It's my basil.

All ready and waiting to be moved into some bigger pots.

I got myself a couple of new books on Monday. They're both books I'd been thinking about for a while, perusing them whenever I passed through the bookstore and saw them on the shelf. Halfway through Monday afternoon I remembered I had a full stamp card (worth a reasonable discount at our bookstore) and decided it would be a good time to get them.

The first one is a cookbook - The French Country Table - and if I only ever make the sweets in it it will be worth it. Chances are I'll make several of the savouries too though - my mouth was watering while I read through recipes. One of the sweets I'm most excited about is the Rhubarb Clafoutis. I make cherry clafoutis every summer and it is one of our favourite desserts - simple, fruity, not too sweet - but last fall Rob's mum gave me a big chunk of her rhubarb plant and if it takes off we'll be able to eat rhubarb from our own garden this summer.

Book number two is Front Yard Gardens. Our house is set back a long way from the street and the previous owners put in a long strip of grass in the space between. It's almost three times as long as it is wide (or at least looks that way from the street). We really want to have a nice front yard but I had no idea where to start let alone aim for. This book is great. It's written by someone who lives in Canada and has examples of gardens from all over including Edmonton which is close enough to our climate (i.e. it gets as cold just not for as long) that suggestions for plants can actually be considered useful.

Most of the book is not suggestions for specific plants though, it's more about planning types of plants (trees, shrubs, perennials etc.) and how to group things together to go with your house and neighbourhood and stuff like that. There are even examples of creating gardens that are interesting when covered with snow! I'm very excited to see this year's snow finally disappearing so we can start playing around with ideas and take a good look at what we've got to work with.

I've been a slave to my dog all day today. Abby loves to lie in the sun in the living room in the morning and early afternoon but she won't go out there unless someone else does too. My choice of activities since breakfast this morning has consisted of doing something I want to do with Abby sitting behind me whimpering or going out to the living room and knitting while I watch her sleep. It's a pretty hard life. The sock I started yesterday is now ready for me to work the heel. These are my March socks for the 2011 Rockin' Sock Club.
My kit was waiting for me when we got back from our vacation. I love that moment when I cut open my kit and first peak inside. It's always so exciting and it makes me grin. This time around I kept grinning and I think I even laughed when I pulled out the skein. It's so bright. It's hard to capture with my camera just how bright it is. There is some florescent pink and an acid yellow-green in there. This is one of those colourways I would never even pick up in a store (not true actually: I'd pick it up, giggle and then put it back again) and one of the reasons I like being in the sock club is that I end up knitting with colours I'd never have considered otherwise. The colourway is called "Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test" and the inside of my ball band says "Wavy Gravy". The yarn is lightweight.

The patterns this go around are both pretty simple things to accommodate the dazzlingly bright yarn. When I saw the Merry Socksters pattern I thought "This looks like something by Irishgirlieknits" and it turned out it is. I decided not to knit them though because they look kind of slouchy and I'm not a huge fan of slouchy socks even when they have a cute picot cuff. Instead I cast-on for Intrepid Traveler which is basically a ribbed sock but every few rounds there's a little blip in the rib that makes them interesting. They're going pretty quickly so far and I think I might actually get a kit finished before May's shipment arrives (January's kit currently exists only as a never ending swatch as I try to find the right gauge for the pattern).