Friday Cozies – Week 28 of 2020

Good morning, friends. On Fridays I like to spend my blogging time going through the photos on my phone and putting together a short narrative of our week. I managed to take a lot of garden photos throughout the week, so please come into my burrow and check out all of the things growing around here!

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What a week! It’s been hot and muggy, but thunderstorms make that weather worthwhile. Thunderstorms are the only thing I miss about growing up in Texas. The garden has loved the weather and we’re in a very exciting spot – just waiting for cucumbers, zucchinis, and squash to get a bit bigger and soon the deluge will begin. Our local farmstand is open now and I’m looking forward to buying some local honey!

I’m frightened by the news and the push to reopen schools. We’ve already made the decision to keep Bear at home next year, but our family really needs the treatment that Bug gets so he will continue going to his treatment center. We’re able to minimize the risk and exposure for Bug and his classmates by keeping our other two children safe at home. I know that not all families have that luxury and I’m thankful that we do.

Speaking of learning at home, we’ve had another really good week of focusing on the basics and beauty. I’m getting more and more encouraged about the fall. Bear is a rebel who pushes back on any sort of expectation (I’m the same way), so school was definitely not his cup of tea. He spent a lot of time in the school office and refusing to finish his work. It was a constant source of heartache for me. But when we switched to remote learning in the spring and continued our learning at home over the summer, things have vastly improved. He has permission to be super silly with his learning as long as he’s making progress. And we can take deep dives into subjects when the opportunity arises, instead of being forced to put things away when it’s time to switch subjects. For example, he spent hours studying a timeline of the evolution of human-like skulls in our Smithsonian History book on Wednesday, which led to a great discussion about how the actual shape of our brains changed over time given the kinds of lives our ancient ancestors lived. I love that we’re both so fascinated with evolution and the history of our planet. We can explore it through our secular worldview in ways that the school can’t, out of fear of upsetting families with different belief systems. Can you tell that I’m excited about all of the possibilities ahead of us?

Remember when I shared that a domesticated bunny appeared in our backyard and I scooped him up and gave him a home? It happened again! That is clearly not a wild bunny, I walked right up to it (in my nightgown, no less). I didn’t try to capture it because we only have two bunny cages and they’re both occupied, but I haven’t seen it since early Wednesday morning and I’m hoping it’s okay! I’m super tempted to go to Agway and buy a third bunny cage, just in case. (My husband would kill me.) We spent a couple of weeks watching John Harry Jack and I was amazed that he survived as long as he did, especially since it was early spring and all of the predators must have been starving. So maybe this bunny will surprise us and pop back up in the next few days. And maybe it will let me love it, hug it, and call it George.

And in knitting news: thanks to the Through the Loops Mystery Knit Along, I’ve developed a taste for mosaic knitting. And then Andrea Mowry posted the tease for her next pattern:

View this post on Instagram

The studio reorganization is a bit of a bigger project than I had anticipated 🤦‍♀️ In the meantime, how about a sneaky peek?! #comingsoon 🧶: @magpiefibers Nest and @spincycle_yarns Dream State

A post shared by Andrea Mowry (@dreareneeknits) on Jul 6, 2020 at 10:28am PDT

Friends, I think this is my next project! Look at the rainbow of stitches! I’m looking forward to seeing the WHOLE sweater, but I have a feeling it’s a winner for me. The collar alone is probably a whole hank of yarn and I might have to clean out my corgi fund to pay for the materials (!). Susanne Sommer also teased the possibility of a mystery knit along, which would be very exciting!

I’m looking forward to the weekend. It will be the last few days of my husband’s vacation and then it’s back to the real world for us. It’s going to be hot and steamy, so expect to find me in the living room and under the air conditioner! I hope you stay cool and find some time to recharge. I plan to be back on Monday and checking in with my Hobonichi Weeks.