Friday, July 31, 2009

July Flowers

The first Cosmo from my little flower patch.

Our Hens and Chicks have gone to town this year. Seriously, I have never seen this type of plant behave in such a fashion. It's gone plumb crazy!


Hydrangea


Bumblebee on lavender.

More of the afore mentioned lavender.

Purple Cone flower ( Echinacea Purpurea )

Hollyhock
Shasta Daises


Bee balm ( Monarda )

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Summer Fun

A week and a half ago my siblings and I went on a 22 mile bike ride with some friends. It was on a trail that I had never been on before, the scenery was beautiful so I took plenty of pictures for the blog. This river was right at the start of the trail.



It was a hot sunny day, perfect for bike riding. There were shaded areas as well as trees along the route so we had a nice variety, and never got too hot.

At a cross road we came to there were a few buildings. They looked forlorn and long unused. I liked the look of this stone house, I think it could be charming with a little bit of work. It needs some flower beds and a few trees.


There also was a huge feed mill. I think it might still be used but I am not sure.




I think altogether we crossed three rivers/streams. It was nice to be out in the countryside and see all the beautiful sights and smell all the wonderful smells.



I've always had a thing for barns and this one standing in the wheat field was just too lovely to pass up. If you look close, there is another one way off in the distance.




All along the way there were different types of wild flowers. I am not sure if they grew there of their own accord or if someone planted them. Regardless, they were beautiful. This was one of the many little poppies we found near the tail end of the trail.


And lastly, a shot of the sunset on the drive home.

It was a lovely day, filled with friends, fellowship, food, ice cream, games, and lots of good memories.


Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Gardening....

I was scrolling down through my old posts and realized that in the last picture posted of our garden, everything looked weak and anemic. So here is a new and update picture of our garden, as of last night, this is how it looks.

These poor tomatoes here are not doing the greatest, I think it might be partly because they are shaded by the garage for most of the day. We gave them some organic tomato food and that helped a little bit. The two way on the end are struggling sadly along.


Our one and only zucchini plant has taken root and is doing well. So far we have not harvested anything from it. But that is partly due to the fact that we took of the first blooms in order to let the plant grow a bit, before putting so much energy into growing little zucchinis.


We planted the garden when Grandpa was in the hospital. Consequently it was planted at various times, and in a rushed manner. Which is the reason the tomatoes do not have cages and are sprawling everywhere they please. They are taking over the poor peppers on one side, and about to spill into the cucumbers on the other side.


We did manage to get the Sweet 100's in cages. They were huge to begin with, but now have taken off and grown to enormous heights.


The plants are loaded with little tomatoes, simply hundreds. They are growing well, although none have turned red yet.


A happy little gardener next to the Sweet 100 plants. I took this picture for size reference. The highest part of the plant comes almost to my shoulder.


One of our sad looking tomatoes has been attacked, quite fiercely, in several places. I looked high and low for the culprit ( which I assume is a tomato worm by the obvious signs he left) but so far I have not found it anywhere.


We have three heirloom tomato plants. I don't remember all of the names, and did not feel like digging down under all those leaves to find their tags. But I do remember these ones here. They are a striped Green Zebra tomato. I think they are very pretty.


The bean plant still lives, it has successfully recovered from being attacked by bugs. But I am rather doubtful as to whether it will produce any beans this year.... it is rather puny.


As I stated in a previous post, I planted four types of herbs this year. They are coming up fairly well. I think this is parsley, but I am just making a wild guess. I need to pull out my seed packages and see what exactly I planted.


This, for sure, is dill! I love the smell, and it is growing just marvelous. Although, at only five inches tall, it is a far cry from the height of six feet that it is capable of attaining.


I have this ball of sock yarn waiting to be knit up. But I don't have a sock pattern that I really like and the yarn was a little pricey ,so I want to find a pattern that is just so. I ordered four sock books from the library this morning.....we'll see what I can come up with.


The only knitting I have been doing lately is this project here. It is something for my store so I can't say what it is. I know, I know, it looks very dull right now. But it will be lovely when I am finished.

It is one of those mindless knitting projects that you knit when watching action packed movies. Not that I have been watching action packed movies! But you all know what I mean.

I have been working on the "Peace Shawl" but you all have already seen pictures of that. I didn't like the way it was turning out so I tore out the whole thing and went to a different size needle. I suppose swatching would be a good idea but I only do it when absolutely necessary. I know that is a dreadful thing to admit, and yes, if I had swatched I wouldn't have had to tear it all out. I'll try to work on swatching in the future.



Thursday, July 16, 2009

Random Pictures

I didn't have much to post concerning knitting so I thought I would put up a few random pictures of life.

Mulberries at my Grandparents, just beginning to ripen.

Apple mint on the cutting board, soon to be made into tea.


The field out back of my Grandparents. I have always loved this view.



LaMancha kids at the fair. They were sleepy ,and the one on the left wanted lots of attention.


An adorable ,1o month old Huacaya (wa-ki-`a) alpaca.


I loved the coloring!

Another alpaca, only this one is sheared.


A quizzical Nubian.

Sweet 100 tomatoes in our garden.


Our one lone jalapeno pepper.

And last, but not least, some knitting.


This is a child's sock that I made up awhile ago. I have had the second one halfway done for quite some time now. This sock is also from the "Knitting for Peace" book. It is made with a worsted weight yarn, which is nice because it whips up fast. I think I need to make a list of all my WIP, it might help me to get some of them done and out of the way.


Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Knitting and the like.....

Finally! I have something new to post! Over the last couple of weeks I have been trying to get some things finished up for our local fair. Last year I didn't even have to make anything, I just collected together some things that I had made throughout the year and took those in.
I enter in the open class at the fair, so the competition is quite wide and varied. Only one item per class is allowed, but you are free to enter as many classes as you want. For instance under the sewing category there may be ten different classes you can enter: quilting, adult garment, child garment, baby garment, pillowcase, embroider, etc. It is a lot of fun and I enjoy it immensely. Normally there are other ladies and gals I know entering, and it provides a bit of friendly competition.

This is a choker I crocheted last week. It only took a couple of hours to make, that is counting the time I spent pre-stringing the turquoise beads.


Here is the completed chemo cap. In a previous post I only showed the yarn and the book where I got the pattern. It is from "Knitting for Peace", by Betty Christiansen


I love the way the decreases form a spiral at the top.

It is a simple eyelet pattern.

I used Cascade pima cotton. It is very soft! I purchased two skeins, but barely made it into the second skein. So now I have an almost complete skein of a lovely cotton to use for whatever I please. Hmm.....what should I make?

The Rachel Bag is completely finished! It seems to have lingered in the final stage of finishing forever, simply because I have been needing to purchase the little magnetic snap for a closure.

I entered it in the fair ,where, I am pleased to say, it took 1st place in the felted item class!

I look forward to using the boku yarn more in the future. It has a beautiful striping sequence, and feels so soft when felted.
I hope you have enjoyed seeing what I have been working on recently!