geraldine newfry

wordless wednesday: a very big hole for the plumbers

 

 

cleaning up the flood

we had a ton of rain, and apparently a few of our pipes were cracked.  hence the flood.  we had no idea what to do at first.  it was just so overwhelming.  finally john went to the hardware store and bought a pump.  there was so much water it took two days to pump it all out.  then the remaining water just didn't go down the drain.  that's when we had to call the plumbers and realized that we had cracked pipes.  we were able to fix those outside the house, but didn't have enough money to fix the one inside.  so we're living on borrowed time with that one.

the destruction was heartbreaking.  all my journals got wet.  i've had them since high school.  i'm still trying to decide what to do about them.  i aired them out a bit, but that wasn't really enough.  they're outside, protected, airing out while i decide what to do with them.  i can't bear the thought of throwing them out.

john and i just through out so much stuff.  we had too many pieces of furniture that were made out of particle board.  never again.

my entire collection of bookbinding cloth was ruined.

the cool skull cane i made last year? trashed.  that desk on the left? trashed.

i had set way too much on the floor.  one of those boxes contained slides from my grandmother.  i was planning to mail them to my cousin for scanning.

pictures, books, papers.  i was planning on organizing before this happened, so i had pulled out a lot of things and put them on the floor to sort.

 

we found out these rubbermaid boxes are not water tight.  we lost heirlooms and john's collection of baseball cards.

a bunch of art, books and tarot cards.  trashed.

this explains, in part, why you haven't heard from me in a while.  also, i've been having health problems again.  but i realized it was important for me to jump back on the bandwagon and give my blog some love.

wordless wednesday: a studio underwater

 

spring seedlings

i'm really not a winter person. the lack of light and the cold both negatively affect my depression.  but the one great thing about january is the arrival of the seed catalogs.  a little bit of spring in the mail!  in previous years i've poured over these and imagined what my garden would look like.  but i never actually bought the seeds.  what would i do with 100 tomato seeds when i only need about 6 plants?

last year john and i were smart enough to save the flats from all the annuals we bought.  the seed catalogs came again and we decided to take the leap.  we ordered several tomatoes, basil, radish, daikon radish, foxglove, belladonna, coleus, cosmos....and more!  a few weekends ago we planted everything.  we had a great time thinking about how everything was going to look.  full of possibilities!  here's the flats after we planted.

by the next week we already had shoots for most of the plants!

 

i took this picture yesterday.  things are really popping!  it may be time to repot some of them into larger pots, which we also saved from last year's flower buying.

i absolutely love the garden.  we have a double lot, so there's plenty of room.  all the space, a premium in the city, is part of why we bought this house in the first place.  i love to see the plants return from last year, and i love all the color.  we try to buy mostly perennials.  but we still get impatiens for the flower boxes and shady areas.

when we moved in, the previous, previous owner (doris) had left a map of where and what all the flowers were.  what a gift!  unfortunately, the people who owned the house before us didn't really pay attention to the garden.  but i think we've brought it back almost to the level of doris' garden.  i met a neighbor this week who told me the garden was her pride and joy.  and it makes us happy as well.

now that the sun is coming back more, the time has changed, and we have these wee seedlings, everything seems so much better in the world.

march ravelry madness #fail

after all that trouble with the toes, i began knitting onto more of the foot.  and guess what? the socks are too big.  i'm certainly glad that i knit these toe up.  what a disaster it would be to finish the whole sock and realize it's too big.

so what will i be doing during the championship game?  frogging the socks.  it was a valiant effort, but not to be for march madness.  i'm a bit sad.

i'll be rooting for butler, the underdogs, the alma mater of my inlaws.  enjoy the game!

podium finish: knitting olympics and ravelympics

i did frog the toe on the march ravelry madness socks.  i reknit it and now it's perfect.  i have done a few rounds, but they don't look much different from the last picture.

last month i participated in the knitting olympics and ravelympics.  i did the same project for both.  i used the pattern snapdragon tam by ysolda teague.  i bought this pattern because half of the proceeds went to help for haiti, and i'm glad i did.  these were the best directions i have ever found.

    

it all started out with malabrigo carrot and bonker's fibers cotton and merino.

i was worried the whole time that i was going to run out of the bonker's, and look how much i had left:

here is the tam before blocking.

and another view before blocking.

after blocking you can see the cables much more clearly.

however, there was still a lot of the band to deal with after the blocking.  i think i measured my head wrong, because the tam was way too big.

so i felted it.  i was a little worried that the bonker's would shrink too, but it wasn't noticeable if it did.

much better after felting.

 

 

and i finished (except for the felting) before the closing ceremonies.  podium finish!

darn or frog?

so far this is all the progress i've made on my march ravelry madness socks.  i don't know why, but i had quite a bit of trouble with the provisional cast on.  too many stitches, too little stitches, stitches falling off the needles, the crochet knot in the wrong place.  i finally got that right.  and i knit up one toe perfectly. 

on the other toe i somehow dropped a stitch.  due to the short rows, i couldn't quite figure out where to pick it up.  so i frogged and started again.  the second time i somehow picked up a stitch and left a little hole in the fabric.

so what to do now?  should i frog it again, or darn it later?  i think it took me about two hours per toe.  but i'll be wearing these for a much longer time than that.  i'm just worried i won't finish by the championship game, which is april 5.  and i'm really anxious to start working on the foot.  what would you do?

march ravelry madness

i have been trying to post since sunday, but our internet is all wonky.  i created a group on ravelry for fans and widows of the ncaa men's tournament.  i think i'll be watching quite a bit of basketball, and what better time to knit?  the games started today.  the idea is one project, to be completed by the end of the championship game.  i was going to cast on when the brackets were announced, but i got a bit sidetracked.  so today is the day.  i'm creating dead simple lace socks from "socks from the toe up."  i'm using knitpicks handpainted yarn in the colorway of wicked witch.  i think these are going to look great!  although i do have some doubts about being able to finish them by april 5.  i'm going to try my best though.

here's the yarn:

i'll keep you updated as i move along.  if you want to join, and you're on ravelry, click here.  and if you're a knitter and you're not on ravelry, why not?

help for haiti: it's my turn

a month has passed since the disastrous earthquake in haiti.  the pictures and stories may be beginning to fade from your mind.  but the devastation remains.

a lot of knitters have been donating a portion of their sales for patterns to haiti assistance.  i've been buying these up.  also some friends have been sharing their profits from etsy.  i've been shopping there too.  and finally i decided it was my turn to do more than shop.

from now until february 28, i will donate 50% of the sales from my etsy shop to doctors without borders for their continuing work in haiti.  there's still free shipping to the US and canada.

if you've been thinking about buying a book, now is the perfect time to treat yourself and help someone else in the process.  and what could be better than that?

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wordless wednesday...a little knitting