We're all finally over the summer of "big ouches", as my toddler would put it, and are doing some much needed catching up.


In these last couple of weeks there's been a whole lot of family time. When we're sick all we ever seem to be able to keep up with is the bare minimum of house work, so the last thing I want to do right now is stay inside. The boys agree.
We've been picking things in the garden, watching movies, eating lunch at kid friendly cafes, visiting with friends, swimming and generally trying not to sweat the small stuff. It's been a good month for all of us including the dust buffaloes roaming around the living room.
Yesterday at about 8:30 AM we saw a hot air balloon being inflated in the distance and threw the kids into the car with only about half the usual amount of back up clothing, caffeine, snacks and diapers. A bit of bad weather arrived and we lost sight of the balloon so we headed out to a plant sale ( I found a caper berry bush. I know, amazing. I'll talk about that later.) in a neighboring village. Because we'd left in a rush, we arrived a half an hour before the plant show was scheduled to open. We ducked into a second hand shop to pass the time and I found this.


She's a little beat up, but that just means that I won't mind sharing her with little children. There are 11 dolls in this set. The smallest is about the size of my thumb nail and she opens. The patterns on their aprons and kerchiefs are made out of straw.
I've been thinking a lot about patterns lately. I think it must be the changing colors in my garden. With fall coming on I'm tempted to start some stranded mittens or maybe a stranded vest for one of the boys. I haven't the heart to start another sweater right now. I also lack the time and the focus to work on anything of consequence. I've channeled my color work desires into a men's scarf. It's posing with my sexy radicchio.


The color work is an easy to memorize slipped stitch pattern from Barbara Walker's first book, knit from odds and ends of Noro "Cash Iroha" and "Silk Garden". The other day I was pawing through my stash when I realized that I hadn't done any knitting since we recovered. I think these long days in the sun are leaving my brain a little scorched. My other projects are looking too fussy and complicated. I'm glad I started this. The Noro "Silk Garden" in this scarf is providing a little interest without demanding any actual work. I'll just keep on knitting until I run out of remnants. That's about all the planning I feel like doing after a long Indian summer day.