I haven't been knitting much lately so there's no yarny goodness to share, but I did look very closely at the planting bed right outside the patio doors this morning.
The first thing I spied was a raindrop twinkling in the sedum,
looking even closer I found a tiny, tiny, tiny lily of the valley bud barely poking out of the curl of leaves,
then I realized that one of the ferns is sending up curly fronds. Don't they look like they're from another planet?
A couple weeks ago I watched a Pioneer Woman episode on Food TV about making one-dish things, you know, sheet pan suppers and one-bowl cakes, but the thing that intrigued me the most was a ramen noodle soup bowl. She used thin slices of raw steak which I don't have and have no plans to buy but the essential concept was something I had to experiment with. I sliced off a little bit of grilled chicken breast and cut it into matchsticks, thin sliced a single scallion, grated a couple baby carrots into the bowl with the meat and onions. Then I sloshed in about a tablespoon of low-sodium soy sauce, about a teaspoon of hoisin sauce (you could use oyster sauce instead if you'd like), and a tiny squirt of sriracha. I broke up the noodle cake a bit, sprinkled on a bit of the seasoning packet, poured on 2 cups of boiling water, clapped a cover on the bowl, and let it sit for about 5 minutes. Mmm, yummy. Yesterday I made one batch in two bowls to share with Durwood because I'm a nice person and, to be honest, the bowl with the whole cake of noodles was a bit much for me for lunch. Even better a whole cake of ramen is only 6 Weight Watchers points so with an ounce of meat (1 point) and some sauces (maybe a point combined) it makes a good lunch, especially if I put in more veggies. I love lots of veggies.
May 2--Gustav Klimt, Roses Under the Trees. Cheryl thought the roses looked like snowflakes or stars against the dark green trees. She wouldn't think there was enough sunlight for them to survive, much less thrive tangled in the branches the way they were. Of course these were hardy shrub roses, wild roses not hybrids. The roses in the trees had a single frill of petals around their center and the fragrance hadn't been bred out of them. She spread her blanket in a small clearing, ate her lunch, and got to work on a short story but she got distracted by the thick overpowering rose aroma that rolled over her out of the tangles of roses.
It's still cold and cloudy. I dropped my car off at Joe's to get some body work and painting done and it was darned cold and pretty darned windy walking home. Not that I regret the walk but it would have been a whole lot more pleasant if it hadn't felt like my hair was going to blow off.
--Barbara
... I sure hope it's warm where you are because it's barely 40 degrees, windy, and rainy here. See? I saw a flicker of a Cardinal at the feeder but it's even too crummy out there for the birds today.
The forsythia is still blooming happily and the poppy leaves are getting bigger but no buds yet. The bleeding heart is getting big and the blueberry buds are swelling nicely. If only the sun would shine...
My big accomplishment last night was getting the May pages of my Bullet Journal set up. Ooh, way to get the job done, Barbara.
May 1--Frida Kahlo, Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird. She wore the necklace as if it were priceless gems and not digging into her flesh with every step. The stuffed hummingbird hanging like a bauble from the thorny noose moved like it struggled to get away. People looked at her and then looked away in pity or in anger as if her presence forced them to acknowledge their own frailties. If anyone had bothered to look at her, to really see her, they would have been moved by how fragile her calm was, how near to trembling her slightly pursed lips were, and how deliberate her steps were as if she walked on broken glass.
I have a feeling that I'm going to do nearly nothing today. I'll make sure that all the full-spectrum lights are on all day. Come on, sunshine.
--Barbara
It has been unrelentingly gray and chilly and drizzly today. It took me until 3 o'clock to even think about getting dressed and it wasn't until 4 o'clock that I went on my mission of mercy and to ALDI for butter on sale. First, here are the only bright spots of the day. These few tulips didn't get trampled or dug up when the two stooges replaced the fence along the retaining wall two years ago. I would swear that those two guys had never heard of a straight line or a measuring tape. Fortunately they weren't using premade fence sections because not only does the fence waver this way and that along its length, its posts are not regularly spaced, neither are the boards, but it does the job. I'm just glad a few of the tulips survived. And a few of Durwood's raspberries made it, but it's too early for them to be out and about.
