Almost March

Here's a picture I took the day after the Big Blizzard of '11, early this month:

I'm not quite sure how the wind was blowing to cause this formation, but I suspect it was coming from the south, under the fence, and scooped all the snow up into that nice crisp ridge. If the wind came from the north, it would have hit the fence, curled down, and scooped the snow. In either case, it was cool while it lasted.

Knitting News
I finally finished the Socks That Would Not End. My Ravelry projects page tells me I started these in September. Here they are, hot off the needles, unwashed, unblocked, un-anything.



Yarn: Universal Yarns, Ditto. Now discontinued.
Knit on US #1 needles.
68 stitches, ribbed cuff and instep

Earlier this month, in the deep cold that followed the blizzard, I decided that my 3201 wool hats were not doing a good enough job keeping me warm and I probably should make myself an alpaca one. Fortunately I found some yarn in my stash that seemed perfect.



This is just a basic watchcap, k2, p2 ribbing throughout.
Yarn: Blue Sky Alpacas Melange
Knit on US #2 needles
120 stitches.

In Other News
The dissatisfaction with our governor has grown steadily since Feb 11. If he thought this would all settle down and go away, he really underestimated the people of Wisconsin. The Teabaggers he recruited from out of state to counter-demonstrate put in a pretty pitiful showing in comparison. There were very few of them and they were back on their motor-coaches, on their way home, within 24 hours. I try to keep my politics off the blog, but recent events go way beyond politics-as-usual around here. It should get more interesting before it's all done.

Some Sewing

I've been doing a bit of sewing lately.

This tote bag was for a Something Handmade swap. It's red ultrasuede and lined with a colorful cotton print I got in a remnant heap a few years back.



The webbing for the handles was also in my stash. I can think of a few things I should have done better, but on the whole, I think it's ok.

My younger son has been wanting a wallet lately. I'm not sure why, because he never keeps money long enough to need somewhere to store it and he has only one card, his library card, that would go into it. We searched a few thrift shops with no luck. Not too surprising that there were many women's wallets and no men's. The men get one and wear it out. The women replace it as the mood strikes. Anyway, after poking around online at other folks' handmade wallets, here is what I came up with:




Again, room for improvement, but it was my first effort at this, I was working without a firm set of directions, and I was committed to only using stuff I had on hand. So, for a prototype, I call it a win. My son would like some velcro or a snap to hold it shut, which is a good idea.

In Other News
It has been a crazy time in Wisconsin lately. The kids have been out of school since Wednesday while the teachers, and many others, have been protesting downtown. I think the governor is wrong about this bill and doubly wrong about his approach in forcing it through. I can accept that political decisions get made that aren't the ones I support: I can't accept an attempt to rush through something as complex and important as the items in this bill on less than a week's notice.