Happy New Year!

Well, not yet, but it's close enough and I figure most of you won't read this until tomorrow anyway so--Happy New Year!

I was going to fold a basket of clean laundry today but instead I sorted through my oldest watercolors, picked out a mittful, cut them to the correct size, ran them through the embosser, and glued them onto cards. The cards are still nestled under a couple of thick books weighing them down while the glue dries so all I've got to show you is this mess of watercolor cuts.

The birds were slow to arrive this morning and one of the first was this Nuthatch that landed on the round feeder and spent a few seconds, maybe barely a minute, poking around looking for a sunflower seed. Right after I took this it took off. Shortly after that a Red-bellied Woodpecker landed for a nanosecond, too short a time for a picture.

The fat squirrels had a field day on the various suets and the cob corn. This one was happily clinging to the crook with its hind feet and picking off one kernel at a time. Three or four of them were tag-teaming the suet nuggets feeder for quite a bit of the afternoon until I chased them all away by going out to re-wire tie the Slinkys to the crooks. The squirrels had managed to pull down five of the six Slinkys or break the wire tie that held them. I don't have a lot of confidence that they'll stay in place but I had to try.

The next video in From Beginner to Full Sketchbook was drawing everyday objects. We started out with a single line drawing, which means you don't pick the pen up as you draw. It's all one line. She had a clementine with leaves on it but after showing it for a few seconds all the video showed was her drawing so I grabbed a fake plant and drew that. It's not bad.

Then she drew a basket of clementines, again not showing it so the students could see it too, so I drew the plant again, followed by a pen/pencil holder that's on the table, and a squeezed tube of paint. These aren't bad either. I'm dreading the next lesson. It's doodling people. Yikes. I suck at drawing people.

After Jeopardy! I cued up an old Finding Your Roots on PBS Passport and watched/listened to that while knitting more rounds on the cuff of Alpaca Mitten #3. I figure I'll add five more rounds to make it a little longer than the cuff of the last pair before changing to the larger needles and starting the hand and thumb gusset. P.S. I did not know the Final Jeopardy today. Didn't have a clue.

There is no way I'll be awake at the turn of the year. I figure it'll be 2025 when I wake up whether I'm awake at midnight or not so why stay up. I have to fold the laundry tomorrow; I'm wearing my last pair of clean, not handknit socks.

--Barbara