Carol Mackie is Mine!

At 8:45 Saturday morning instead of yarn crawling with the rest of my SnB the wee children and I hit the close-out sale at a local nursery. All perennials were $5 and under. And we're talking good stuff -- not just joe smoe hosta and his friends. At one point after scoring another Tree Peony I found some daphnes languishing in a corner and announced their location out loud as I only wanted one. Another freak woman asked what variety and I said "One Carol Mackie, one blah blah blah, but I want the Carol Mackie." She exclaimed "Carol Mackie!" and started walking quickly towards them. I actually ran a few feet to snatch it up exclaiming "The Carol Mackie is Mine." The competition is fierce amongst (cheap) plant snobs.

For my efforts I was rewarded with the following:

• 3 Brunnera -- 2 Hadpsen Cream, 1 Looking Glass


• 2 Tiarella -- 1 Mint Chocolate, 1 Candy Striper


• 2 Pulmonaria -- 1 Cotton Cool, 1 Raspberry Splash


• 1 Magnolia -- Sweet Bay


• 1 Tree Peony -- Hanakisoi


• 1 Daphne -- Carol Mackie


• 1 Heleborus -- Sunshine


• 1 Foxglove -- Apricot


• 1 Sambucus -- Black Lace


• 1 Hisbiscus -- Galaxy


• 1 Campanula -- this is what it looks like, not sure of actual species


• 1 Balloon Flower -- Fuji Blue


• 1 Fern -- Rambler

All that for $76! That's super cheap. I realize they look awful in the pic but they'll be beautiful in the spring. I actually squee'd when I saw the Tree Peony for $5. Only one thing of buyers remorse -- the sambucus. I love it but I didn't realize it needed full sun and I don't have any room for it. I put it in semi-shade and hope it will do ok.

We came home, I strapped the poor babe to my back and we planted all of them. My assistants:


Please note the cute new crocheted bonnet.


I have finished his Joseph coat but I still need to sew in a zipper.

The Changing of the Guard

Heat's on, flannel sheets in place of percale and it's time to retire the sandles. Luckily I got these cool Think clogs for half price at the Birkenstock store. When the snow comes I'll break out the Timberland boots! (Yes, this is my joy with cool weather -- changing shoes. It's a dull life.)



Not too much fall color here, but the Burning Bush is starting to turn and the mum is beautiful.







We arrived in Cleveland Wednesday morning after a very nice Baltimore trip. JCC had a great time gardening with his Mommom and fishing with Pepaw. Little girl took her first steps, cut two more teeth, and became a stair climbing pro. I am currently shopping for baby gates for the bottom of the stairs. Little man never left my side so falling wasn't an issue with him.

I did do some knitting down there -- a Joseph coat for JCC. However I want the purl side to show so I didn't mattress stitch it but instead seamed it with crochet. No problem until I remembered that the downside to crochet is the lack of stretch. This is a problem around the armholes. While ripping it apart I unforunately ripped part of one of the front halves and now need to reknit. I've been told that one of our wonderful SnB attendees is a seaming pro and hopefully she'll have some good ideas for a nice non-wonky stretchy seam for reverse stockinette. (Google is letting me down, if you know any good references let me know.)

Knitting Porn

I'm addicted. I pore over my wrinkled copy of the latest Knit Picks catalogue with every bath and thumb the latest Interweave (either Knits or Crochet) until there are small tears in the pages. We won't even mention my blog reading. If I spent nearly the amount of time crafting as I do reading and dreaming I would make a ton more progress on my things-to-knit list. That said I just finished drooling over the Sapphire Stars Skirt in IC. It's even in cheap yarn (a rarity) but I just don't think I have much stamina lately. Maybe I just need to get over this pesky cold.

Which leads me to the axiom that friends shouldn't let friends knit sick. I currently feel that I'm on a sisyphisian odyssey with my drop-stitch cardigan. Actually I would have been fine if I was just knitting but I decided to work on the finishing bits of my sweater while battling a cold over the last week. 4 tries later at the collar and I freaking hate it. For my applied i-cord up the cardigan center I picked up stitches twice for one side and then managed to apply i-cord to the seam side of the other front. Grr. I did do a lovely job seaming the sides (that's when I figured out I hate the collar) but after pinning the sleeves in place I feel they're too long for my real life world of child rangling. So now it's sitting in time out on my desk.

I'm also trying to figure out what to pack for Baltimore. I always have at least two projects going -- something easy for car knitting or knitting in the presence of children and something for when the children go to sleep. None of my current projects are calling my name -- maybe it's time to get started on this years round of felted slippers (Chris and I wore ours out and there are a few family members who have requested them. People requesting knitted gifts -- bless them!)