It has been not much warmer than freezing for a few days. In fact, last night I dreamed that we got snow that covered the ground. The good news is that today it is actually sunny and warmer. Yesterday morning it was 40F and today it is 54F, a significant change. I’m grateful.

These flowers were at the bank a few days back. It’s the same flower bed where I took photos of purple crocus early on. It is located in a protected area on the west side of the building, and it is clearly a very happy garden.

I went to my mother’s house yesterday and her strawberry plants are blooming! You can see the little white flowers at the left of this photo. In the back right corner, you can see her rhubarb plants coming up for the year. (They look like the pesky weed burdock/cockleburr, but they are not the same at all.)

Rhubarb is a regional treat, not many outside the midwest have tried it. The plant has large stems that are green with some pink, that are very tart but edible (the leaves are poisonous). The stems are cut up much like a large stalk of celery (without the stringiness) and then cooked as if it were a fruit, with lots of sugar to counteract the tartness. It cooks into a soft texture, very satisfying. The flavor is a little like cranberry or lingonberry, but perhaps a bit more tart. We really love it. Rhubarb tends to be the first harvest of the year, and we usually have rhubarb pie for Brian’s birthday on May 31.

Sometimes people make strawberry-rhubarb pies, probably because both plants produce fruit at the same time. I don’t like the texture of cooked strawberries myself, so I don’t care for that. My mother makes a wonderful rhubarb crisp which features a bit of cinnamon for flavor, and a crumbly oatmeal crust on top and bottom. I like that even more than a traditional pie. Yum! Brian and I have a small batch of rhubarb growing in our yard, and I’ll definitely have to make some in a few weeks.

Oh, Last night I bound off my new ColorJoy stole. I may bind it off again, though. No matter how carefully I try to work, I can’t seem to bind off loosely! It is a little too pulled together at the top edge. You want it a little firm, so it won’t stretch out lengthwise and look like a huge scarf… but this one pulls up on the corners when draped around the shoulders. It is not a big deal to redo, but my hands are really worn out from working with larger needles, and the arthritis in my finger is really not happy. I’m going to let that wait for a few days before I try again.

Just the same, it’s pretty exciting to have the stole in a form where I can try it on and look at the completed creation! I like this part of knitting. I really love finishing things. It is no surprise I choose smaller projects than others might. After all, my last sweater took a year to complete! I can’t handle that very often.

My other knitting project is a pair of top-down, afterthought-heel sox in Heirloom Easy-Care DK washable yarn (this is my third pair from this yarn). It’s a sort of pale raspberry color (same color as my wristwarmers from a few days ago). I am doing these on needles that are a bit too small for the yarn but they will wear like iron. They have been my on-the-go knitting for a while now.

I keep breaking needles with this project, though. With the Brittany birch needles, they were shorter and I only typically only broke them when I was actively knitting (usually during a K2Tog maneuver, since I knit so tightly). However, I bought some bamboo needles to try those for the smaller sizes (zero and 1), and they are longer. I think the birch are 5″ and the bamboo are 6 or 7″ long. Well, that extra length is a drag, because they get caught in everything when I carry them along in my bag. They poke through the sides of my bag and catch on things (including my skin). They break when I’m just carrying them. They don’t snap in half like the birch, they just sort of fold in half. The other day I was knitting on them at a restaurant. I put them in my bag, I thought carefully, and by the time I was in the car two of the needles had folded. I couldn’t knit on the way home.

I really don’t like the feel of metal needles, especially because the give of the wood or bamboo is good for the arthritis in my fingers (I’m only 45, but that’s life). But what am I to do? I take a project on the road and then I can’t knit because the needles are not in working order. Ugh. I do fine with larger sizes, but zero and 1 are a real bear (that’s 2.0mm and 2.25mm for non-US readers), and I’m using them more and more these days. I guess I really need to find some Pony Pearls and try those. They are longer than the birch, but if they don’t fold in half like the bamboo I might like them fine. You know, I have spent a fortune on birch needles and love them. I hate to spend a second fortune on another brand. I guess I’m only talking a few sizes here, anyway, but it’s such a disappointment.

The sox are coming right along, anyway. I’m just ready to decrease for the toes, then I’ll do the heels last. I may need to set these aside, though, because our guild is having a sock swap in two weeks and I haven’t started the pair for my swap partner yet. That’s life, and I’ll finish fine, but I can’t put those off much longer if sox tend to take me about 10-14 days, can I?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 4th, 2004 at 12:08 pmand is filed under Knitting. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.