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A little forest bathing

September 9, 2018 Marie Leave a Comment

This weekend we went away to a perfect little cabin nestled in the woods. I wish I could say it was 100% relaxing, but I have homework for college that I needed to do while there. But, we made the best of it. The Little Mr and I headed down Friday night and because we arrived so late and it was already dark we grabbed pizza from one of the local places, watched a movie, and had a really lovely evening.

Saturday morning I woke up and did a little knitting on the porch while listening to the rain in the trees. Then took advantage of the hot tub and did some more listening to the trees from the comfort of the hot water. Once the Mr arrived, we all headed to the caves to do some hiking. It has been far too long since I spent time out in nature, and I feel that void so very deeply lately. It was raining while we were there, and we didn’t let that get in our way until it started raining extra hard (which can make the hiking a bit dangerous with a little one), but I could have definitely used more time there before coming home. Oh well, I’ll take what I can get at least.

I’m way behind on homework now, because we were all exahusted and I couldn’t focus after we got back, so now I’m playing catch-up and trying to not stress about all the work that I need to do. But even if I bomb this homework and following exam, the self care alone from the weekend was worth it.

September, already.

September 3, 2018 Marie Leave a Comment

I finished a thing! Autumn has been calling to me, and I have been suddenly feeling in need of warm wool in my hands in preparation for the season. I ended up starting this Stormy Sky shawl in July – on my birthday, in fact – and that urge for warm wooly goodness has only grown since.

The yarn is handspun, which Ravelry tells me I purchased back in 2010 and it looks like I spun in 2011. It’s a lovely, drapey blend of wool and seacell from Fiber Optic that I remember really enjoying spinning up. At the time, it was just too lovely to use and I was SO excited to get such a large amount of yardage off the fiber. These days I find myself trying to be more mindful of using what I have, and decided it was time to pull this lovely yarn out of storage and to use. Aside from the fiber itself being lovely, it was actually pretty wonderful to use this yarn and compare my past spinning to my skills now and be able to really see/feel the difference practice makes. I actually have enough yarn, I believe, to make a second one. The pattern was easy enough to remember and makes such a lovely shawl that it might just have to become a holiday gift knit, as it’s something I can manage to work on when I’m entirely overwhelmed with homework for my college classes.

Canning season

August 12, 2018 Marie Leave a Comment

A lot of years I have been terrible about canning up our tomatoes. I’ll freeze them for later and then forget about them in the deep freezer never to see them again.

This year I’m trying to be better. Small batch recipes are my favorite, simply because they’re quick to make with my limited time. So far I’ve made pizza sauce, which we have been using a lot of for homemade pizzas, and today I’m doing crushed tomatoes for use with pasta recipes. There’s still a pile of tomatoes ripening in the garden so I’ll have to research more recipe ideas (or just load up on pizza sauce)

#caturday

June 23, 2018 Marie Leave a Comment

I’m pretty certain that I’ve been turned into a crazy cat lady. I find myself looking forward to going home, not because it’s the comforts of home but because I can’t wait to lay on the couch with the cat in my lap and listen to him purr.

He’s fitting in nicely

June 9, 2018 Marie Leave a Comment

This cat. So much love for this little guy! We’re all adjusting to having a cat in the house. The dog, when she was still with us, was always at our heels and never so mischievous as Buttercup. My potted plants are taking a beating already, which is a bit frustrating. I’m not sure what the point was in buying specific “cat” toys when he seems pretty content to play with all of the kid’s toys. But he’s such a snuggler, getting on my lap and purring away while I read.

He’s slowly becoming more of the kid’s buddy. And I’m encouraging him to be more involved in his care since he’s the one that Buttercup bonded with initially. So he came with me when I took him to the vet for a check-up to make sure he’s healthy, and then he picked him up yesterday with daddy after Buttercup had his surgery to neuter him (I am, after all, a responsible pet parent). He feeds him in the morning (if he gets up when I get up), and I make sure he feeds him at night. They like to sit and look out the windows together, and earlier this morning (pictured) he snoozed on the table while the Little Mr played games on my phone.

I’ve had one or two incidences where Buttercup found my yarn, but so far I’ve been able to knit and spin without much trouble from him. But, all in all, he’s been a really good addition to our house!