366 is the number

Posted on Posted in book reviews/events, designing, food and garden, projects

you guys are the BEST—you deserve flowers! and i have just the ones; these freshly-blooming pink lilies are for you because the number of roger sock patterns sold through midnight last night is 366, and that’s a big number. my donation of the proceeds has been sent but stay tuned—on sunday we will draw one name from the purchaser’s pool to be awarded this beautiful prize from briar rose fibers

thank you so SO very much; this means the world to me. and it looks like claudia’s last week of fundraising for her MS bike ride has gone very well—she’s a lot closer to her goal now than she was seven days ago and she still has a few days to go. if you have a minute, stop by claudia’s blog to wish her luck on the ride this weekend.

ok, we wouldn’t be knitters against MS if we didn’t have knitting to talk about, now would we?

last night i went to debby’s house to knit for a few hours with her and susie. we watched a specTACular thunderstorm roll in over their lake and unleash its wrath over the land. sorry for sounding so biblical, but it really was that dramatic.

i worked on pompa all evening, in between gasping at the sky and lightening. unfortunately i didn’t have my camera to take pictures and i forgot about my iPhone (sorry, i’m getting there, but i’m still not a phone kinda person)

i think i’m almost to the halfway point on this scarf now; it looks like i’ll have plenty of yarn for the little accent scarf i imagined—one-skein pretties are a good thing. we all fawned over the bison pearl yarn and gave it a squishy hug—it’s so incredibly soft when it’s knit up, mmm.

i’d really like to finish some of these small projects up this weekend—i’m feeling a little scattered because my knitting is so spread out right now—i’ve got two scarves, two socks, a sweater, and a stole on the needles, plus, i’m in the middle of writing a pattern for the new secret project. that’s just a couple too many (and only the ones i remember off the top of my head; there might be one or two more i’ve forgotten).

i think i’m in good shape to get at least one of the socks done (although i’d still have a second one of each to knit, too). right now they are both at the same place—the start of the heel. above is the neutral version of the regatta sock in lorna’s laces shepherd sock, colorway pleasant prairie. i’m knitting this one according to the pattern i wrote which includes a few tweaks i made after completing the first blue sock.

someone mentioned that there appeared to be a lot more blue in the neutral mix than we could see in the skein; at first i thought maybe it was a trick of the camera, but no—it’s definitely there in the knitted fabric and i love it with the taupes and grays. i enjoy those kind of surprises that come with knitting . . .

nate’s sock is zipping right along on 2.5 mm needles (they feel huge compared to the 2 mm, hahaha) in a fun pattern that i like more and more as i go. i have no idea yet if nate himself is fond of what i’ve chosen to do for his namesake sock, but for some reason this pattern just stuck to him like a magnet in my mind. and the orange grandma’s blessing, really is perfect for showing off those stitches, too. look at colorway 9058a if you’re a fan.

so yes, i’ll finish at least one of those socks this weekend and hopefully, a scarf as well.

i also need to get back to the maze sweater

which is still at the exact place i left it off last—the knitting fairies have not visited my house for even a few minutes to add a row or two. to be fair, they probably could not figure out my pattern notes, heh.

i never meant to leave it off this long, but i’m glad i got this month’s secret project all done, too. something just had to give. now i can get back to this and write up the pattern so progress can move in a forward direction.

i’ve added one more repeat to the nightingale stole but honestly, you don’t need to see another photo—it looks almost exactly the same as it did the other day. in fact, i was thinking that for the next little bit, it MIGHT be more interesting to photograph the changes in the yarn cake as it collapses and loses shape while i plod toward the finish. like watching tomatoes ripen or something.

speaking of which, i’ve really got my work cut out for me in the garden this weekend, too.

the tomato plants are loaded with fruit—and also with aphids, ugh. we’ve had some soaking rains, alternating with hot, humid days, which have caused the plants to grow like crazy and form dark, cool canopies that are the perfect environment for buglies to thrive. i have some organic insect deterrent that usually works really well to control the problem, so this evening i’ll get out there and do some spraying. and maybe prune away some lower branches, too; there’s a lot of extra foliage down below that will not produce fruit or help keep the fruit on the upper branches cool, but is providing much-too-easy access for insects to step up onto the plants.

and my greens—WHOA. in the last few days they have gotten even taller and there’s a lot that’s ready to pick—chard, more zen greens, bok choy, and the rapini (far right) which is huge and now flowering

it’s the perfect time to cut it all down, put it up in the freezer and then reseed. in fact, i’m feeling that friday afternoon antsy feeling; i might go out when i’m done writing this, cut some of it down, and cook it up—should only take about an hour and that will be that.

i’m trying to decide if i should grow one more crop of rapini or put something else in instead. i have seeds for green beans and okra that i’m considering, too. to quell my impatience with the part of the asparagus bed that was still stubbornly devoid of life last sunday, i planted few okra seeds there and this morning, they were sprouting

wow, i just went out there to look again and now there are like a dozen more okra up out of the ground—in just a couple of hours! some of them with leaves unfolded already. really, it’s a miracle, you know?

