Flowers and Afghans, Oh My

Hello again! Poking my head back into the blogging world for a quick(?) ramble.

We are mostly settled in our new place.  There was a terrible lot of rain over a few days and while the basement didn't flood, it certainly oozed.  Last weekend my husband and I ripped out the drywall in one room to see just what the extent of damage was -- luckily, not too bad!  And we got the pleasant surprise that the wiring down there is actually grounded, but the outlets had not been updated.  That is an easy fix; I am comfortable swapping outlets and it means less than half the house will need updated.  We will tear out one more wall, and probably a closet, to see if there are any more suspicious spots and to remove moldy drywall.  Renovations are kind of fun but I am so tired of being surrounded by boxes that had to be hastily moved and spread out to dry.

I have no vegetable garden this year, and the flowers already planted have been mostly disappointing.  I was hopeful the iris blossoms would be lovely... they were black.  A washed-out deep purple black.  Yuck.  They will be finding new homes with people who can appreciate them.  The daylilies turned out to be yellow and sort of scraggly due to lack of light.  No daffodils. This will be remedied next year.  I cannot live in a world without daffodils.  There are also clumps of what I suspect are going to be "naked ladies" (surprise lilies, or whatever you know those goofy things as).  The leaves have died back and I expect the flowers to pop out of the ground overnight within the next month or so.

almost worth it

 
We also have a small "water feature" that has some beautiful water lily blossoms.  I really love the flowers but I do not want to take care of a water garden, nor invite mosquitoes to take care of it for me! It is also in pretty rough shape; the liner is torn in places so it's not as full of water as it should be and there are weeds everywhere around it.

pink "evening" primroses

These guys are taking over the backyard.  I rather like them but they can be very voracious spreaders. They are native wildflowers here and I am contemplating getting them started in the ditch in front of the house. There they can spread to their little blossomy heart's content and I won't have to mow that (very difficult) area.

Then the lone rose bush bloomed.  It was in sad shape when we moved in.  I gave it some fertilizer and a haircut and it had a few blooms.  At first I thought it was going to be yellow, which was okay with me.  Then they blushed!  I think these are actually Peace roses (or possibly Garden Party) and I am gonna try my hardest to spread them all over the flower gardens as they are truly beautiful (even after a rough life) and have a wonderful aroma.

Corelle salt shaker vase

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Well, enough about my gardening woes.  I have been a bit slow on the crafting front.  I have an item on the knitting needles, but no picture of it, and it's, like, way over there, far too far for me to move and snap one.  Instead, here is a crocheted small baby afghan for a family member who is expecting their first.  The father is a Dallas Cowboy's fan so this was a fairly easy choice to make.  The star afghan is quite popular on ravelry and I scoured the projects page(s) for notes and ideas for color placement.

little cowboy afghan

  Technical Details

• "Little Cowboy Afghan" pattern by Beth Parsons, found here on ravelry (free).
• G hook
• Yarn: Caron Simply Soft, dark country blue, grey heather, and white.
• Started March 17, 2017; finished June 14, 2017; unknown hours.

I have no idea how big or small a baby blanket should be!  A friend suggested I wrap up my largest cat and then make it a bit bigger, so that is what I did, to much amusement of my husband and much confusion of my cat.  It wound up being 39" from point to point, unblocked.  I suppose this is a little small.  Babies are a little small too, right?

a very confused purrito

It's done in (US) double crochet with a crab stitched edge for a bit extra strength.  I would love to make another one of these in rainbow colors, or all blues, or a Mario Star, just for us.  I was happy to make this one as a gift, but the colors are very drab for me to work on for long stretches of time.  It's not entirely mindless because it required counting or the points would spiral.

The yarn itself was nice to work with too, so very soft, until the second skein of blue.  What a yarn barf mess that was!  I don't mind untangling yarn but that was the closest I've ever come to snipping off the offensive part.  Yeesh.

Still no cross-stitch, though while I was crocheting the blanket, I was sitting next to the bag containing my few WIPs.  It was whispering to me.  :)  When projects start talking to you, that's a good sign, right?