Making Progress

Winter has been avoiding us so far, and this is great news for the firewood supply, and even for the collection of solar energy. The solar pump runs every time the sun is out, and now with the lengthening days the sun is UP more, which may mean even more solar gain. I am knocking on wood as I write this, of course, because there's weather coming - tomorrow sounds like a right mess, with snow, sleet, freezing rain and then rain at the end.  When the weather office says "snow at times heavy" it's a sign to batten down the hatches. To say nothing of storing up some water in case of power outages.

    It's all been great for creative time, however. I finished the POW vest, and it should arrive in Toronto tomorrow. I've fallen hard for the Yarn Harlot's "Cloisonee" mittens, and have made two pairs so far, one for Emily, also winging its way to TO, and one for Katie, whose birthday is next week. I am just finishing a hat to match, and I lined the brim with some lovely Belfast Mini Mills yarn in what I believe may be alpaca and angora. Katie likes her fibres soft, and that's what this is!
I'm trying out a pair of Cloisonee in Briggs & Little yarns, but it looks like they will be rather big and a bit scratchy too. They look gorgeous, though. Black and three bright colours.

I've been working with the blankets from MacAuslands to make some cushion covers. I discovered that my blanket stitch leaves a bit to be desired. Quite sloppy! I must practice. 
    In gardening news, I've been reading Anna Pavord, a great book called "The Curious Gardener", which is a month-by month guide to doing all sorts of things in the garden, as well as a selection of her gardening essays from her columns in the Independent. There are great stories of visits to gardens, including (curiously) two which appear in Monty Don's Around the World in 80 Gardens, which I have just finished watching. (I must say that I truly enjoyed the episode on the gardens of China the most, and his visit to the Yellow Mountains was a revelation. But the last two episodes, particularly the last one in Indochina, where Don was so disappointed that there were no gardens such as he likes or was searching for, was odd; and a rather inconclusive note with which to end the series) I shall keep my eye out for other books by Pavord. She is a great writer. As we don't live in England, a lot of her advice isn't seasonally appropriate for here, but it's very interesting, and welcome. I've planted seeds - cat grass! and some of Veseys Microgreens. They are already up and I must think of a use for some of them today. Speaking of Veseys, their Bulbs catalogure arrived this week, and I fell for the $50 off offer and ordered three hydrangeas and three bush cherries. I must look up the latter - developed in Saskatchewan,  so hardy and productive, but I want to know how to prune them. Can they be cordoned?

Also on the creativity front, I have been doing a bit of mosaic work as well - we bought a 24-inch round arborite-topped table at the Habitat for Humanity Re-store, for $10, and I have made a glass-marble design for the top of it. I started by painting the brown arborite white, so the dark wouldn't show through and spoil the colours of the glass, and then drew out the design on paper. Then I laid out the glass marbles on it. I used sticky-back shelf paper to pick up the design, and then plopped it down on the table, which I had spread with tile adhesive.

It wasn't as simple as all that, as some of the marbles shifted, but it was easily set to rights, and I think it was much easier than working marble - by - marble in the wet adhesive. It took a morning to lay out the marbles on the paper, but I think you'd have to do that anyway, and being able to pick them up with the shelf paper was like magic.  I bought dark grout to make the marbles seem stained-glass like, but I haven't decided what to do with the sides of the table yet - I like it as is, but I don't think the white paint over the arborite will stand up to the weather - the table is meant for the deck. I think I'll have to do the sides as well, and I must do that before I can grout. (It was so much fun that I had another look around the Re-store for more tables. None so far.)

Deep, deeper, deepest

    Brrr, it is COLD! We've had just two days of -16 degrees, complete with WNW winds around 40 k. making for just above -30 with wind chill. It's hard to get the house up to temp. (around 20 is nice) in the morning when we get up and in the evening when we get home. This is where being a knitter really pays. Throw on another sweater, and another couple of logs into the furnace! Our wood is quite big this year, and rather more white birch than we usually see, which isn't good. It doesn't have the heating capacity of beech or maple. The one advantage: it is self-kindling!
    We've been to Halifax, and I made another visit to LK Yarns while there. I've decided to make up a few sets of cowl (or scarf) plus fingerless gloves (I hate doing fingers, especially finishing them) for next Christmas, so I've been trolling my stash to find appropriate yarns. I found a fingering-weight alpaca in bright red, which I bought at The Loop a while ago, and made a Yarn Harlot Pretty Thing with Fishtail wristwarmers to go with. The Pretty Thing was easy, and I THOUGHT the wristwarmers were as well, but the second ended up shorter than the first, so it is on the frog-and-reknit list. No big deal. Then I bought three skeins of Balmoral, a wool-alpaca-silk DK, and made an Eleanor cowl and a pair of mitts with one of the motifs on the back of the hand. They are quite short, so I'm not sure how much I like them.
   Anyway, I was on the hunt for more fingering-weight yarns for cowls at LK Yarns. I am always so overwhelmed by choice when I'm there (compared to Owl's Hollow) that I am not sure I make good selections. However, I got some Cascade Yarns solid royal blue, a skein of Estelle Arequipa in oranges, Classic Elite Alpaca Sox in burgundy, and a skein of Fiddlestix Knitting silk in a light purple. It is halfway or more to being another Pretty Thing. I fell for a mystery skein of turquoise merino-and-angora laceweight too - 1000 metres! Whatever will that become, I wonder.
Then an couple of days later an order I'd made early in January to Knit Picks arrived. Mostly lace weight (2 skeins each colour, or 880 metres) in a medium gray, burgundy, bright red and basalt - which is a greyish-purplish. They are all heather colours. And two skeins of sockweight - in a lovely brown mix called "Kindling" and a blue mix. They are tonal colours so no mad stripes or pooling to contend with. Now, if only I didn't have to work, and could just cozy up at home and knit to my heart's content!
   I've been signed up for the 11 shawls in 2011 - even though I didn't get the 10 in 2010 finished - I just had seven completed. However, seven is pretty good! I must try to do more of the really small ones - just shoulder-size or scarf-like...Then I should be able to complete.

In The Bleak Midwinter

We have had another snowfall - actually with plenty of warnings, so we were all hopeful that we would have a Snow Day today - however, the wind promised did not materialize, so we just bravely swept and shovelled and went in to work. Rats! I have knitting I could be busy with right now!
The snow was sticky (it was barely minus 1 degree at the worst) so it stuck to the tiniest of branches. It has changed to wet snow/rain now, so most of the beauty is dribbling away.
I am getting right to work on next winter's Christmas presents, so I have a beautiful bright red fingering-weight alpaca which I'm almost finished making into a cowl and matching fingerless gloves. They are lacy and fine, which looks super with the red. I really should have photographed it in the snow, to make it look properly festive. Perhaps I will when all 3 pieces are done. I'm at work on the final glove now.
The cowl is The Yarn Harlot's "Pretty Thing" which I bought and downloaded from Ravelry. I really appreciate the convenience of this online shopping lark! And I also liked that I got to keep this pattern in my downloads - I bought a pattern from Fibre Trends before Christmas and you only get to see it - and print it - once before it disappears. I must put it in a page protector before it gets destroyed (I tend to be pretty hard on my patterns, lugging them about and stuffing them into various bags, etc.) But "Pretty Thing" is mine forever! And it truly is pretty. I may even use my precious skein of Qviuk to make one - for me!
Now that I've decided to make cowl+gloves sets, I'm looking at my stash and realizing that I really don't have much in the gorgeous hand-dyed fingering weight - most of my sock yarn is boring plain colours. However, a trip to Halifax next week may remedy this.