Snowed In!

But first, an update on my progress on the Bunny Block. Having finished another knitting project for DD's little Daphne, due June 6th, I turned back to the bunny block from Hop To It! by Edyta Sitar. I'm making progress:

The fabric to the left is the backing and my focus fabric for the quilt top. It's Beatrix Potter's Peter Rabbit Garden Scene. To finish the block, I have to applique the eye, nose and mouth, and then another stem with leaves and a berry. The rest of the quilt will be pieced. I hope to get the piecing done next week, as I have an "appointment" with my friend Julie for machine quilting in May. The applique is getting easier, but I still don't have the dexterity I had before I had to give up quilting due to thumb pain. I'm finding my eyes are worse, too. I have to use a pair of clip-on magnifiers and my Ott light to be able to see. My actual vison is fine with my glasses, but as I get older, I need increasing amounts of light to see what I'm doing. (It would help if the sun came out for a while!)

Here's the knitting project I just finished:

The yarn is Knit Picks' Comfy Sport in "Creme Brulee" and "Ivory." Here's a closeup of the front detail. I created this detail because I decided to do a M1R, K1, M1L for the increases in the front, and then didn't like the holes created.

It looks sort of like cross stitch. The BSJ can be found several places, such as The Opinionated Knitter by Elizabeth Zimmermann, which also has the bonnet pattern. (The book is on sale right now at Knit Picks!)

I was supposed to go to the nursing home yesterday with Sunny for pet therapy for the patients, but we were snowed in! This is the first time we've been actually snowed in since we've lived here. Here's DH cleaning the driveway around lunchtime. (Psst! It wasn't done snowing. We got more after this photo!)

He spent 2 1/2 hours with the shovel and the snow blower! I'm so glad we didn't get a dump like this right after he had his shoulder surgery!

It was so bad, our milkman couldn't get to our house. He called in the morning and explained that his chains had broken. No problem--for me, anyway. I had enough of everything to last until he got here. He couldn't have gotten to our front door without going through waist-high snow anyway. He finally got to our house last night.

The upside to being snowed in is, you have more time to knit or quilt. In my case, I want to finish the baby quilt (see above) before starting any more knitting projects.

Tomorrow is supposed to be clear. I hope so, because my quilting minigroup "Vintage Stitchers" is coming here for a trunk show. I hope to have some photos of Tina's quilts in next week's blog. Our "Common Threads" group met last Thursday. That group is made up of quilters, knitters and other stitchery enthusiasts. Karan, our hostess for Common Threads last week, showed off her first pair of KP socks from the kit "Speedy Sport Socks."

It's fun being in groups with both knitters and quilters, because they go back and forth between the two crafts/art forms, as I do.

Saturday brought the usual doggy snowshoe. Here fellow snowshoer Jay helps Annemarie get up, while Annemarie's Eddy watches. (You don't have to have a dog to go on a doggy snowshoe.)

Jay doesn't have a dog, but his wife has a horse and writes steamy novels. She hired me to be the proofreader once because her regular proofer wasn't available. I was forced to read the steamy parts (a lot of the book!), because there might have been a typo, and she was paying me to read them. [Blush!]

Of course, I have been enjoying "hanging out" with my Quilt With Us and Knitting Community buddies, and you know who you are!

What's on my needles: Finishing up DH's Fair Isle sleeveless cardi
What's on my wheel: Still the baby alpaca, but I'm making progress. I've plied the first two bobbins from this batch. Just a little to go.
What's on my spindle: Still the Ashford Merino and Silk in "Mulberry."
What's on my quilting frame: Bunny Block from Hop To It (see above).
What's on my iPod: Just finished Sarah's Cottage by D. E. Stevenson, and have gone back to Dean Koontz's Frankenstein: Prodigal Son (Book 1 of the Trilogy). I really like Audible and am looking forward to downloading more books for my trip to Wisconsin the end of May, to be with DD when Daphne is born. I forgot to mention last week that I finished Lorna Doone, downloaded from Librivox.org. I read the last three chapters in written form through Project Gutenberg. Their volunteer readers are all very good, but I found the accent of one of the readers very distracting, so I resorted to reading the last three chapters while knitting the baby sweater, rather than listening to it.
What's on my Zen Nano: Knitting podcasts, mostly, such as Sticks and String, and, Knit Picks' wonderful podcast, my favorite! (I'm on the verge of KP podcast withdrawal, since there was no podcast last week.)

Happy knitting and quilting, everyone! --P