WIP Wednesday 199: Cold Molasses

Spiral Tarot

Grey and overcast today, and the only thing that will ease me at the moment is a blitz of the house. I know, that just shows you how bad things are. But before I whizz off, I can tell you I've completed clue 3 in the Wild Flowers MKAL:

There are nupps in there. Although I quickly gave up with needles and used a crochet hook (on the purl row, to drag the yarn through the loops), I have no love for them whatsoever. I should have gone and bought some nice big sparkly beads and used them instead of the nupps, which are kind of lost in this yarn anyway. You live and learn, sometimes more slowly and painfully than one would wish - the crochet hook method in that link looks a breeze.

I've chosen to use the 'large lace' option on the Yalinka Shawl, and now stand at Row 45 out of 96. It still looks tiny:

I thought I had fished out all the dog hair, but the camera tells the truth: I failed. And it proves that I really, really do need to get the vacuum out. While I do that, why not pop over to Tami's Amis and see what else is going on .....

Mystery Monday

Spiral Tarot Deck

Having survived both the torrential downpours and thunderstorms of Saturday, and the scorching heat of Sunday (endured while watching Mini Diva play cricket at a rather picturesque location), today is somewhat humid and overcast - but, ever optimistic, I have washing out on the line to dry anyway. We must hope that it holds off until after Mini Diva's Quad Kids competition (for which I could not find one single solitary updated link) this afternoon.

All the rain and sunshine has been excellent for the gardens this year - the last remaining rose we inherited on our move to this house has finally showed not only it's colors, but that it, too, is scented:

So it is only the scentless red rose on death row. He may be joined later by the incredibly boring columnar cypress ....

The Wild Flower MKAL continues - here is mine at the end of Clue 1:

Yep, looks like a ruffly sparkly nothing, and probably will until it's finished and blocked.

That's your lot for now, just a little update while I remembered; I feel the urge to go raid the kitchen for red velvet cupcakes. 

What diet ?

Random Roundup

Fantastic Menagerie Tarot

I'm feeling a little low today, mainly because the half-term holiday is over - Mini Diva is back at school, Titch is back at work. I have only Destructo Boy to console me, and he is welded to his tablet and 'Clash of Clans'.

Wilhelmina passed her MOT, the kids' cousin D. came to stay, we went to the beach, the kids went swimming a couple of times (different leisure centres), there was a sleepover, they went to the funfair with my friend K. - it was Destructo Boy's first time as he is finally old/tall enough, and it turns out he is as fearless as Mini Diva. There has been cricket and tennis.

It was a week of weatherly contrasts, too. There was this:

And there was this:

Noah, Noah - what is a cubit ??

 But there was no football. The team Destructo Boy played for has fallen apart owing to adults behaving like toddlers - I am told there has been lots of stirring and back-biting, resulting in the main coach flouncing off resigning having cherry-picked the boys from his clique of favored parents. The squad has collapsed: what is left is being run by a couple of fathers who have some innovative ideas for training, but who lack experience and the ability to impose any kind of discipline. 

If I sound annoyed, it is because I am - Titch and I, as openly confessed non-football types, were not amongst the clique, and so Destructo Boy now has no team - we withdrew him from the ruins of the squad as he will have no opportunity to grow his skills.

I think what has amazed me the most is the behavior of the adults involved: parents of kids on the A team sneering at parents of kids on the B team, committee politics, lack of support from the main club - I am hoping that it is a football thing as opposed to a sport thing. On the plus side, now we have Friday evenings and Saturday mornings free to try other things which might actually set a good example for their youth sections.

Sorry about that - I am apparently not as over the whole thing as I thought I was.

So anyway. Our potatoes are planted, along with some peas, beans, sweetcorn, tomatoes, lettuce, strawberries and one solitary pumpkin plant. There had been 6 pepper plants, but snails reduced them to 0 overnight. I am awaiting delivery on 48 lavender plants ( a deal where they were free if you paid for delivery) which will form a nice scented hedgey thing in the front garden. All that I am on the look-out for now is a plum tree for planting in autumn. I need to mention that Titch has done most of the planting, nearly all of the watering, and all of the weeding. Yes, I know !

There has been knitting - I am taking part in a new MKAL by Kitman Figueroa, which should be even more interesting since I got the name muddled in my head, so I've been thinking of it as 'Summer Flowers'. When it should be, 'Wild Flowers'. So I may have chosen a totally inappropriate yarn .... but I am looking at that as part of the mystery: will it work, or not.

And now I must away, today's chore is to order Mini Diva's high school sweater and blouses so I can collect them at her 'Transition Day' in a month's time .... and hope they might still fit come September.