Tag Archives: growing orchids

Rabbit Rabbit

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Sunday, February 1, 2026

HOLY COW! It’s February today! We’ve been wrapped in winter here in Central Maine. It’s been the coldest part of the winter thus far with temps dipping into the negative numbers and even the ice fishermen haven’t been coming out but they’re out today! I was at work the last three days and I’m enjoying a day at home catching up with all the stuff I’ve been ignoring – watering the plants, cleaning the air cleaners (is that really a thing?) … you get the drift. It feels good to have “all” the work behind me so I can escape to my studio to clean up a little bit and get some work done at my desk and on my knitting queue!

My orchids are blooming and I want to share them with you. They’re so pretty! I have one more that is working up to blooming but it’s not quite there. Two are in full bloom. I have to remember to mist them daily and they’ll keep their blooms for a lot longer.

I’ve been working on two of my WIPs this week. I’ve made a lot of progress on my Ranunculus sweater that’s knit on large-ish needles and knits up quickly in the worsted weight yarn I chose. I enjoyed working the yoke which is meant to resemble strands of beads/necklaces and then the rest of the body is stockinette stitch. Around and around I go. I believe that I’ll put the body on hold when I reach the required length and I will knit the sleeves before finishing the body. I want the sleeves to be 3/4 length, I think since this will be a summer-y sweater so I want to knit the sleeves to the right length, try the sweater on and then finish the body. I have decided that I don’t love me in cropped sweaters. I’d rather have it a little longer than the designer planned. I think I’ll have enough yarn to make it a couple of inches longer. We shall see.

I frogged back and started my Le Bandana scarf again on larger needles and I’m liking the fabric this time much more. It’s less stiff and I think, especially when blocked, it will drape nicely. The yarn is a collaboration between Lola Bean Yarn Company and Cece’s Wool in remembrance of the civil rights movement. The colorway is called “Good Trouble”. I have also started another pair of socks since I finished my hubby’s Christmas socks. This will be a vanilla sock so the “Paper” colorway can stand out. Doesn’t it look like the ruled paper we bought for school? I’m finished with the leg and am working my way across the heel flap on the first sock. Maybe I’ll spend a little time with this today.

I have officially finished my first sock of 2026. Hubby’s Christmas socks. I’m going to try to get a pair a month knitted from stash. This pair is from deep stash. I do have a bit more of it left, however. Hubby loves wearing this heavy wool yarn in the winter. These are the Thompson River Socks and they were from a magazine way back when. They were fun to knit and kept my crazy brain focussed when I needed it the most last month.

I still haven’t finished my little crocheted car key fob character although I have put it into service. I will get to finishing it eventually. LOL. It’s cute but it’s so fiddly. I probably won’t make another one any time soon.

I also finished my first “Melt the Ice” hat in Malabrigo Rios. It looks tiny but it fits pretty well when I don’t roll up the brim. Because my head is so big, it will eventually pop off my head. The next one I will make on a bigger needle, make the ribbing longer and I may add a few more stitches, too.

I’ve had a request for a purple, pink and blue scarf for my granddaughter. This will take priority for sure since her little neck is getting frozen in New York City. The little Sophie Scarf I knitted for her has gotten too small. I’ve got to go do some stash diving for this one. They like to have washable woolens because she’s apt to drag them around her day care or the streets of New York.

Gone knitting.

Since You Heard from me Last …

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Wednesday, November 5, 2025

I’ve been a busy person! Since I’m feeling better, I am finally able to wrap my head around all the things that need to be done before winter actually hits and around our house, in particular, that’s a lot of stuff. We are bringing in the outdoor furniture, blowing leaves, and I’ve bought some insulated curtains for our big windows at the front of the house so that we can keep the heat inside and hopefully cut our heating bill. I’ve got all the parts of this project arriving today, I hope, so we can put it all up this weekend. Well, Sunday, since I’m working on Saturday.

I’ve sent Advent calendars to my kids, caught up with the laundry, finished and sent off my daughter’s fingerless mitts, and several other “chores”. It feels good to get some stuff checked off the (never ending) list.

