Swatchless

It felt like summer today!  It was a perfect day to take pictures of my grandmother’s beautiful flowers.  She has been an avid gardener for most of her life, and has a long yard edged with flower beds.

While we were out in the garden we saw birds and their nests, butterflies and other insects…

tulips

There’s a rabbit and a fox that are sometimes spotted in her yard

lupin

My grandmother sat watching her garden and her trees and wondered out loud how many places you could sit in the middle of the city and see nothing civilized.  We could still hear lots of noises though.

ranunculus--in the buttercup family

The sun was very warm, and after doing a few garden errands, moving some plants up from the basement, and positioning St. Francis by the tree, I introduced her to a refreshing beverage made from her estate mint.

St. Francis is in position

Drink Recipe:

Combine ice, water, lemon juice, honey and mint in a blender.

Blend it until the ice is ground up, and the mint is shredded.

Garnish with a sprig of mint

I first encountered this drink while in Cairo last summer.  It brings back good memories.  I’m planting mint on my balcony, so I’ll be able to make this drink all summer.

At least they are trained to nest in their flowerpot!

I guess one-month old pigeons are not fully independent yet.  Tonight when I was watering my plants I noticed that Bernice and Bernie had taken up residence in with my radishes.

To keep them from fertilizing my plants, I brought their “home” back again, and within minutes, they were cuddling in their flowerpot once more.

I was talking with my mom, and we agreed that pigeons might be a little like kids.  They can grow up and move out, but they can always come back and expect a spot to stay.  I don’t mind so much as long as they don’t poop all over my garden.

This evening my sewing machine was back in action.  I was making some project bags out of old bed sheets and things.  While I was all set up for sewing I took the weaving off of my loom and sewed that into what might be a bag or a pillow cover or something.

I’m not quite sure what to make it into, but I’m thinking it might be a cool shopping bag, or craft bag.  It doesn’t really match my decor as a pillow case.

The weaving was warped with cascade 220 charcoal gray wool, and the weft was a variety of wool that I bought at a thrift shop.  This is the first time I’ve tried weaving two layers of fabric at the same time.  It’s a pretty neat technique that results in the bottom of the bag being seamless.  I sewed the two side seams with a very dense zigzag stitch to attach all the strings together.  It seems pretty sturdy.  I just need to find something to use as handles now!

My loom is still warped–enough for 2 more bags I think. I need some colour inspiration though–any ideas?

They are gone!  24 hours of an empty nest and empty balcony signals my opportunity to clear out all traces of pigeon.  The young birds were last seen hopping around in my dishpan flower boxes.  They had practiced flying from shelves to the bench to the balcony floor and back again.

These little birds sure grew up fast!  I snuck a picture of two pigeons on the balcony rail, and I can’t tell from this shot if it is the parents or the babies.  When I opened my balcony door they flew off, hovered and circled back.  This makes me think that they are the young ones–scared to fly too far away from safety.This may be the last I see of them.  I’ve taken down the balcony screening, and moved the bench inside (after I washed a LOT of pigeon poop off of it).  The shelf and flower pots are moved into the wind–we’ll see how hardy these birds are.  They were pleasant enough company for the spring, but I don’t think I would like them to stick around all summer too.

Now maybe my plants will get the attention they deserve.  I was hesitant to go out and water, lest I disturbed the birdies.

The sun is shining, the wind has calmed down a bit, and things are feeling like spring again.

It’s so warm out that the pigeons are showing their toes!

They are making a little “cheep cheep” noise when startled by the camera or by my shadow, and they hop around a lot in the flower pot.

They are getting iridescent feathers around their faces, and they’ve lost almost all of their little yellow feathers they had since they were born.  They look like they are all grown up, but from what I can tell, they’ve never left their “nest”.  I look forward to seeing them taking flight in the future.  In the mean time, they don’t seem to mind too much when I go out to the balcony to water my plants.

There is currently some top secret knitting on the needles in sock weight yellow and purple…it will all be revealed when the project is completed, but for now, more news about the pigeons.

Today I was given an excellent suggestion for pigeon names–Bernice and Bernie….do you know of a pigeon named Bernice? Do you remember Sesame Street?? Bert named his pet pigeon Bernice. While searching youtube for this videoclip I realized again how much I love vintage Sesame Street–here’s a videoclip that is older than me!

I’m not going to play checkers with my pigeon…I don’t know that my pigeons will put up with me photographing them for much longer. I brought the camera out today, and Bernice puffed up and stood up and started to almost unfurl her wings. This was the first time I saw some little pigeon feet!

Here’s another Sesame Street pigeon reference–this one is for you Mom!

I came home, and checked on the little ones to see what’s changed today.  The first thing I noticed was that I can tell the birds apart!  Physically, one is growing white feathers on the tail, and the other is growing grey feathers.

The bird with white on the tail is much calmer, and quieter.  It doesn’t seem bothered by me being there.  The other one, with the grey tail was making itself tall and puffed up when I was taking photos.  It started making clicking noises too.  I wonder if it is a scared reaction, or if it thinks I am its mother and it is calling for food.

bird on the right is standing up and clicking

Maybe it is the one that hatched first, and the other one will become scared/hungry and puffy tomorrow.  No flapping yet, but that will be exciting when it happens.  They look softer now that the feathers are more than just quill-stubble.

Any bets on when they start to flap, or make pigeon noises, or venture out of the poopy flower pot?

It’s amazing how inspiration sometimes comes from yarn, or from a serendipitous email from a knitting site, or sometimes from diving in the stash….it didn’t take long for inspiration to find me!

100g of soft wool....from the stash

While walking downtown I ran into a friend I haven’t seen in a long time.  She reminded me of a knitting project that I had promised to make and hadn’t yet started. I went home and looked through the stash to find the right wool–I think there might even be enough there–weekend knitting project here we come!

In pigeon news:  They are getting more feathers each day….and apparently pooping a lot more too!  They still seem oblivious to me being there taking snapshots daily–tonight the flash even went off!  Maybe they know that I am one of their biggest fans.

Today I knit a Lego man!  He is awesome.  Pictures to come

I have been checking on the pigeons….here’s my super spy shot of the mother sitting on the “nest”.

She left once she realized that I was watching her….and revealed that there are now TWO babies in the nest.

It’s hard to believe that they are pigeons!