All Hail

And more rain. Last evening while heading out to pick my first asparagus of the year, I narrowly missed being deluged on. There was a big black cloud over my head and a few drops of rain as I headed back to the house. I just got inside when the heavens opened. Every day I gain new respect for local farmers and the difficulties in getting crops to grow in our mild but wet and occasionally unpredictable weather. It seems impossible to consistently produce anything but moss and mildew around here! Today is nice so far so I guess I shouldn’t complain too loudly.

I have to tell you the further story of the baby goslings I showed you last Thursday. Yesterday the parent geese decided to move the whole family of 8 babies to a new home. They all took off walking through a series of parking lots, across a very busy multilane street and partway across the technical institute’s campus to another pond — 3/4’s of a kilometer in total. I measured it on Google Earth! Someone (or several someones) in T-Man’s workplace took photos of the whole procession but unfortunately I don’t have permission to show you how cute the little guys were especially when trying to get over some steep curbs. All the cars stopped, students were taking cell phone pics, mommy and daddy goose herded carefully and everyone arrived safely. Whew! I wonder if they’ll stay there or go back or even go somewhere else entirely. There’s a much larger lake a couple of kilometers away so they may be heading in that direction. Doncha love how nature still happens even in the middle of the big city?

Well I’ve finished knitting the Unmentionables and they have been washed and are currently blocking on a towel. Washing instructions for Sublime say machine washable but dry flat and reshape whilst wet so that’s pretty much what I did, substituting hand wash (because I didn’t want to fill the washer for one garment) but I did machine spin to get out the excess water. I’m now braiding ties for them on my marudai using a 16-strand braid called Keiruko No Himo. I plan to attach the tie ends to the elastic so that it can be tightened and tied in place but she can still get out of the bloomers by herself by pulling them down. She’s having enough trouble with toilet training without me making it more difficult! This will also allow her to grow and still fit into her Unmentionables for another couple of years by loosening off the ties. I’m using 3/8” swimsuit elastic since it has a mostly cotton content with rubber for stretch and will hold up to a lot of washing. I’m debating on whether to dye it pink and see if I can get it close to the same colour or just to leave it ecru. I might try the dye later this afternoon and see what happens. I can still replace it with undyed if it doesn’t work. Wonder if the rubber minds the salt and soda for Procion MX dye?

I decided to use the rest of the cotton on part of a secret project. You won’t hear more until I can talk about it. Mum’s the word around here for now. OK, quit trying to guess, you guys!