I finished the knitting part of Sylvie’s (our granddaughter) Christmas sweater and have begun the embellishment. She loves Frozen this year and I hope she’ll love a sweater that’s loosely based on the idea of Frozen. I had the icy-purpley-blue chunky yarn in my stash and had the plan to use a Knitting Pure and Simple pattern to knit a pullover sweater. That part was done last week. The sweater took no time at all. Now the hard part starts. I had decided to embroider/duplicate stitch snowflakes with white yarn and some silver thread. So far, it’s turning out pretty well. I think I’ll be happy with it but the “stress” of creating different snowflakes is hurting my brain. So, I’m going to stop for now and add some more tomorrow. I think I’ll make some silver snowflakes, too, but here is what it looks like after a morning of work …

I’ve been working on a pair of socks for Sylvie as well. She loves my handknit socks but her parents don’t love having to hang socks to dry so I’ve been using King Cole Footsie yarn which is a fingering weight yarn that’s not wool and can be washed and dried in the dryer. BUT the kid’s feet have grown so fast. The last time I made her socks was at the beach in September and they’re already too small. Her favorite color is purple and here are the bigger socks (in the same yarn as before.) I’m making these a little more than six inches long. Hope they’ll fit for a couple of months. I’m using the Yankee Knitter pattern #29 Classic Socks for the Family.

I found a recipe for a French Apple Cake on the internet, in a meme, and decided to try it yesterday. It’s ok. Not great. Lots of apple and not enough cake IMHO. But the hubby is happy that I baked and I was going to bake today but I have a board meeting at 5pm and I had to get ready for that this morning – shower and get dressed and review all the documents for the meeting. We also have a finance professional development session in advance of the meeting planned for our newer members. Anyway, the cake will be eaten and my hubby has something sweet to have with his coffee. Next week I’ll bake more … I think scones are in order.

AND I’ve been trying to catch up with my houseplants. I have grown three lemon trees from seed. They are all at different stages and sizes. One is in a huge pot and the other two are medium and small but they’re all indoors now. I also have several orchids, one which appears to be struggling, and a few African Violets, and we have other plants too … one is like Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors. It is taking over our entire house, it loves it here so much and I continue to take cuttings from it and plant them and give them away and it’s growing so fast that I truly can’t keep up. I have three pots worth to plant and there are a couple of “legs” of the plant that are ten feet into the living room! That’s the long story about my new Clivia plant that I bought from a local nursery and brought home a few weeks ago. It was blooming when I brought it home but then we left for two plus weeks and the flower is gone AND the plant is covered in a white sticky powdery looking something. I suspect it’s a bug so I sprayed it with some home made insecticidal soap and washed the leaves and will keep it separated from the other plants until it’s clear of the bugs. Good grief. That took a bit of time this morning. Watering all the orchids, the plants in our bedroom window and the lemon trees. (Our heat is one and it’s very dry in our house. Time to hook up the humidifiers again.)

I cut off the flower spikes from the orchid and repotted it in orchid medium with no other materials in it in a smaller orchid pot. I just have to pay attention to it so it doesn’t dry out too much but it seems to have a couple of good healthy roots. Time will tell. I also decided to try to root a couple of the flower spikes – apparently you can cut the spikes and if they have a thingy where the flower spike will eventually pop out, you can get a baby orchid. My cut pieces look like they may indeed have that happening. I’m crossing my fingers. If it works, my dad will be so excited (he’s in heaven so I won’t see him but he always fought to get orchids to bloom and thrive. I seem to have the orchid prowess that he didn’t have. He’d be proud that I am having success with them and I love the plants so much.) I’ll post more as the baby plants and the mother plant start to feel better and grow again.

The leaves are truly falling off the trees. Oaks, which we have lots of in our yard, are the last to drop leaves but the yard is full of oak leaves. Hubby will be blowing and raking this weekend no doubt. It’s totally dark now at 5pm and that means it’s time to light up the inside and snuggle in for the winter. I don’t mind winter here at all. It’s so pretty and quiet and a good time to watch some television and knit more. We are so grateful to have such a good life.

I’ve also been cleaning up and straightening up my stash (at least the part that you see). I’ve got four shelves of yarn in my studio that I’d love to make doors for so they’d be more protected but I haven’t made that happen yet. SO once a year or so I pull down all my yarn and clean the shelves, refresh the bags of lavender, and put everything back on the shelves. This year I’m adding some of the sweater/garment quantities of yarn to my Ravelry stash list, too. I’ve gotten two of the shelves done and have two to go. Progress! It does feel good to care for the investment that I’ve made and to know that if I am stuck at home for another several months (or years) that I have enough yarn to keep my hands busy.

Gone knitting.