Category: Blog

It was glorious in the garden today. Perfect for pruning work, which is progressing nicely-

We were mostly out back today, reining in the big cherry tree and thinning out the smaller cherry as well.

Prunings are piling up fast,

Amazing how much new growth these trees put on each year!

Sheep seemed to enjoy the beautiful weather as well. Here they are cheering us on from the sidelines 🙂

Other pre-garden season garden work involves taking stock of the seed inventory and establishing a seed starting schedule

Here are this years selections, all snug in their seed cozy, awaiting their planting dates

which are recorded in my 2026 garden plan spreadsheet

And in wool work, I’m excited to report that I’ve got my Pluviae vest assembled, and am now working on finishing.

Bottom twisted ribbing first, then armholes, and then…….. a doubleknit buttonband, which is a new thing for me. Was having a little bit of a hard time envisioning how it worked, so I did a little sample in scrap yarn earlier in the week to try out the technique

It is really slick. Results in a nice, substantial fabric that lies flat, and has a nice edge. And the buttonhole thing is so simple that it is kind of genius. I’m really excited now to get to that bit.

Perhaps I’ll have a finished object to share next week!

Also got some knitting done (Pluviae vest, right front) so wins all around! 🙂 Will catch up on photos later.

Take care folks, and have a good week-

Well, I’m back from the 2026 Expo, and it seems like the KoolAid class was a success. Folks seemed to have a lot of fun coloring their wool, and two hours proved adequate to get everyone through the process. We had some particularly adventurous young students who hit upon a really nice deep forest green result by combining Blue Raspberry Lemonade, Grape, and Orange, so sharing that here for future reference

With the Expo in the bag, I can now focus my energies back on the Pluviae vest! I’ve got two out of three pieces compete (back and left front),

and I’m a few inches into the right front. Getting a lot of good practice on my right-handed knit stitch. Not sure it will ever feel entirely natural, but I’m definitely getting more consistent with the repetition!

And, earlier this week, I completed my third stash blanket!

Feels good to have repurposed all that handspun from the ill-fated saddle shoulder sweater of years ago. And I like how the strong colors really pop out from the dark warp.

Alrighty folks. That’s all I’ve got this week. Here’s hoping the groundhog gives us some good news tomorrow! 🙂

More KoolAid sampling, in preparation for the Expo in a couple of weeks.

This morning I cooked up a set of blended mini skeins, trying out all possible combinations of these six flavors: Orange, Grape, Blue Raspberry Lemonade, Pink Lemonade, Cherry, and Lemon-Lime

The plan-

I found that the different flavors actually had different volumes per packet, and the least of them was under a teaspoon. Since I needed 5 portions of each flavor to get my compete set of samples, I decided to use 1/8 teaspoon of each flavor in the recipes.

I used two shades of yarn in all the colors- a bright white, and a medium beige. Here are the little yarn samples tucked in their tiny dye pots

I zapped each one in the microwave for a total of about 1.5 minutes, tho found that if I did it all at once, they would start boiling as the volume of water is pretty small and gets hot very quickly. Then they sat for a bit cooling and fixing the last bit of color in the jar, until the remaining solution was clear or just milky.

And here are the results-

Some of my favorite results were the most unexpected.

Orange and Grape yielded a really nice orangey brown

Grape and Lime- is kind of a rosy taupe on the the white, but almost black on the darker yarn

Orange and Lemon Lime is a beautiful olive on the darker yarn

I might try some more recipes if I have a chance- they are so much more interesting than the bright, hot colors straight out of the packages!

Hope y’all had a good MLK Day.

Knit on, and keep bending the arc of the moral universe towards justice.