This and That ~ Welcome March

The new sprouts for the chickens.  These are organic peas.  I am sprouting a small amount to introduce them to the ladies (chickens) and see if they like them or not.  They love sprouted lentils.  They should be ready to treat the ladies in a few days now.  

 Welcoming March!  We already had our first adventure day trip on March 1st.  We drove a few hours to visit one of the kids and their new house.  The weather was back to freezing cold here, so what a better way to spend a Saturday in winter.

I surely gave me a break from lining closet shelves and purging clothing.

My goodness, it was so nice to see the kids and their pets again.  We haven't seen their pets in many years, and Jasper (cat), bless his heart at 16 years old, sniffed my face, put his nose to my nose and rubbed his head on my forehead.  He remembered me.  He did the same with my husband.  Such a sweet moment.

Of course we stopped at a pet store and picked up toys and treats for all three of them.  We had a meal with the kids, got a tour of the house, and it snowed the entire time.  Loved every minute of it, and this particular daughter is crocheting!  Ha!  She is crocheting a blanket. She has a stack of books she read, and I shared with her my crochet "book" blanket.  She is just a beginner, but I will still offer ideas to her.

On the drive home, I convinced my husband to make a pit stop at a JoAnn Fabrics (on the route home), and check out the yarn.  Sadly, the yarn was already picked over and very limited.  What I did find, was 25% off.  They had a ton of #10 cotton thread, but hardly anything left of Caron, Redheart and Lion brand yarns.  We only have one JoAnn Fabrics within a 30 minute drive from our home.  I did find another one this morning, about a 33 minute drive.  

Do you have anything exciting planned this month?  I do not, but every day brings us an "open book" so to speak.  I have already sent a few emails, to inquire about some walking trails/parking etc.  We also visited a book store and purchased a guide book with trails in our state.  There is no local bookstore close to our homestead.  Everything here is a bit of a drive.

I do plan to get outside this month more than we did last month, now that we are approaching better weather. Ha, or we hope to anyway.  

My first goal this month, is to locate some inexpensive tulip bulbs.  I want to experiment in planting them again.  The first year we lived here moles ate every single one.  I read one idea in a recent book, so hence "inexpensive" bulbs to try it with.  I absolutely love Breck's bulbs, but want to be sure the moles will leave the bulbs alone (otherwise I'll pot them in pots and insert the pots into the gardens).  I love tulips, and really, really, miss having them in our spring flower beds.  We do have two mole chasing windmills up too (and I still see mole hills some days).

This and That ~ Welcome March  ©  March 2025 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart

. . .from the handiwork journal {Feb 28, 2025}

 The month of February typically is the month we tend to get the most snowfall.  Now we are thawing out, and having some flooding.  Heck, Wednesday we started out with everything frozen again, then snow showers, followed by a day of rain.

Yesterday we woke up to fog.  The weather is all over the map right now.  Just after dinner time last night, we had a rain shower.  

 Ribbit, Ribbit. 🐸  Sounds like Rip it, Rip it.  It's where the term "frogging" a crochet project comes from.  Ripping out stitches due to mistakes in previous rows.

I did more frogging this past week than I wish I had, ha ha!  I worked on the blue and white baby blanket, but kept making mistakes.  I am not sure if it was my husband talking to me, or if I was just having an "off" day. Ha.  If fact, I had to rip out a few rounds last night (again) due to an extra stitch I had made in a previous row.  I hope to get it finished soon.  

Update on the "book" blanket granny squares.  

.  .  .  finished more books, so more matching granny squares for my "book" blanket. These books were both on my shelf for several years (other than the very last book). The first book granny square is a repeat photo from last Monday's post, but these are all the newest ones made for the "book" blanket.  All of them have been crocheted to the blanket (other than the last three).

The "BAT" book was tucked into a drawer and forgotten about last year.  My Mom gave me book #1 and I read it about a year ago, and bought book 2 and 3.  She just handed me the book with a giggle, and told me I just had to read it.  Hence the kids book included in my reading this year.

. . .  some embellished paperclips, to use up the last bit of some crochet thread.  

Lastly. . . 

I found a new pacifier holder pattern, and I love it.  Funny story about finding it.  I went on a search, so I could make one to gift with the pink baby blanket soon. 

I can't exactly remember how I saw the one I liked. Maybe doing an image search?  Once I found the one I wanted, I checked Ravelry.  All of the finished ones were noted with a pamphlet or copy of Crochet World Magazine.  After extensive searching, I somehow found a book that it was published in, and wa-la, our library had a copy.

                         

My first crocheted pacifier holders - Pattern is from Crochet Crowd.  As you can see at the clip, it is rounded, and slides back and forth on the clip.  It's cute, but I was not really that happy with the final results.  I also had a hard time getting it to lay flat, even after blocking it.  

These crochet up very quickly, and they fit the clip much better than the last pattern I used from Crochet Crowd (using #3 crochet thread).  The pattern I used, uses #10 cotton crochet thread.  I already had the clips, because I had made a few using the last pattern.

Last month, I was him-hawing about getting rid of a bag of misc. beads.  I'm glad I did not.  I used some jewelry supplies, jewelry tools, spare beads, and created a way to attach a row counter to my project bag (or project) for traveling.  Talk about a happy gal.  No purchases needed.  The row counter actually came in a bag of odd assortments from a thrift store haul years ago.

Results?  I love this for road trips or just any long drive with time to do handiwork.  I still feel I will be using paper and pen any other time.

. . . from the handiwork journal  {Feb 28 2025} © February 2025 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart