I've enjoyed the cold winter weather these past few months. Handknits and boots and sweaters are nice. But spring is my favorite time of year. I can't get enough of spring flowers, and I love the green hillsides, the buds on the lilacs and Easter and my birthday. The longer days boost my energy, and I want to soak up as much fresh air and sunshine as possible, despite spending eight of those sunny hours indoors at work five days a week. 

I'm still loving the daffodils in our yard, and picked an enormous bunch today. With each new type that blooms, I declare a new favorite. Today I love the little apricot ones (center left).

Of course I can't forget the tiny grape hyacinth and snow drops with their green-dotted bells.

We don't have any ranunculas in our yard, but Trader Joe's was well-stocked the other day, so I brought these peach beauties home for just $4.

What are your favorite spring flowers?

While in Spokane, I got to spend a fun day browsing antique shops and malls with my sister-in-law (her excellent finds are here). I showed you the elephant pitcher I couldn't resist as we were checking out of our last stop, but that's hardly all I brought home. 

I also couldn't resist this tiny pink dress, not with it's $5 price tag (actually, the shop owner quoted me $6 and then lowered it as I got ready to pay). 

I've been wanting to start designing some knitwear patterns, and one of my first ideas is a sweet little baby cardigan. The details on this dress are providing all sorts of inspiration, and I am thinking I will document the design process here as I figure it all out. I hope you don't mind. 

I love this round, smocked yoke:

And the miniscule embroidered pocket:

I have a couple things to finish up, but once my needles are free, I have the perfect pink yarn and a head full of ideas to turn into a sweater.

I'm also enjoying playing around with the video camera on my phone, and I so loved the lodgepole pines surrounding my brother's house in Spokane. I'm still figuring out all the editing, but I rather like this brief glimpse of the wind bending the trees.

 Did you catch that brief glimpse of my nephew and his chip bag kite? I will have to tell you more about that, but in the meantime, here he is with his "smile for the camera" smile, curved lips just like a smiley face. He is the funnest 7-year-old I know, and I miss him already.

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I just had a four and a half day weekend, and not much happened and it was fantastic. In fact, I barely left the house, and when I did, it was purely on foot, with Winston, to walk through the frosty meadow in the middle of our little valley. I didn't drive anywhere once I got home Friday afternoon. I made sure to run all my errands, and did lots of grocery shopping on Friday so we were well provisioned. Saturday was an official pajama day, so I made a hearty breakfast of bacon, potatoes, and eggs, and then a good, warm pot of soup for dinner (sausage and kale, a favorite around here). There was a nap and a lot of knitting while sitting on the couch watching Netflix. I might have accidentally cast on three new projects, as well as working on that one existing one, but I will save all that for another post. They are all pretty quick projects and one is almost done, so I don't feel bad.  

Sunday morning, we woke up to the sound of the snow plows scraping the street. Finally, we had our first snow storm of the season! It came down heavily all morning, so we decided it would be wise to stay put, and there was still soup to eat, and I also discovered that Downton Abbey was available to watch instantly on Netflix. Have you seen it? Why did they leave us hanging like that? I was happy to read that there will be a second season. If you love a good BBC costume drama, and you haven't seen it, watch it soon, so good! 

So, with all this free time, I spent a lot of Monday and Tuesday in my little house studio doing some general cleaning up, but also a little sewing. I've been keeping all my DPNs collected together in a little ceramic pot, which looks really cute, but is super annoying when I actually want to use a set, and have to shuffle through and find a whole set in the same size. So I made a case that I can easily tuck into my knitting bag, and now I will always have the right size needles as soon as I need them. 

The new case is the one on the left. On the right is my much-loved case for regular needles from Yvonne from one of our annual Christmas swaps ages ago. And underneath is a binder with page protectors where I keep all of my recently-organized circular needles. Cute, right? Let me tell you about all the things I did wrong with my cute, new case. I should have made some sort of flap to go over the needles, because now, if you turn it upside down, they all fall out. I sewed a piece of ribbon on both short edges, which means that when it's rolled up, one is uselessly rolled up inside.

I didn't do the best job on my little labels. They're just scrap fabric, with the numbers stamped on. I cut them out rather unevenly, but they are just tacked in place with a tiny bit of fabric glue, so I'm thinking I might remove them and stamp the numbers directly onto the polka dot fabric. Ah well, I can just make sure to store it upright, and the one ribbon is long enough to wrap all the way around to keep it closed, and the number labels are still kind of appealing in their wonkiness. Not every project can come out perfect, and sometimes I can just be happy with 'good enough,' and I really like my new little case, despite it's shortcomings resulting from my inability to think it all through before I sewed it. And it turns out that I have four sets of size 7 needles and no eights or nines. 

 Project number two was to make a batch of marmalade, which is one of Mr. Heylucy's favorite things ever, apparently. I didn't realize he liked it so much, but when I brought home a bag full of citrus on Friday, and told him my plan, he asked me multiple times every day when I was going to make the marmalade. I was greatly inspired by this post from Putting up with the Turnbulls. Heart-shaped bits of peel? Yes, please! I had some organic Meyer Lemons and some mandarins, so I went to work. My heart cutter wasn't quite as cute, but it was just as tiny and blister-inducing, but totally worth the effort.

