G is for...

Garden House!! That's Ragnarson, of course, trying to cram as many woodchips in his mouth as he can before I put the camera away and come after him.

Our Governor, the esteemed Jennifer Granholm (she's canadian, eh?) started something called the Cool Cities Initiative. The idea is to make Michigan's cities cooler, so that young people won't relocate out of state, and perhaps some of the people who move here for school will stay once their schooling is done. Sort of a lame name for what is essentially a really cool (heh) program.

So communities write up grant proposals for things that are "cool" and if they meet the cool criteria the government gives them some money. One of those cool things is in a park right by my house.

It's a huge greenhouse full of raised garden beds. Community groups can apply for space, and then they can use the greenhouse to grow veggies. There are even tons of seedlings started so that literally all you have to do is dig a little hole and plunk them into "your" bed.
This is the "moms and toddlers" plot. Currently it's full of collard greens and chinese cabbage, but the cabbage at least is starting to bolt, so I expect it will be pulled out soon. I've been planting a few tomatoes and things every time I get a chance to go. In the upper right corner there is a foot square section of lettuces that's been keeping my family in salads for the last month and a half, and in front of that is some basil that someone else planted. I'm excited to see that coming up.

This is the first year that they've been open, so I'm sort of waiting for the other shoe to drop. Right now I go in every couple of weeks (I'd be in more often but I'm trying to get in some studio time as well), and I transplant a few things, and I plant a few things, and I harvest bags and bags of greens. There is a staff of interns and volunteers that keep everything watered, and there are hardly any weeds or bugs because it's inside. Maybe I'm the only person in the neighborhood that eats spinach or something, but I'm finding it hard to keep up. Every time I get the chance to visit someone says "That lettuce needs to be harvested." or "The Cilantro is bolting, why don't you take some home with you." It's MADNESS. Here's my haul from today. A pound and a half of Kale and a pound and a half of spinach.
Ragnar...gettin' her green on.

Requiem for a cat...

Last night we had to say good-bye to our cat. The grief hasn't hit me until just this second...something about looking for a picture of her for this post just made it all real.

We joked a lot about her, since she wasn't the brightest crayon in the box, and she had some irritating personal habits...like bringing half dead animals into the house to play catch and release with, but she was just about the sweetest natured kitty you could possibly know. When we first brought her home, she was out from behind the bathtub and sitting on our laps within half an hour, and everyone who came over remarked on how friendly she was.

Good-bye Splashy, it was nice to have you in the family. I hope you're in a good place where the cat nip is always fresh and plentiful, there are lots of half knit sweaters to lie on, and the food bowl is always full.

F is for....

Fiber art...or "fucked, if I don't finish this fiber art in time for the East Lansing Art Festival on May 17th."

I don't think of this blog as a "knitting" blog per se, but rather as a "humorous reflections on life," blog. Sort of like if Erma Brombeck and Dave Barry had a child and she was a pirate with a potty mouth who thought she was funnier than she really is, kinda sorta thing. If it's been awhile and I haven't had anything funny to write about, I put up a knitting post. Lately it's just been me barely scrapping by in the world of ABC along...and I'm going to do something about that really I am, 'cause it's lame damn it, and this here is the year of gooder blogging so that just won't fly.

I have done a few quilt posts in the past, but for some reason I have this feeling that my bleaders just aren't interested in quilting. Which is silly for several reasons, the first of which being the supposition that I actually have bleaders, the second being that I know most of the people who read my blog (hi Jiggy, hi Dr. Vic, hi Lavendurgle, hi, Layne, hi Nancy, hi Sarah, hi Diane) and they've never given me any indication that they wouldn't be interested in quilting.

So if you're coming along for the ride, you can expect a few more posts like this:

What have I been doing that's keeping me away from the blog? I've been chasing Ragnarson around the house in a semi crouched over position, and prying various choking hazards out of his mouth, and I've been "working." Working means driving over to pick up the babysitter, driving over to the studio and spending at most three or four hours dividing my time between co-wrangling the baby, and trying like hell to put together a few new pieces in time for the first art show of the season so that it's not painfully obvious that I'm showing pretty much exactly the same stuff that I was showing last year...

Last time I picked out some fabric:
And sewed some of it together:
Yeah: doesn't really look like three hours work does it? Have to step up the pace a bit. Thankfully Ragnarson seems to be over his teething at least for the moment, so at least he's in a pretty good mood.

Ragnar...baby wrangler