I was the recipient of a dandelion bouquet the other day. It's been years since I've had such an enthusiastically picked and generously given gift. I was informed that butterflies need dandelions because the flowers have nectar and that's what butterflies eat. Durwood will have to look upon the lowly yellow flowers with more respect now.
What mission of mercy you ask? The other afternoon I walked up to the bank to cash a check and noticed a shopping cart from the Dollar Tree store in the nearby shopping plaza in the parking lot behind our house. I had seen it a couple weeks earlier too. It was nuzzled up to the dumpsters but hadn't gotten picked up. I took a look at it and it wasn't broken, just made off with. If it had been a nicer day my plan was to walk it back to its store but since it's rainy and yukky today, I shifted the stuff out of the back of my car, folded down one side of the back seat, and tucked it in there for the ride home. I know those things cost a fortune and suspect that some prankish teenagers were to blame for its abandonment so far from home.
For most of the day I nestled on the couch with my broad spectrum lamp turned on and knitted. I have inches more to add to LC's 3 Sweater. The pattern says to add 5" from the underarms but I think I'll go until I'm nearly out of the dark purple yarn and then finish off the bottom with what's left of the lighter purple. Maybe I'll add another narrow orange stripe. We'll see.
I really am using the same three balls of sock yarn for Helical Sock Sock #2 only in a different order AND (this is the biggest change) I'm pulling from the outside of one of them, that's where the solid orange and red is coming from. I'm hoping that the speckledy blue yarn I started sock #1 with comes back for the toe of #2. Time will tell.
April 30--John James Audubon, Roseate Spoonbill.
Feathers the color
of dawn light
lift the spoonbill
over the mangroves.
Snow white egrets preen
in the treetops
while the rosy pink spoonbill
sifts for supper
in the shallows.
~~~~~
And that, for good or ill, is the end of Poetry Month for another year. Whew. We made it through injury free. Today's crap weather is making my left ankle ache but I suspect that breaking a bone has turned it into a permanent barometer. I'm not thrilled. I suppose it's time to go rustle up some grub.
--Barbara
Remember yesterday I said I was thinking of adding a narrow stripe of orange between the two purples on LC's sweater? Well, I got to the body part, picked up the orange and knitted four rows, then picked up the dark purple and knitted two rows before the end of the work day. As I tucked it into my bag to leave I realized that four rows of orange were going to make a STATEMENT in such a small sweater, way more of a statement than I had in mind. I mulled it over on the drive home and through supper and cleanup, pulled it out of my bag and knew what I had to do. I turned on all the lights for the best view of my daring yarn trick, tugged out the needle, catching all the stitch markers, then pulled out the dark purple and one of the orange rows. Then I carefully tugged out the next row of orange while catching the released orange stitches with the needle one at a time. I didn't bother with whether the stitches were mounted on the needle correctly, I just wanted to catch them before they went anywhere. Then I picked up the dark purple to carefully knit the first row, adding the stitch markers back in, and making sure with each stitch that the right leg of the stitch came first. Ah, much better.
This morning I got an inkling of why I was determined to put that orange stripe in the purple sweater. See these grape hyacinths around the orange tulip? There's the sweater inspiration right there.
Sometimes you just need cake. Chocolate cake. I have been craving chocolate cake. I almost bought one at ALDI last week but I didn't want to spend the five bucks. Last night I printed off an old Hershey's Cocoa recipe from 1979 called Wacky Cocoa Cake (made with vinegar, baking soda, and oil instead of eggs and water), dug out my mother-in-law's old fluted cake pan, and this morning I mixed it up. I'll serve it plain with powdered sugar available for shaking over it. Yum. Chocolate cake. (it's just out of the oven and too hot to cut, dang it) (one of these days I'll remember to "flour" the pan with cocoa so its outside isn't this weird white)
April 28--Martin Johnson Heade, Portrait of a Young Lady.