along with—i almost fell down—the asparagus david planted ages ago. i couldn’t be more surprised; i thought the asparagus was a total loss—it wasn’t there yesterday morning when i looked. but then norma said hers was finally showing signs of life so just now i looked again and sure enough

mine are too. now i have a dilemma because i planted okra seeds in between. i can transplant those into a row i’ve emptied of greens, though, once they get a bit stronger. or just plant new okra—that might be smarter.

all the greens are way bigger than i’ve ever been able to grow them. it’s so hard to express how exciting this is for me. greens are vegetables we did not grow at home on our farm, so i don’t have much experience with them. but i love eating them. i never expected that growing them prolifically would be fraught with angst, but it makes this season especially sweet.

yesterday i picked peppers and squash and i think there will be more squash today; that means i can put bag or two of that up in the freezer as well as cook some for dinner.

over in the spinach box, the seeds i planted sunday are also sprouting today—just little threads for now, but in a week, they’ll have second leaves and be on their way. last night while i was out, david ate a big salad for dinner with shrimp and green beans on a bed of our own lettuce (i was jealous).

and there are some things that are over already, now that midsummer is past (ouch—i can’t believe i’m saying that the longest day of summer is behind us now)

i’m pretty sure this is the last handful of strawberries for this year. they were gorgeous, each and every one, but i have to admit, not all that sweet. something to work on for next year.

have a great weekend everyone; thank you all agann so much for your help in making the MS fundraiser a rousing success—our best ever. thank you.

18 thoughts on “366 is the number

  1. Congratulations on the money raised for the MS bike ride through the Roger Sock! And congratulations on having soon so many Roger socks out there. 366 orders… that’s at least 732 socks!

    And as always the pictures of your yard are amazing. Wish I could taste those strawberries…

  2. Yay! SO glad it was such a huge success. 🙂

    Love the pink flowers on top, they are even prettier than my pink ones! We’ve got yellow too I just found, and dark red, along with another shade of pink, and then the regular tiger lily flowers. 🙂 My faves!

  3. yep, my clippers and tomato plants had a little meet up last week after I realized that my first crop of ripe tomatoes had been eaten from the bottom up. did some serious thinning of interior and bottom branches and sprayed the daylights out of them.

  4. lilies and strawberries and tomatoes Oh My!
    My kind and wonderful mother bought me a hanging basket of everblooming strawberries this year…so we are just starting to get some fruit and they are amazing…by far my favorite of the garden…till the tomatoes ripen that is!

  5. That’s quite a lovely total! Good for the sock knitters. Or the sock-pattern-purchasers, anyway.

    And that “Nate” pattern is drool worthy! And green growing things. It’s always swell to read your blog.

  6. Congratulations on the success of your Roger sock pattern fundraiser for Claudia! That’s fantastic!

    Love the pink flowers (and the rest of your garden), and Nate’s sock is coming along nicely.

  7. Congratulations, Anne, you are a true enabler, for a wonderful cause. Lots of strawberries for you!

  8. Congratulations on the amazing number of Roger sock patterns sold! Count on knitters to come through for a real need.

    My tomatoes are swarming with aphids, too, but I’ve been afraid to spray…haven’t had this problem before where the soil seems to move! What kind of insecticide do you use? I can use all the help I can get! Too much rain and too many storms (I live in Indy) have kept the blooms from setting so tomatoes are sparse for now. I sure don’t want to lose any plants just because of those pesky aphids!

  9. Oh, don’t even start showing me those tomatoes,again, this year!! Our tomatoes aren’t going anywhere; we’ve had so much rain and NO sun. Out of twenty-seven days, we’ve had twenty-three with rain. I’m not kidding. It’s so depressing.

    All of your on-going projects are just beautiful!

  10. Those are just about the prettiest strawberries I’ve ever seen. Perhaps they’re like people – beauty and sweetness don’t always go together! 😉

  11. What pretty strawberries!

    Since you are growing tomatoes, thought I would tell you what I saw yesterday at Sam’s Warehouse. A contraption that lets you grow several tomato plants…upside down. Evidently (going by the picture) the luscious plants will hang down, dangling their fruit, which will grow and ripen without the plant ever touching the ground. I just stared and stared.

  12. Thanks for your recommendation of The Help awhile back Anne – I spent a wonderful Saturday knitting away and listening to it. It’s one of the best audiobooks I’ve had the pleasure of (and I’ve been going through one a week since I got my first iPod back in 2003), and one I’d mentally crossed of my list due to its girly cover.

  13. Awesome, awesome, awesome– the sock fundraising, the asparagus up, the greens going wild! My strawberries were variously (they’re still coming) sweet and not-so-sweet also. I wonder what it is. Some are just knee-weakeningly sweet, others disappointing. I’ve already decided, though, that when the garlic comes out of one of the 6-foot beds, the strawberries are going to be dug and divided and their space doubled from their 3-foot bed. Yippee!

  14. All your garden produce looks amazing. I feel really inspired to make a real effort with our pots and tubs on the balcony this autumn ready for next year.

  15. My husband clicked through to your blog a couple of days ago, Anne, and couldn’t get over the abundance of your garden. I think you’ve made him jealous, because he’s been quite attentive to our own piddly veggie patch this week!

  16. I swear if you show yummy strawberries like that one more time I’m on a plane to your house for desert! Mmmmmmm, they look good!

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