Author: denisemor

Not much to say this week, but just wanted to share a couple snaps of things that are brightening my days.

Heavy rain has been taking a toll on the peonies, but I managed to gather these beauties between downpours.

And also roses- they are trying hard to get their first bloom on, but June-uary weather has got them a little confused. Lady Emma Hamilton is hanging in there, though

And my shoulder chart is working out as far as I can tell….though I’ve still got my “lifelines” in place just in case 🙂

The Layton-ish project is joined at the underarms and starting to grow shoulders!

And I have mapped out how the sleeve and body decreases should be placed in order to most closely approximate the shaping of the Layton pattern.

Once I got that sorted out, I revisited the EZ seamless saddle shoulder instructions, and realized that I’d forgotten about the final step – the short rows at the back of the neck.

The EZ saddle shoulder has you knit short rows a the back of the neck after completing the saddles- eating up half of the saddle stitches. I can’t do that because the stitch detail on the sleeve is supposed to run up the mock-turtleneck collar. So I’ve opted to incorporate short rows earlier in the shoulder shaping to create extra height in the back, effectively tipping the whole upper chest forward and raising the back by about 1.25 inches before I get to working the saddles.

Feeling good about the plan at this point. The math checks out, so here we go!

Yesterday’s storm had us all hunkered down. But today the pasture gang was back in action.

the deep watering was appreciated by this old “came with the place” rose that I transplanted earlier this spring. I’m so pleased that she has survived the move- she’s a rosbust climber and I thought it might be cool to let her ramble up over the sheep/chicken shed

lots of other pretty things budding out as well- Reine de Violettes

And peonies are starting to pop!

Yesterday’s stormy weather also provided me with a fair bit of knitting time.

so now I’m almost at the point where I start working the sleeves together with the body and shaping the shoulders.

I think I have enough yardage to finish, but If not, I’ve got a couple bobbins of singles in reserve waiting to be plied up.

The tricky bit will be finding the best blend of Layton shaping and EZ seamless saddle shoulder construction.

Everything is fabulously green and growing like it’s a time lapse video. I’ve been engaged in an epic battle to free our garden beds and borders from the bondage of buttercups, with some (albeit temporary) success. So in this moment that the lawn is mowed, the beds are (mostly) weeded and the evening sun is casting a beautiful glow on everything, I thought I would share some some shots of the things that are keeping my spirits up in the midst of this pandemic.

The bumblebees are thick on the rhodies right now. They just can’t get enough. I understand the feeling. The spring garden is intoxicating.