Jane in her pleated dress
stood by the window
cloaked in shame and shadow
while sunset spread
its brazen light
across the forbidden sky.
~~~~~
Don't ask me what that means, I haven't got a clue. Oh hey, the sun's shining. That'll make running errands later a whole lot nicer.
--Barbara
Even on a rainy morning like this one there are still birds at the feeders, especially the platform feeder, favorite of the Cardinals. He's good at sharing; she's not. I spied her a few minutes later pecking around on the ground under the feeder giving the cold shoulder to any mourning dove or sparrow that dared come close. See how rainy it is? The birdbath surface is all dimpled and I guess I didn't have to hurry out last night to fill it up, Mother Nature did it for me overnight.
Last night's sunset was a symphony of pastel light. I saw the clouds turning pink and grabbed the camera thinking that the western horizon would be vivid. It wasn't. Instead the pale pink suffused the clouds and sky, making the neighborhood look very peaceful.
This is why I spent the extra bucks for the double-sided suet feeder. Even after all these years Durwood gets a bit snippy when he spies a squirrel or grackle having a snack. I try to tell him that I buy 12-packs of suet cakes when the birdseed store has their annual sale and usually don't have to resupply until the sale rolls around again. I can afford to feed the marauders when I'm spending less than $15 a year, besides who doesn't enjoy the sight of an acrobatic squirrel or a frantically flapping grackle?
I did a little sweater yoke knitting yesterday. See the pink stitch markers? They measure off the parts that will become the body of the sweater after the 5 or 6 more rows of yoke/cap sleeves are done. I'll be adding the dark purple yarn for the body but I've got a skein of the same yarn in orange and am sorely tempted to add a tiny stripe of orange where the yoke becomes the body. After all, orange is LC's favorite color. I think I'll grab the skein before I leave and give it a whirl.
I also couldn't resist casting on Helical Sock SOCK #2. I'm starting with the remains of the same three yarns I used on the last one but in a different order and I'll pull from the other end of the ball to introduce a totally different color. Can't have matching socks now, can I? I'm going to work a different short-row heel on this one too since I'm less than thrilled about the heel on the first one but, hey, it's a sock. It'll get shoved into a shoe so who besides me will see it?
April 27--Gentile Bellini, The Miracle of the Cross.
A bridge over a canal
flowing with blue water
the curious line the bridge and street,
gondolas gather,
Cardinals gape and pray,
watch swimming angels
display the Crucifix.
~~~~~
Okey-dokey. Today I will wear my new coat and stay dry also warm because last night's low is supposed to be today's high. All this upping and downing, warming then cooling then warming again is confusing. I feel like I should have three different outfits per day--one for cool mornings, another for warm evenings, and a third for the hot and sweaty midday. Crazy.
--Barbara
...what I like best are two lips in the dark." That's the racy rhyme I learned in second grade at Sacred Heart Catholic School in Evansville, Indiana from a group of big, sixth grade girls. When I recited it to Mom she asked where I learned it and then told me not to say it again, which meant that it was engraved in my brain forever. All of that is to introduce the first tulip ready to bloom in my front yard. It's the only one of that color--peachy orange with a purple blush on the outside of the petals--and I keep hoping that the bulb will divide and make more. So far, no luck.
The sky this morning was lovely again but this time there was a vapor trail too. Whenever I see one of those straight white lines which are airplane tracks I wish that I was on that plane going wherever, I never care where, I just want to GO. I told Durwood last weekend that I wish that I was footloose and unfettered. He said I am, that I can go anywhere I want to. He didn't understand, to me footloose and unfettered means I don't feel tied to responsibility, that I can lock the door and drive away for a day or week or however long I want to go but I guess that's not really my personality. I tie myself to people and places with nice tight knots, anchoring myself, not being anchored by others. Maybe I can work on that--once I'm retired. Did I tell you I gave notice? I'll work through the end of June and then be a retired person for real. Yikes. I need to start making lists of things I want to do, stuff like scan into the computer all of the bajillion photographs lurking in albums around here and learn how to put slides and videos onto cds. Along with all of the sewing projects I want to tackle... and then there's the knitting, and gardening, and... and... Hmm, I'm seeing a problem here...
