May musings

May is almost over, but it was a good month for the most part. We traveled, I got my garden going, and I made some things. I’ll have a book post up soon, but I thought I’d do a bit of a round up via photos of the month.

Travel to the Midwest

We started the month with a trip to the Midwest to see family but also a bit of big city time for us in Chicago. We stayed in Wicker Park and really enjoyed being close to the train downtown as well as lots of restaurants and shops close to the small inn where we stayed.

The weather was not great at all, raining on our first day so we took refuge in the Art Institute of Chicago. It’s always crowded and while we were there it was no different, but for the first time we spent a lot of time in the Modern Building which was less crowded and had some really great work from the 20th Century. I realize that Impressionists are what most people go to see, but I was really glad to see a lot of work by artists that were hugely influential on me when I was in art school.

A woman stands with her back to the camera in front a a full length wall of windows and outside the sky is gray, skyscrapers are seen and some of the tops are obscured by clouds.
Looking out at the city and the rain as captured by G in front of the huge windows in the Modern Building of the Art Institute of Chicago.

We made our way to Milwaukee where I went to my first home Brewers game. The highlight, other than the fact that they won, was seeing the racing sausages in person. Such an oddball thing, but also so funny. The Polish Sausage ran away with the win.

Five different people dressed up in sausage costumes line up on the sides of a baseball field, in front of them are seats with people and behind them are baseball players warming up for the next half inning.a
The racing sausages at the Brewers game, ready to race. (Photo credit G)

A final shot of me at O’Hare on the way home. We got there with a lot of time to kill because we were worried about the traffic when driving down from Milwaukee. I’ll be honest, I don’t mind extra time at the airport, I do what I’m doing here, find a quiet gate and get out my knitting or my book and relax.

A woman sits in a row of chairs, with no people on either side, the chair to her left is filled with bags and sweatshirts and she is looking down at her hands as she knits. Out the windows to her left is a jetway and a plane.
At O'Hare, on the way home, with plenty of time to kill, so I found an empty gate and sat and knit while listening to a podcast. (Photo credit G.)

Snapdragons galore

We came home from our trip and I was ready to get going in the garden. My snapdragons were also about a foot taller than they were before we left. I scoured through a local nursery and found plants for the raised beds and pots (of which I have two new ones) and got to planting. Our patio table is right next to the raised beds and I’ve loved in recent years filling it all up with color. There are still several plants that need to fill in and bloom, but I’m really pleased with the way it’s going so far this year. A highlight has been the sedums I planted in pots last year and they’ve really come into their own this year with interesting colors and textures.

In the foreground is a tiny bit of a metal lattice work table, behind it sits several different pots, a raised bed, and flowers blooming. In the raised bed is a large group of snapdragons, each about 18 inches tall, in the bots behind are yellow and red flowers. In the pots in the foreground are various daisy like flowers and some succulents with spikey red and yellow shoots.
The view of my raised beds and pots full of things that are blooming. I spend a lot of time at this table in the summer and love all the colorful blooms being right next to it.

Finished some knits

As is normal for me, I did finish some makes, all knitting this month as it’s so much easier when traveling. I’ll get back to sewing soon as I have a large stack of fabric staring at me from my sewing table, patiently waiting. But I did get some summer weight tees made and a hat.

The Uptown Tee was a great travel knit (sorry for the Ravelry link but this designer doesn’t have a website). I got the yoke and sleeves done before we left and set it aside to save the never ending stockinette for travel. I’ll be honest, I love knitting stockinette in the round even when not traveling, so it was a good mindless, but meditative knit. I’m wearing the tee here with my favorite shorts pattern, Emerson shorts by True Bias.

A woman with brown glasses stands in front of a door and window in the corner of a porch, wearing a bright blue knit tee and a pair of shorts that are mottled green color. She's smiling and her hands are behind her back, with her head tilted to the left and one leg in front of the other.
A recently finished knit tee, what I was knitting while traveling earlier in the month along with my favorite shorts pattern, the Emerson shorts. (Photo credit G.)

I also finished up the Moonset Tee and I found a new favorite summer weight yarn, Knitting for Olive Cotton Merino. So soft and wonderful to work with and I think it’ll only get better with wear and washing.

My final make for May was a knit-a-long challenge, knitting a hat over the long weekend. I started it on the Thursday before Memorial Day and finished it on the Saturday, so I knit it in three days. Andrea Mowry runs the challenge and released a new hat pattern specifically for it, The Traveler Hat. It was fun to knit with a lot of other people. That being said, my hat is way too big, I chose the wrong size and probably should’ve changed my needle size as well. But the good news is I have enough yarn left to make another one, which I’ll probably do at some point. The one I’ve made will be donated via the hat drive my local yarn shop does every fall.

I’m hoping, by documenting some things, I’ll remember a bit more about the small things this month down the road. Since I’m not using Instagram anymore, this is a great way to get myself to share some photos from the month as well. That, not using Instragram, has been really good for me, by the way. I’m on my phone a lot less for meaningless things and using it to read more longer form or putting it down all together. Being off line more has been so good for me, especially since the news of the world is… awful. I’m far from perfect in this respect, but I’m trying.