A Day of Pictures: Swatching for Ellie’s Skirt while Babies Sleep

It is a pretty day here.  A day of full sun that started with an early visit to the farmers market.  There are beets roasting in the oven (they smell stunningly good), a bowl of blackberries macerating in sugar, and a breakfast room table that is covered in torn scraps of paper, glue, and paint (I collaged, the kids drew horns on people in the newspaper.  I worry about them sometimes).

It really is pretty, so pretty I decided to have a day of pictures.  This pretty.

Hydrangeas

It's a pretty day for yarn too.  It must be pretty, because my seventeen year old, he who winds for movie money, stopped in the middle of the first skein and said, "this is really pretty yarn!"  That has never happened before.  It was a day-maker.  Probably a month-maker.  It may just be that his best friend's girlfriend crochets, which means having a mom who dyes and spins is suddenly cool.

Bascleo

I've been having a hard time with my knitting lately.  Just when I want to knit on something, I can't find it or I can't find the directions.  Despite my massive organizational overhaul of the house, knitting is still out of control.  Even my swatches have been bad.  This week, I swatched for Ollie's Bamboo socks, my fall cardigan, and Ellie's Be Sweet Skirt.  The first two swatches have been repeat failures.  So we will only discuss the Be Sweet Skirt, which is going to be gorgeous.  here is the swatch.

Skirtswatch

This is some bamboo I'm going to use for the waist band.  I think she's too big for an eyelet ribbon tie, so I'm going to do an elastic band at the top (you can see the garter ridge that I put in the swatch to make sure it would work to fold the band on).  I'm hoping to get started tonight and then take all my yarn along to knit on the drive to Arkansas for Catherine's wedding.

I've stashed some Be Sweet yarn for the skirt, and have some silk I'm going to dye to work in with it.

Skirtyarn

Isn't it pretty?  And lastly, I have to show you some "baby" pictures.  Ollie was napping with the Judge.

Ollie

Isn't he sweet?  You can barely see the Judge, snoozing away obliviously in the far corner of this next photo, but I don't think the kids ever sleep. I don't remember naps being this much fun when I was little.

Nap

I'm off to roast some okra and zucchini and stuff some squash blossoms with goat cheese for dinner.  I'll saute the beet greens to go with the beets and maybe sear a little bit of tuna or some scallops to go on the side.  I love long, lazy summer days.  I hope you enjoy all the pictures!

4 thoughts on “A Day of Pictures: Swatching for Ellie’s Skirt while Babies Sleep

  1. Beautiful pictures! How nice to have such a pleasant summery day and to have pictu res of it.
    Joanne

  2. I took pictures of my hydrangeas today, so I smiled a little when I saw this.
    and the yarn, the shiny, shiny yarn! One day, I hope to dye yarn half as well as you do.
    Happy Summer day!

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