Odds and Ends of Knitting

Although I didn't get as much knitting done yesterday as I might have liked, I have been getting in a row here and a row there.

I started another frame-knitted potholder to use up some odds and ends of dishcloth cotton. I started it with the Magic Cast-On, but this time I turned it so the purl side was in. That makes the knit side wrap around the bottom. When I use the tubular or grafted cast-off, both ends should look very similar.

I've been doing a row here and a row there on my blue scarf, too. It's about 21 inches long. I like a fairly long scarf that I can wrap around my neck and have one end in front and the other down my back, so I have quite a lot more knitting to do on it. I could have used it this morning: it was 32 degrees F., brrrr.

Then I realized I hadn't posted a picture of my Sampler M in a while, so here is the current one.

From bottom to top, patterns 15, 16, 17 (yes, it does appear to be one repeat of pattern 14) and 18.

I've only done one of the four repeats of pattern 18 so far. This is the first pattern to feature lace rows in every row, without a row of plain knitting between. It would be pretty easy in the round, but in a flat sampler you have to do "p2tog bl", purl 2 together through the back loop.

On the Sampler M list ("Join" button in the sidebar), someone suggested purling the first stitch, returning it to the left needle, drawing the next stitch over, and then sliding the stitch to the right needle. Although this is pretty cumbersome to type out, I find it a bit easier than the p2tob bl.

The guy from the LP gas company came and took the empty tank away yesterday. My husband got the chain link fence back up when he came home from work, so the dogs were able to go out and sniff the spot where the tank sat. I had pruned out the mulberry sprout, but there is some shaggy long grass that was under the edge of the tank, out of reach of the lawn mower.

It was sort of warm (meaning not windy, around 40 degrees F., and the sun was shining), so I got inspired to prune back the scraggly rose heap. I took our garden cart out there and snipped myself a path along the chain link fence, so I should be able to mow along it next spring.

The rose heap is some kind of climbing rose that throws out long canes, with nowhere to climb. The long canes just flop over into a dome shape. I haven't dug it out because it provides thorny cover for the birds that come to my bird feeder. Once I saw a hawk try to chase a bird into it!

But it certainly has wicked, backward-curving thorns, as all the little pricks and scratches on my fingers will attest.