Yesterday, I saw the first three dandelions in our yard. We won’t love the multitudes which will follow, but the first means it is warm on the ground. This one had an insect drinking up nectar, and was feasting from the looks of it:

Today, only a week or less since we had sleet:

For my friends outside the USA, this is 27.7C, and that means warm. The sun shines, the birds chirp, and it is spectacular to have the front door wide open.

Today I have a day at home alone. This means that I have laundry and a million other domestic things to do, which wait for me to be home. I will definitely go on a walk sometime soon, but home with doors/windows open is wonderful enough.

Winter this year was cruel. It got cold and it never let up. We had snow on top of snow. There was no melting period between accumulations (which has been the pattern we have come to expect). Pretty close to everybody in Lansing, Michigan has been quite ready for a day like this, for a very long time.

My favorite temp is 84F. Today is April, and we’re approaching heaven already!

 (Update: at 5:30pm the thermometer said 87.2… heaven. I got out the hammock on the porch!)

I have three hats to show off today. All were knit by kids I work with.

Example 1, A. (age 14) knit herself a Topper-Down hat with lovely self-striping yarn (I believe this yarn was a gift). It fits her perfectly and goes great with her “I love it” coat.

Example 2, M. (age 13) HANDSPUN some yarn with rovings gifted to her. She held two strands together and knit an EZ Fit Hat (pattern by my friend, Rae Blackledge). At the top of the hat, she was getting low on handspun so she held one strand of handspun with alternating stripes of dark blue Nature Spun yarn and green O-wool. I think it looks magnificent! It’s worthy of two photos.

Example 3, B., a boy in the 3rd grade class I volunteer with, started a wristband on 5 stitches late last autumn. He found himself increasing by many stitches on every row, while I was working with other kids. The next thing we knew, he had a very large triangle with many stitches per row.

To his credit, he did not give up and he kept knitting. He changed colors when he started getting bored, so there are many stripes.

A few weeks ago he really wanted to be done, and it was no longer a wristband. He was hoping he could make a wristwarmer like his friend, but the triangle was much larger than his hands. I told him we could make it into a hat.

So I found the largest side of the triangle and made that the bottom of his hat. I sewed together the 5 beginning stitches to the bind off at that point. Then I put the hat on his head and figured out how to fold the piece of fabric to fit his head. I took it home, and continued to sew with the hat on my styrofoam wig head. I had to put some excess fabric on the inside, which makes a little sculptural bump at the top of the hat.

In the end, it fits him and he’s pleased. We are talking first project, friends. There are “hiccups” because he was learning, but he finished something pretty big!

A boy in 3rd grade, I think that is about 8 or 9 years old. This is quite a lot of stitches for a child of that age. Go, B.!!!