How To: Reinforced Buttonholes in Knitting

I came across a very nicely done video today by Eunny Jang of Interweave fame. It describes an alternative single row buttonhole method that produces a strong, symmetrical buttonhole for your cardigans. I think many of you will find it useful. Have a peek:

Rabbit care: The 4-Leaf Clover diet

Finding 4 leaf clovers is one of the things I have a freakish talent for. This bouquet of 15 was picked in about 5 or 6 minutes just after I put one of the bunnies out in their mini-grazing area. And yes, all of them are 4-leaf, but no, this isn't a sign of nuclear waste in my pasture. These were distributed among the bunnies here on the farm that weren't going to get to graze that day.

Rabbits are grazers. As such, they're designed to eat a lot of foliage. Yes, they also like fruit, grain, & veggies, but the overwhelming majority of their diet in nature would generally consist of grasses and foliage. Just read the label on your rabbit feed - what's the first ingredient? Usually alfalfa or similar.

So when the weather is mild, setup a pen in a nice shaded area with clover and tasty looking grasses and weeds, and turn your bunny out for some grazing time. If you haven't been giving your bunn stuff from the yard already, limit the first time out to 15 min or so (longer if they're investigating rather than grazing). First time out, if your bunn is a house bunn, you might also want to keep them in their cage for 12-24 hrs after, just in case they get a bit of loose stool. This is a normal reaction to a sudden introduction of large amounts of fresh, juicy food when they're used to eating hay, generally a result of the natural intestinal flora not being in quite the optimal balance for this food. You can make successive visits longer and eliminate the cage confinement as their intestinal flora adjust to the change in diet.

Just remember to keep watch over your fuzzy friend for their safety and protect them from the heat. They'll enjoy the change of pace and fresh yummy food, and you'll enjoy watching their joy.

Cthulhu attends conference with Evil Bunneh

Cthulhu discusses tactics with Evil Red-Eye Bunneh at a recent conference. Evil Red-Eye Bunneh, who is well known for her work in eating Arthur's Knights during the Holy Grail Quest, is currently available for contract work. She specializes in gnawing. Cthulhu, easily recognizable from his squiddy head, is currently on assignment at our San Francisco office.
Full story at 11.

Ok, the bunny is actually not Evil at all. This is Empire's Rosalind, also known as GirliQ, after her first shearing. She is the critter we kept from the New Year's Eve 2009 litter. She has fantastic wool with excellent density, and enough personality for two rabbits. She recently proved to be an escape artist, managing to pop open her door at around 5AM I think. I'm sure she had to have been loose for at least an hour before she ran into the bedroom and spooked the cats, causing me to actually wake up fully. We do frequently let her out to run around the house, but 5AM? Not the best time for that. I'm more careful about fully latching her door now. Fortunately she is litter trained.

The Cthulhu amigurumi was a gift custom crochet for a friend. I used what I consider to be a 'standard amigurumi body shaping', and crochetted-on (crochet-on??) squiddy facial tentacles, angry eyebrows, and horns, adding two-hole button eyes, and wings that are essentially identical to the feet of my angry duckling pattern. His new owner found him very funny, and has since graciously employed him for the purpose of terrorizing glamazons.