Plant ICU

Kristin has taken an interest in plants and has acquired several for her apartment.  She brought home at Spring Break a very sad jade plant.  The main stem had died and two branches were the only sign of life left on it.  She was very upset and didn't know what she was doing wrong.  She has had several cacti die also. I think the issue is the lack of light in her bedroom.  She has only one window and it faces east.  The type of plants she has been trying to grow are sun loving plants.  

I told her I will try to nurse this one back to health.  The two little branches spent a week or so in water and then were potted.  A leaf on each immediately died.  The remaining portions seem to be hanging on.  The one on the left is actually showing small leaf buds.  I'm closely watching and hoping it continues to improve.  The one on the right is showing no change.  I'll take that as a glimmer of hope.

Lately I've been doing more sewing and quilting.  Here are a couple projects I've been working on.

This is the top of a quilt that will eventually go to a woman receiving chemotherapy treatments at a local hospital.  Once I put on one more border and sew the backing fabric together, this will get turned in to the organization that coordinates this activity for the final quilting, binding and gifting.

This one is being made for the quilt group I belong to.  We donate our quilts to the local children's hospital, county family services agency, homeless shelters and Wounded Warriors.  I'm not sure where this one will end up.  All I have left to do is the binding and then it is good to go.

The knitting projects are making slow progress when I have idle time.

On Thursday evening I was part of a large software release at my work.  Most of the evening was spent waiting around until I was needed to troubleshoot an issue.  Most of my waiting time was spent catching up on some work.  Later in the evening my brain needed a break so I pulled out Charlotte.  

I got one more pattern repeat completed.  My hands weren't used to working with the fine thread so it took some time to get into the knitting groove again.

Blake came home for Spring Break the other week.  We had to pick him up at the beginning of the break and then took him back at the end.  That gave me some knitting time in the car.  Drachenfels is slowly coming along.   I'm almost done with Color A (grey).  Color C (green) was introduced briefly for one garter ridge.  You can see it as the dark stripe in the photo.  I'm anxious to see how Colors B (maroon) and C play together.  I'm about 5 garter ridges away from their playground.

It's now time to get moving.  We have a lovely, but a bit breezy, Spring day here.  I'm going to go out and soak up some sunshine.

F is for February and the Flu

A good amount of February was spent at home.  One would think that my knitting progress would have been tremendous.  Not so. I had the flu, not just once but twice.  I began the month with the flu and ended the month with it.  I spent a lot of time looking at my knitting, but too tired to pick it up and stitch.

I'm feeling much better now except for a nagging cough.  The doctor said that will last a while.  Too bad she couldn't tell me what the definition of 'a while' is.

I am making some progress on Drachenfels.  I finished the first section Thursday night and began the second section.  

When I am finished with this, I'm going to have to keep a close watch on it.  Kristin has been home this week for her mid-semester break.  I caught her looking at it.  She dropped some less that subtle hints that she'd like to have it.  She said that while wearing one of her dad's sweatshirts that she took from his closet.  She has a habit of helping herself to other's clothes.  I'll probably have to make her one of her own someday.

Someday.  I think after this is finished I'm going to work on a sweater for myself.  It'll probably be another piece of knitwear that she covets.