So I set to cutting and cooking. I didn't add the cinnamon hearts, I just wanted to do a simple marmalade for my first time. I cooked and cooked and tested to see if it was set. I checked the internet and read that it would set once it reached 220 degrees, so I got out my candy thermometer and watched the tempurature carefully. The recommended 30 minutes passed. I waited another 15 minutes, and still, we were only at 210 degrees. Another ten minutes, and it crept up to 216. Then it started looking a little too golden, and then it was sticking to the pan. Oh no! I stopped immediately, and got it into the jars, and then I processed them to seal. I had been licking spoons and tasting regularly and it was really, really delicious. I made myself some toast this morning, and eagerly opened a jar. Not only had it set, it was set more than any other jam or marmalade I had ever had. I could scoop it out with my knife, but it was kind of hard to spread so I just made due with a few evenly spaced chunks. So, another not-quite-a-success. It does taste delicious, but I obviously need more preserving practice. I think my thermometer is not quite accurate, it's the same one I used to make three batches of caramel, and the first two batches didn't work either. I also wonder if the tempurature thing has to do with our altitude at all. I know water boils at a lower tempurature, so maybe I'll try cooking it to 210 or so next time. I will keep experimenting and figure this out! So it was another failure, but a delicious one, and I will keep trying. 

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This summer I seem to have lost my creative mojo. Is it too dorky to say mojo? Is there a better word for it? Anyway, whatever you call it, beyond cooking on the weekends and living on the leftovers and peanut butter and jam sandwiches during the week, I haven't done much of anything lately. In an attempt to remedy that, I decided to spend a little time in my little house studio this weekend. First of all, it needed a good tidying up. I cleaned up all around my sewing machine and ironing board, although I didn't quite have it in me to tackle the work table and closet just yet. Still, that little bit made all the difference.

I made a little garland from vintage book pages. There was nothing too it, I just used a big circle punch and sewed a long chain. I stacked three circles at a time and by folding the top and bottom circles, ended up with these flower-like shapes. I thought of doing something like this for Christmas cards last year but realized that there was no way I would have time to make enough. I think I'll do it this year and just start now, it's easy enough to make two or three at a time. I think they'll be fun wrapped flat around a postcard, and then the recipients can fold them open. See, already I have another creative project to think about. 

Another thing about this project that makes me happy is that I don't have to buy a thing. I have way too much junk, and I need to start using it or getting rid of it. I worked on two more projects this weekend that I started long ago. I think this will be the focus of my autumn cleaning-using stuff up and finishing what I started. So hopefully, I'll have lots to show in the coming weeks as I do this. The more I think about it, the more motivated I'm getting. Yay! 

As I was cleaning, I remembered that I had my grandma's thimble collection stashed away in a box, and decided to pull them out so I could enjoy them. As I was tidying up in the little house studio, I realized that many of them were tiny enough to fit on the ledge above the window. 

 

I love  being able to see them. She collected them when she traveled, and I know I gave her a couple as gifts when I was little, and I also have a bunch of just plain, utilitarian ones that she used when she quilted. 

 

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I'm sewing today, just because I can (Happy President's Day!). I'm also practicing taking pictures with my new 50mm f/1.8 lens. I went the bargain route, so it doesn't have auto-focus. I have to do it all on my own. It's quite a challenge.

  

One sewing project: hankies! Just for fun. I found this woven plaid at Joann last fall. It's soft, soft cotton, so it will feel nice against my nose. I love vintage hankies, but I can never bring myself to use them, but this fabric was on sale, super cheap, so I don't think I mind if they get a little snotty.

  

Look at those dreamy eggs!

And this sweet dog:

  

I may need to adjust the aperture for shots like this. Still, he's so cute.

  

This one is actually from a few days ago, when the snow was melting. I like water droplets. 
 
 
 
 

 

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I think I've almost worked out how to make some pincushions out of the little vintage jello molds that I have. 

 
 A little felt, and a little embroidery, and a little wool stuffing, that's all it took. I do still wish I could figure out how to make the edges smooth and not bunchy. Any ideas?

I also wanted to tell you about a book that you should get. I was super lucky, and the publisher sent me a copy of How to Sew a Button, by Erin Bried.  I pride myself on being pretty self-sufficient, and knowing how to do a lot of things, but this book is just full of great stuff. I will be referring to it often. 

  

Right now I'm trying to fix a slow drain with baking soda and vinegar, like one of the chapters suggests. 

The author interviewed a bunch of grandmothers, and shares their answers on how to do everything from roast a chicken to make strawberry jam to tying your husband's necktie. It's all written in a friendly, sassy way, as if you were talking to one of these ladies yourself. How to Sew a Button would make a great gift for newlyweds, recent graduates, and anyone just setting out on their own, and not just women, I think anyone would benefit from having this in their library to refer to when they're not sure just how to do something. 

It's also great, especially now when frugality is once again a necessary skill and self-sufficiency is something to be proud of. I can't recommend it enough! 

 

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I don’t want you to think I’m going to neglect Hey Lucy, just because I have another blog. I made a lot of things in December, so I’ll tell you all about them this month. I decided to do a little quilting, and made a log cabin pillow with some of my favorite shades of pink & green.

It was part of my annual Christmas swap with Yvonne of Yvestown (I am a lucky duck, we’ve been doing this swap for four years now? or is it five?). Yvonne is a super good swapper, so I wanted to make sure I sent something worthy of her beautiful home.

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