Month: February 2010

Saturday fun

Shawn and Sanna came over on Saturday so that Shawn could help Kevin reinforce the floor from the crawlspace for our new fishtank! I was so appreciative – I continue to hope I will never have to go down there. Here they are suiting up with goggles and masks:

Poor little William the cockapoo was sort of freaked by the bright white suits and had to retreat between Sanna’s legs:

(He also wasn’t such a fan of the sound of drilling beneath the floor. Poor puppy.) I definitely feel like I got the best end of the deal – got to hang out with Sanna and hear how their wedding planning is going! Meanwhile, Shawn and Kevin finished up in about three hours – pretty impressive (speed and stamina). Shawn was also remarkably cheerful about the chance to do real physical labour – talk about putting the bright spin on things.

Pembroke vest!

This one’s just been waiting for buttons and a good blocking for the last three and a half weeks.

This was a simple project that turned into a much longer one. I’d originally started knitting the six month size, then realized in December after finishing the back that it would be way too small. So I cast on, in the round this time, for the 12 month size. The yarn (Dream in Color Classy, color is Go Go Grassy, exactly as in the pattern sample) is so smooshy and fun to work with. I was expecting the color to be slightly more saturated, but now that my eyes have adjusted I’m a huge fan of the result. I was also expecting to find buttons in the brown/red/orange/wood family, but ended up going for ones that just blended in – subtler was better. The yarn color is funny – I really debated because I loved the sample but thought that part of what made those photos work was having a baby with that red-gold hair color. I did not think our baby would fall in that type, so would the green work? Ordered it anyway, and lo and behold, his hair is reddish blond. 🙂

Here it is on, front:

And back:

A great knit!

Mountains

The days are getting longer! My drives from work to daycare in the evenings this week have been filled with pink light and gorgeous sunset mountains – it’s been an unbelievably enjoyable sight.

The entrance to the daycare comes about 30 ft after you crest the hill and the Olympics come flooding into view. It’s wonderful. The strictly fastest route home from daycare takes about five minutes and features lovely views of the Cascades. There’s a twelve minute route, though, that winds through a neighborhood up on a hill, and has gorgeous views of the Olympics and Lake Washington and then swings around and you can see the Cascades. It’s just enough longer that it’s not an everyday route, but the views are inspiring.

Really the only thing I miss about our old apartment is those Olympic and lake views – they were incredibly uplifting. It’s a treat to have a daily reason to glimpse them again. We live in such a beautiful place.

Playing along

I have been steadily planting bulbs for the last two years. Last spring, the result was underwhelming – a few listless daffodils. But I got so much enjoyment out of that paltry showing, and planted tons more bulbs last fall. They all starting cropping up about three weeks ago along with the ones from two years ago that never came up, and I can’t tell you how much I’m enjoying the steady growth and anticipation of blooms. These are pictures from Valentine’s day – each of the sixteen photos is a different spot in the yard. (And it turns out that I missed one, because the mini daffodils in the rock wall suddenly bloomed on Tuesday!)

My very favorites right now are the bulbs outside our bedroom window, because they’re the first thing I see in the morning, and the increasingly full garden of tulips along the path to the front door.

Other fun signs of spring:
The elephant ears in the rock wall are blooming pink. This is definitely their most attractive time of year.

The pathetic forsythia (that lives under the pine trees and doesn’t get anywhere close to enough light) is blooming a bit!

Due to the sparseness of the buds, this one is best appreciated from less than a yard away. At least the flowers look pretty next to the red holly berries, although seeing such an early spring flower next to such a Decemberish plant is kind of jarring.