Mother Nature is conspiring against me

Well, she IS!

The forecast is for rain and rain and rain, today and tomorrow and maybe even Tuesday. Not only will the rivers rise, wreaking havoc on the garden center … again … but this kind of steady rain rarely offers a window of opportunity to get outside to walk.

Days like this are exactly why I have an elliptical.

I'll have to check today's movies to see what might keep me going for more than an hour. (Speaking of movies, I saw the very entertaining Oz the Great and Powerful yesterday at the theatre and my husband and I watched The Help [again] on television last night. I'm definitely in a movie mood.)

Enough of that. Happy St. Patrick's Day! My family is German, Irish and Welsh, and my husband's is Scottish, so we've got plenty of blarney to go around here. I'm making a traditional Irish feast today, carbs be damned. I've never made Irish soda bread before; I'm using Jenna's recipe for my first attempt. And we're even having dessert.

But, wait! This isn't a food-porn blog, it's a … knitting blog! Heh.

I've been working on a square – that's right, just a square – which will be sewn and stuffed to make a bunny. I can't remember when I began knitting it, but it's been more than a week. FOR A SQUARE! And then last night I finished it off and started and finished a second one, all while watching The Help. Not sure where that knitting mojo came from, but I'm glad it did. My Democratic women's group meets this Thursday, and I'm hoping we complete an armload of bunnies to donate to the sheriff's department, who will then take them on domestic violence calls for any children involved. In order to complete them, however, we need squares.

It's also a reaping (gardening) blog, from spring through fall, and spring arrives this week. My seeds have been ordered and I have a neighbor with a load of sawdust-and-manure ready to spread on the garden, if it ever dries up enough to do that. I still need to buy electric fence tape. The very bold deer have been grazing on the lawn like cattle this winter, and the thin wire I've been using didn't keep them out of the crops last year. The garlic has started coming up and I expect to see horseradish soon.

Even though the first day of spring isn't until Wednesday, today – St. Patrick's Day – has always seemed like the first day to me. So, kiss me, I'm Irish, and go plant a potato!