver where a specialist had to do emergency brain surgery. She's doing ok now, but we nearly lost her 3 times and she's got a long haul of physio ahead of her, to get her arms, legs and brain functioning normally. So, not only is she grieving the loss of her boyfriend, now she has all these health issues to deal with.

I work with Megan's aunt, and asked her if she might need some hats to keep her head warm until her hair grows back, so that's where the hats went. Please keep Megan and her family in your prayers!


Off to the frog-pond with my blue 'Silver Belle'! I had both sleeves and fronts done and after all that work realized that while I was enjoying the cables (process), I could not see myself actually wearing the finished item. From all the photos I've been seeing, it seems to only flatter those with very tiny bodies, which doesn't apply to me, and I have no intention of going to all that work only to end up looking like a Beluga!

Here's our smiley boy taking a tour of the back garden with Grandpa. Pretty much everything is up, if not already blooming, and we actually had a bit of sunshine last week. Normally, it would have been hot for a month already, but it's still very much like early Spring.

This is pretty much how he looks, all day long, unless he's hungry ... He goes from happy to crabby in about 3 seconds flat!

He loves Brinkley, who gives him lots of kisses, particularly if the baby has just finished eating a cookie. Oh well, saves me getting out a face cloth! :)

He's coming to stay at our house from the 14th-22 while his parents are away in the Dominican Republic ... don't plan on seeing any new blog updates during that time!

We have a 40 year old flowering ornamental cherry tree in our front yard. It's probably 30 ft or more, wide and when it's in full bloom, it's spectacular! All the lookie-loos are standing in our driveway, or driving past slowly to see it. Amazing!