Peeking around the corner …

hope someone’s here – things have stayed busy and the poor blog has been seriously neglected for much too long! The garden’s long gone, though some of it (mostly green & wax beans, and roasted tomato sauce) lingers on in the freezer, knitting projects have come and gone, and of course more’s on the needles.

The most recent one I can talk about, Tangerine Leaves can be found in Knitter’s K113, and was lovely to knit!

We got a pretty good snow (for us – probably 6-8″) starting on Thursday, and it’s been Bird Central, with cardinals, juncos, chickadees, titmice, canaries, some rather unexpected robins, bluebirds, yellow-rumped warblers, a couple of pileated woodpeckers and swarms of cedar waxwings, which are going after the berries on the cedars, and the year’s bumper crop of persimmons.

Cedar waxwings feasting on persimmons

Toby’s been loving the snow, in fact it’s been hard to get him to come in, even when it’s been in the teens & 20’s, and he comes in with snow sticking everywhere, including ice balls in his feet

Maggie’s more into cozy spots – here’s why it’s hard to get the bed made around here 😉 We’re trying to get ready for the holidays, but there’s always something more to do!

Catching up is hard to do!

The Knitting Camp trip was great as always. In addition to all the usual wonderfulness, after some years of blog and email virtual visiting, Angie and I were able to arrange a real meet-up in Cedarburg WI for lunch at Cream & Crepes (yum!) and some visiting after lunch. Fingers crossed that we can do it again! 🙂

Meet-up in Cedarburg.

A friend at Camp had made the Scallops & Ribs top (Knitter’s K110) and brought it for Show & Tell, so of course she was also part of my Show & Tell. I love her choice of color!

Natascha’s Scallops & Ribs.

I had a wonderful time, but of course the downside of trips is catching up when you get home. The garden (especially the beans!) kept growing while I was gone, and I’ve frozen quite a few beans to be enjoyed next winter. They’re still coming in at a pretty good rate, and the little French fillet beans (Calima) are definitely on the do-again list, in fact, probably more of them and a bit less of some of the other varieties.

Except for a very few here & there, we’re still waiting for the tomatoes, but the squash and cucumbers are coming in at a manageable pace.

My new rose bush had a tiny, but nice surprise for me – I wanted red, and this is a lovely red.

Prairie Clogger (Griffin Buck rose).

If anyone’s looking for me, I’ll probably either be in the garden, or in the kitchen dealing with the veggies 😉

Goin’ Knitting

Time for Knitting Camp – can’t wait to see everyone 🙂

Meanwhile …

There’s another shawl pattern, Ripples on the Shore, up on Ravelry. The sample used Crazy Zauberball; I had to keep going just to see what the colors were going to do next 😉

Ripples on the Shore

These 2 geraniums were very small when I got them – they’re starting to fill the larger pots quite nicely!

The beans have really taken off; I picked the first ones on Wednesday, then even more yesterday, and we had the first ones (just plain with a little salt & butter – yum!!!) for dinner last night. At the rate they’re going, I’ll be putting lots in the freezer, which will be lovely next winter! I’m still waiting for the wax beans to be ready, but some are starting to show color.

No ripe tomatoes yet, but there are quite a few green ones out there. I imagine the trick will be to get them before the squirrels do. The now huge volunteer squash plant in the compost looks like it’s likely to be a butternut, so it will be a while before any of them are ripe, but it’s really spreading … and I thought the dill almost looked like little yellow bursts of fireworks 🙂

KIPing, gardening and catching up

I was actually KIPing* at the end of the appropriate week for once. Potosi (originally Mine au Breton) celebrated the 250th anniversary of its founding with a big parade, pageant and all sorts of activities, including heritage crafters. We were pretty lucky with our location on the porch of the courthouse, which provided shade as well as shelter from rain – we needed both! I ended up working on a pair of mittens, which is mostly finished, but I suppose I really should go back and finish the 2nd thumb 😉The following weekend was TNNA, which is always both hectic and interesting with all the new yarns to pet. All in all, a good trip (though I’m still catching up with details from it), and I was lucky to leave ahead of the later weather delays!

The garden is coming along nicely, and we have actual teeny-tiny beans on 3 of the 4 varieties I planted; the other variety is blooming, just no beans yet. If they all do well, we could have beans like all the bad zucchini jokes 😉The Italian Roma beans are labeled as bush beans, but the more they grow, the more I think they’re not bush, so I recycled an old gate as a trellis for them, just in case.

Supposed-to-be-bush beans

And more … I can hardly wait for the fresh veggies 😛

Sweet Italian peppers

Tomatoes

Volunteer tomato plants and mystery squash/melon in the old compost pile

Salvia by the deck

*Knitting In Public

Off & running …

or at least sort of 😉 This weekend is the 250th anniversary of the founding of our nearest town, and I’ll be KIPing (in costume) at the Courthouse both Saturday and Sunday. I’ve packed a variety of projects – a lace edging, facecloth, sock and a mitten. I’ll try to get some photos.

All the yarns in the basket have been worked up, and they were all lovely. Here are a couple of the yarn doodlings

Panda Silk

Sweet Georgia Cashsilk

Yesterday I was looking for some straight needles (well-hidden as they so rarely get used!); Look what I found while digging in a box of old knitting stuff – wow!!!The shaded sweater actually caught my eye first, but the 2nd one is also an Elizabeth Zimmermann design, though in 1960, Woman’s Day obviously wasn’t into giving designers credit. Mom must have ordered the booklet, and also saved the pictures from the magazine. There are more goodies in the box that I need to investigate later.

Found this in the yard this afternoon (right before it was mowed) – there was 1 small clump/plant that was mostly 5-leafed ones, though I never saw one quite like this before. And this was the first thing I saw when I went out on the deck yesterday morning – big surprise! I’d prefer it stay off the deck, but I’m happy to have it doing rodent patrol in the yard.

Black rat snake; usually just called a black snake

Guess I need to quit procrastinating and finish packing!

Yarn, garden and other bits

I received some interesting yarns to doodle with,

Seeds are coming up in the garden …

Roma Italian beans.

Squash.

and the planters are looking good

In a moment of possible insanity, I said I’d participate in the 250th anniversary celebration for our county seat, which meant digging out a craft show wardrobe that hasn’t been used in forever. We won’t discuss the fact that some alterations are needed, but if I do say so, I’m still rather proud of some of the trim details I did so many years ago!

Craft show clothes

Apron pocket detail.

Apron lace (yes, it needs to be ironed)

Garden and a little knitting

Lots of things in bloom now, with more to come. The peonies are right on time for Memorial Day. I’m wishing I’d put supports around them earlier, especially Festiva Maxima, which is so loaded it’s drooping badly, but it’s gorgeous!

Peony White Sands

Pink Peony

Peony Festiva Maxima

I’ve made progress in the vegetable garden. There’s now a tomato plant next to each of the stakes but 1 – I’m still chasing a black/purple tomato plant for that spot. I had a Black Krim last year, but haven’t had any luck finding a plant this year. The asparagus (extreme right; planted last year) is doing nicely, and we should be able to pick more from it next year. There’s 1 row of okra in (blue tag, left) and a couple of rows of beans yet to plant – I get hungry just thinking about them 😉

And here’s the gratuitous knitting picture – I finished a pair of socks in Lang JaWolle from stash (!); there’s another pair already on the needles. Hope everyone has a lovely holiday!