Flowers of Filbert

 

As far as cultivated plants go, the flowers of the Contorted Filbert (Corylus avellana) are my favourite. Those are millimeters showing on the ruler in front of the bright pink female blossoms. The catkins (dangly bits) are the males. If pollinated, the females will form a "hazelnut." In the past, I've managed to protect a few of them from the birds and squirrels until they were mature, and yes, they held tiny, rather flat nutmeats. There are some who claim they are edible and I do not doubt that, but at the same time, you'd be hard put to collect enough of them to fill a tablespoon. That's never an issue here. The varmints eat them long before they are fully formed, sometimes even when they're in the budding stage shown here. And that's what my yard is about, anyway: providing habitat and food for the critters who so amuse me.

Nalbinding Hats

 

When I was hit by an unexpected cyber-vacation (i.e., my computer turned up its metaphorical toes and died without significant preamble), I shifted my focus to finishing old projects and starting some new ones. It was while I was making a red nålbinding "resistance" hat in the "cat hat" style that I remembered having started another one ages ago using wool from one of my first sheep. There was only one place I could have put it (in the cedar chest to keep the moths out of the wool), but a perfunctory initial search didn't turn it up, nor did a subsequent deeper dive. There was nothing for it but to take everything out until I either hit bottom or found the hat. Fortunately, it was only about halfway down, nested in a bag which should have been obvious. I finished the cat hat (not to be confused with a "pussy hat," but it does have corners which look like ears, hence the name of the style), and then settled in to completing the cloche. I found nålbinding to be an exercise in "mindfulness" this time around, and noticed that during the enforced cyber-vacation, my stress levels dropped to nearly normal instead of running at a fevered pitch. Sigh. But good things seldom last, and here I am again, back with a new computer...and two new hats. Henceforth, I won't be numbering these posts because of the lapse.