Reunited

On May 2, 2023 By CarynIn Cats

The feral long-haired calico cat stayed in isolation (a spare bedroom in the house) for over a week after her spay. She turned out to be advanced in a pregnancy when I took her in (hard to tell under that long fur). Since that is a risky operation with a high probably for complications, we kept her calm and resting afterwards. She ate, drank, and used the litter box, so I felt OK keeping her inside, especially since we had cold wet weather for that week. When the weather cleared we took her back to her territory. Getting her back in the cage was tricky, but my eldest, the cat whisper, managed it. The cat bolted from the cage into the woods, but within five minutes I saw her in the meadow reacquainting with her family, which includes Mr Tom, Shadow, a gray tabby that is one of her adult kittens, and a short-haired black female that have also been through the TNR process. I’m hoping this is my last trapping for awhile. The other cats seemed to have cleared out.

May Day

On May 1, 2023 By CarynIn Garden

Here are some flowers for you for May Day that are near my front porch. There is an arbor in there somewhere. I can’t drop them off on your doorstep, and we don’t have smell-a-vision yet, but this year you would be grateful as the scent is overpowering. Being socked in the face with a bouquet of flowers isn’t very neighborly. Lol. These are predominantly Japanese Honeysuckle, the red blooms poking through are native honeysuckle. I really need to get out and thin down the mound.

Shuttle

On April 30, 2023April 27, 2023 By CarynIn Craft

I still haven’t found my weaving shuttle. Hm. So I made one. I’d seen some trapezoidal shuttles on Pinterest, so grabbed a small thin wood sheet and cut a shape using a coping saw. The shape isn’t sellable perfect, but it works quite well, once I sanded it down.

I was then able to weave my new band pattern. It was quite cool to see the muddy mess of warp threads focus into a distinct pattern as I wove. The main experiment in this round was to see if staggering the turnarounds on the edges made the transitions smoother. They do, but it still isn’t as nice as having the edges a consistent direction, but I didn’t have to deal with warp twist. I did discover that I could tell where I was in my pattern by when the “A”s lined up. Every fourth turn, the cards line up, and since the pattern is based in 4, it meant I only had to move my pattern marker every fourth line. I need multiple cues to remember where I am in a pattern; sometimes I forget to move my marker.

“A”s lined up at the end of a set of turns (note there is also no twist in the warp)

I did discover my original pattern had errors, which I fixed as I wove. I went back to the pattern editor and updated it as shown above. I also really like weaving with variegated yarn, it gives added depth to the pattern.

Always check your shoes

On April 29, 2023 By CarynIn Life Hack, Wildlife

I was taught young to always shake out my shoes before putting them on, especially if they have been sitting outside. The caterpillar trying to climb in my sneaker when I was checking on chickens was a subtle reminder why.

Oh, that and snakes, which are now coming out from their winter rest.

Blurry picture of a rat snake, probably wouldn’t fit in my shoe, despite how skinny it is

Rough earth snake, ten of these would fit in my shoe, non venomous, but very wiggly

Here is a short of the rough earth snake, which is so wiggly because it was having trouble getting traction on the sidewalk.

Oh, and the scorpions, which would be an ouchie shoe find. And rocks, which also hurt, but don’t defensively pinch or sting. But spiders bite. Basically, always check your shoes before putting them on.

DIY bobbins

On April 28, 2023 By CarynIn Craft

In my Grandma’s stash of knitting supplies, there is a stack of bobbins she made from plastic containers. I decided to follow suit, and make more bobbins from my used plastic lids.

Grandma’s bobbins (left), commercial bobbin (bottom), ricotta cheese lid (right)

There are no signs of tracing on Grandma’s bobbins, I’m not sure if she wiped them off, they wore off, or she made so many she didn’t need to trace them. I need trace lines, so I used a thin sharpie to outline the commercial bobbin.

I cut out the traced design with kitchen scissors.

I think cutting was a harder task for Grandma; the plastic she used was much thicker than mine. It is a visible reminder that plastics manufacture has changed, and products are using less plastic per item now.

Grandma’s plastic (left), modern plastic (right)

Despite the thinner material, my new bobbin works great to organize the extra bits of thread I’m accumulating as I warp my Inkle loom.

Newly made bobbin wrapped with pearlized cotton

Critters and Craft

Author: Caryn