Yard work

Wow, it's been a while since I posted anything. I've been pretty busy the past few weeks. The fence that separates our back yard from our neighbors' yard has been leaning since a hurricane hit a year and a half ago. Our neighbor's business has been slow, thanks to the economic downturn, so he finally had time to work on the fence. I've been helping a bit with the demolition and building; since Hubby is working these days, he can only help in the evenings and on the weekends. Anyway, the fence is almost completed, and it looks great!

♥

There hasn't been a whole lot that I could do, so I've been doing other yard work. I've trimmed our crepe myrtle trees, which I really should have done two or three months ago. I trimmed our Mexican fan palms...which needed a lot of trimming. I cut down several bushes and trees that were dead or dying. I dug out roots from those bushes and trees. I planted a few new plants. I raked and bagged leaves. I carried all of that brush to our back yard, to await permission from a nearby farmer to burn it in a small section of his field. Once we got permission, I carried brush from the piles in our back yard to the burn pile. My tasks for today are to mow the lawn in the back yard, and kill whatever poison ivy/oak/sumac I find, and maybe dig out some more roots in the back yard. I'm trying to get our back yard done so that I can set up the new wading pool I got for the girls. It's not technically summer, but summer weather has already arrived, as it usually does this time of year in our area.

♥

In knitting news....not much has happened. I had an idea to make felted oven mitts that my girls could use, since the ones I have are really much too big for their little hands. I used size 15 needles, and three strands of worsted-weight wool held together. I started by making a very large swatch and felting it, to test the felting properties of the wool. That swatch became a potholder. Then I began knitting a basic (huge) stockinette stitch mitten. I felted the mitten, and it became the perfect size for my oldest daughter's hand. It was still drying yesterday, so she hasn't tested it out yet to see how well it actually protects her hand against the heat of a hot pan or baking sheet; maybe it'll be dry today, and we'll have the opportunity to do that. I haven't got the pictures downloaded from my camera yet, so I'll have to wait to post them.

♥