Intermittent Net

What a week!

I've been struggling with an intermittent internet connection (and a cold) most of last week.

So let me do a quick summing-up.

First off, the robin and her nest. We had cold frosty weather much of last week, but by the weekend, she was feeding babies.

I tried and tried to catch her on the nest feeding them, but one baby craning its head up was the best I could get:

And then seconds after I got that picture, two more popped their wobbly little heads up:

It must be spring in Michigan, because while I was lurking at the window trying to take robin photos, a pair of mourning doves and their baby landed on the garden wall:I see mourning doves all the time, but I think this is the first time I've seen one so young.

Ruth in the bath looks like something you might find in a tide pool:

My first pinning attempt used a lot of pins, all my rustproof florist pins, and I still wasn't quite happy with it.This little doily reminds me so much of some of the Niebling designs, where he totally ignores the "increase by X per round per needle to create Y shape" and just blithely creates beautiful floral shapes. Your rigid one-at-the-end-of-each-needle, like Winde, you will not find in Ruth!

I tried a second time to pin out Ruth, this time stringing a nylon thread through the outer round, tying it, and pinning inside the cord.I still used almost all my pins, but I like the smoother sides of the square better.

I found two errors in the chart near the end, detailed in my Ravelry project notes.

Let's see, what else?

I don't have a new photo of the swirl doily, but I soaked it in water and washing soda, rinsed it multiple times, and dried it out in yesterday's sun. That stain lightened considerably, hooray!

Yesterday I went to a local estate sale, and came home with this haul:Several nice sets of dpns, a copy of Emma Brockstedt's 1916 Practical Tatting Book No. 1, a couple sets of straight needles, multiple nylon circular needles, and something new to me called a "condo needle", with a large end and a small end, all for six dollars.

All things taken together, a good week, especially as I shake this cold.

Now to see if I can get this to post!