Out back the rhubarb is going great guns and the lilies of the valley have started to spear their way out of the ground. I need to grab a rake to clear all the leaves etc. out of their way. Maybe tonight, if it's not raining.
April 26--Alexander the Great, Silver Tetradrachm of Lisimachus of Thrace.
Silver disk of coin
profile carved on the heads side.
Money hasn't changed
in twenty-four hundred years.
Still round, still silvery,
still with a head on it,
only the jingle has changed.
~~~~~
It might be going to rain today. It might not. Do I take my new coat which is water resistant and be too hot or wager that it won't rain and then get wet? I guess I can carry the coat, can't I? I never had this problem before I bought the coat and turned myself into a sort of grown-up. Mrs. Boss called yesterday to ask me to pick up a whole bunch of tanks she took in for service on my way to work so I'd better wrap this up and get a move on.
--Barbara
I checked the Hummingbird Migration Map last week to discover that at least one had been seen within fifty miles of here so the other day I got the feeder up, cleaned it up, made a batch of nectar, and got it out there. Durwood expected a squadron of hummingbirds to pounce on it immediately but I warned him that we don't usually see them until the lilacs, apple tree, and honeysuckle bloom and none of them are close to blooming. He sighed and went back to napping.
This morning's sky was a winner, I thought. I love the moodiness of the sun glowing behind that wide band of clouds. Makes my suburban neighborhood look all mysterious when, in fact, that tree's at the back of an office building parking lot with dumpsters just out of the frame.
I forgot to take a picture of the Spinach & Ham Scrambled Egg Muffins yesterday so you get to see them when they're all frosty and bagged instead of fresh and cooling. Guess I don't wrap them in plastic wrap after all. That must be why the ugly colored stuff has lasted so long.
I'm about a dozen rows from stopping the cap sleeve portion of this yoke then changing to a dark almost-navy purple for the body of the sweater but I've been knitting on it fairly steadily and my right hand's a bit achy. I'll give it a rest today.
April 25--Thomas Sibley Cooper, Landscape and Cattle.
Two lie down,
two stand guard,
the bovine equivalent
of a street gang,
attitude rises off them
like heat haze.
No kaffe klatsch
of dairy cows,
these beef cattle
mean business.
~~~~~
Just five more days to Poetry Month and then it's back to stories or story parts anyway. Look how tall the day lilies are getting. It's a beautiful sunny day today. Maybe I'll snag a grandkid later and go for a walk.
--Barbara
A couple weeks ago I watched a Pioneer Woman episode on Food TV about making one-dish things, you know, sheet pan suppers and one-bowl cakes, but the thing that intrigued me the most was a ramen noodle soup bowl. She used thin slices of raw steak which I don't have and have no plans to buy but the essential concept was something I had to experiment with. I sliced off a little bit of grilled chicken breast and cut it into matchsticks, thin sliced a single scallion, grated a couple baby carrots into the bowl with the meat and onions. Then I sloshed in about a tablespoon of low-sodium soy sauce, about a teaspoon of hoisin sauce (you could use oyster sauce instead if you'd like), and a tiny squirt of sriracha. I broke up the noodle cake a bit, sprinkled on a bit of the seasoning packet, poured on 2 cups of boiling water, clapped a cover on the bowl, and let it sit for about 5 minutes. Mmm, yummy. Yesterday I made one batch in two bowls to share with Durwood because I'm a nice person and, to be honest, the bowl with the whole cake of noodles was a bit much for me for lunch. Even better a whole cake of ramen is only 6 Weight Watchers points so with an ounce of meat (1 point) and some sauces (maybe a point combined) it makes a good lunch, especially if I put in more veggies. I love lots of veggies.
