Monday Morning Mirth  
 
 

I’d like to celebrate the DVD launch of Twilight
with a little Orange Mocha Frappuccino!
 

 
…everybody, dance now….

The first day of Spring and the Lake is almost a lake again. The icebergs and floats are vanished, surely popping up on the other side of the Globe so everything stays balanced but I have to say, I am not sorry to see them go. Seeing the water on the north side of the Shedd Aquarium, in Monroe Harbor, so full of color and sky, was the certain clue that warmer, better days are ahead.

Also on the north side of the building? Whole panels in stone relief, of sea creatures. This was my favorite, the Smiling Whales with Floating Turtle. The surface of the walls there were polished by the wind and grand storms the Lake faces year-round and even though they were too high to touch, I could feel their smoothness from afar.

The original picture was fun to try some filters on and this one made it even smoother and dimensional, more like an illustration. The Film Grain filter was used here.

Then it was just a short step to fresco: this is the Dark Strokes applied to the original.

Celebrating the last day of winter, a lovely Sandrine!

The lovely Karen, from MinglingYarn just finished a short-sleeved version that is adorable!

Karen also used a new this season yarn from Rowan, called Lenpur Linen.

Now the yarn markets have seen all sorts of new eco-friendly fiber blends, beginning with the bamboo explosion a couple of years ago, to soy, corn, milk, and I must say writing this is now making me hungry ;p but I’d never heard of something called lenpur.

The headline pundits write that this is Nature’s OTHER Cashmere. (Which to this I have to say, careful now, we’ve all been down the rather bumpy C-word road before!) “The comfort of silk, the feel of cashmere, and the coolness of linen. The resulting pieces acquire surprising thermal regulating and anti-stress properties….from TreeHugger.com”

This is a cellulose product which begins as fir trees and is harvested during pruning so the tree growth regions are sustained, making it the latest in the Green Race among the yarn companies. What’s the difference from rayon (viscose), another cellulose product? Perhaps its cottony hand, and it’s anti-odor and moisture releasing properties. It’s said to be hand washable (in this yarn form) which is a property not shared by the rayons I’ve owned. Very nice…

I think it’s really pretty, too! BRAVA, Karen!