A Sock, a Shawl and some Houseplants

The snow still hasn't melted and frankly I'm rather bored of it now, especially as I've been walking up the footpath/Olympic luge run twice a day which now has slippery muddy patches as well as the slippery icy patches. I've had to separate the hens again as despite giving them an enormous run (the large ark, extension run plus small ark), Henry kept picking on the chicks, and I find it so disconcerting to hear them squawking. So, the chicks and Ida now have the small ark and the extra run, and the 4 older chickens have the big ark. I can't let them out for long as there's not much to do in the garden with the snow on the ground, so they end up on the verge outside, or - their favourite place - across the road in to the garden where my white call ducks met their fate :-/...honestly. So, I have decided to take the opportunity to keep them shut in for most of the day and give them their Flubenvet-spiked mash so they actually eat it, otherwise I can't get any wormer down them. The ducks have a herbal pellet which is added to their food on a monthly basis but I can't rely on the hens sharing the food out quite so equably as Mr and Mrs Duck. Anyway, they all seem ok and there are enough hens in each coop to keep each other warm when they roost.

I've suffered a bit of pain in my wrist from all my knitting! Oops. So, I've not done so much recently, although I've done the first bit of colour work on the second fairisle sock:

I am also crocheting a cobweb scarf/wrap in the green Kidsilk Haze yarn - I made a shawl for my mum and couldn't resist making one for me! It's a bit of a trawl and rather a boring stitch but it looks good and is lovely and springy:

I've also decided on a project for my Sissinghurst granny squares, but I've a bit more to do on that before I can take a proper picture:

I spent some time in the garden yesterday as I'd had the foresight to bring my sack of compost in overnight to defrost it. I had lots of spiderplant babies in dishes of water, and they now have roots. I've potted them up in to Nutella jars and tins with grit and sand at the bottom for drainage. I love golden syrup tins too so the ivy went in there:

I have a new book about biodynamic gardening so I'm going to try and get my head around that this weekend! I sowed sweet peas in large yogurt pots and pricked out some Cosmos seedlings, as well as some lupins from an old seed packet, which I now realise are the rather boring yellow ones but not all of them germinated. I'm longing for some sunshine and spring warmth. I always get so desperate to have plants I always sow everything far too early so it gets all leggy or damps off, but I can't resist. I have about 20 hollyhocks in the coldframe which are looking brilliant, and I have sweet peas in there too, and at least when the snow has gone I should have some crocuses and snowdrops to enjoy :-)