Looking For Spring

So there I was, standing with another woman outside the grocery store in the cold and damp, looking longingly at a small selection of bedding plants, a few showing blooms. So starved for color, we contemplated if it was too early to buy and plant flowers yet. There were snapdragons and pansies . . .

I was there for groceries and decided to think it over, going back the next day to pick up 4 pony packs: the pansies and the snapdragons, dianthus since the ones that have wintered over year after year are showing no sign of life, and one simply labeled "mixed". I set them on top of pots on the deck, not ready yet to do the transfer but wanting to enjoy that bit of color that I can see from the sofa. Wouldn't you know, that night we suddenly dipped below freezing, the next few nights as well, but on the deck, these new plants didn't seem to mind.

Trees are on the cusp of blooming, but not enough warmth for them to "burst" into bloom. The chokecherry tree outside my place is slowly unfurling its delicate flowers as are other trees close by. Besides the colder weather, there have been bursts of heavy rain and some sleet. Springlike but not how we tend to envision spring. Somehow seemed appropriate though to move ahead with the rails baby quilt and get all the various lengths of strips cut from the "rain drops" background fabric. My graph paper chart worked perfectly as reference, my figuring correct, assuring I got the border strips cut with the raindrops going the right directions. I've pinned them along with sashing strips to the design wall for safe keeping.

Here are the 96 strips to go into the rail blocks. Very handy that all the cutting for this quilt is 2 inch wide strips cut to various lengths. Easy on the brain. Even so, it has been long enough since I made my calculations and notes on printouts that refreshing my memory and being sure I was getting the numbers right took a little time.

And just when I thought I had the pink fabrics figured out, this happened. I moved them from the ironing board to the work table, placed a stack of strips over them and began to question if they really did work. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the layer of purple fabrics exposed in the wire cube storage rack and pulled them out. My camera struggles with purple so to adjust settings in Paint Shop Pro to show these fabrics as purple and not blue, it turned the pinks underneath a little orange so ignore that. Focus on the fact that I am now considering purple instead of pink (these pinks and purples do NOT go together) along with some blue, and wondering if I can sneak in a little of that print fabric, all that is left of a fabric that has shown up in the other quilts I've made for the baby's siblings. Decisions, decisions! I think I'll just have to cut a few strips of various fabrics to mock up a block, see how they really look with that background fabric. Sometimes you really can't tell how fabrics work together unless they are cut to size.

I've been finding solace in my knitting as I run into issues elsewhere, making good progress on the sweater and just about have the pattern memorized. But here I am, at the end of the first ball of yarn and only halfway to the armhole decreases. In theory, when I figured the total number of yards needed for this pattern, the 6 skeins I had was more than enough. Now it looks like I only have enough for the body of the sweater, no sleeves. I bought all that was on display and doubt they have gotten more in, although I will stop by and check. But if not. . . I do have 8 skeins of this yarn in a different color and could start over, but oh do I hate undoing what I've already done. A part of me wants to continue and be happy if it turns into a sweater vest. At least then I would know exactly how short I am on yarn. Another part of me says, who are you kidding? Find another pattern for this yarn. As the owner of the local yarn shop said, as I mulled over if I could get away with a single skein of yarn for a pair of knee high socks, how willing are you to play yarn chicken? On a project with this much investment of time, I shouldn't be willing at all. Oh please, be more yarn waiting for me when I go back to the shop where I bought it. Hope springs eternal . . .