Sunflowers!

Sunflowers are such a cheerful flower. We have some really tall ones growing in our garden. We didn't plant them. They're volunteers from last year's garden. Hubby posed next to them so you can see how tall they are. (BTW, he's 5' 8".)

After some much needed warmer temperatures, the squash, cucumbers, and tomatoes are finally producing. I have almost enough zucchini in the freezer for the winter. That's good because the squash bugs and vine borers are working on them. Tonight we're having squash fritters for dinner. Yum!! I may bake a couple of batches of zucchini bread to freeze. Tomorrow, we'll harvest the sweet corn. The raccoons have knocked down a couple of ears. We'll eat some of the corn but most of it will go into the freezer for winter meals.

Take a peek at size of this winter squash. That's my camera case sitting next to it for size comparison. Can you believe how large that squash is? It's a cushaw squash which I've heard tastes a lot like pumpkin but sweeter. I've spotted 3 or 4 of these babies in the garden. This may be the first but not last time we grow these!

Here's a tip that some gardeners may not know: When you harvest cabbage to eat, carefully remove the head leaving some large leaves and the roots alone. After a few weeks, it will start to look like this. Let them grow into the fall and you'll have a second harvest of mini cabbages to use.

It's feeling more like fall around here today. I have my fingers crossed that we don't have an early fall. I am so not ready for cold weather to return. Last winter started early and stayed overlong with lots of snow. And this summer has been a cool one.

In honor of the sunflowers blooming, I'm releasing a new free pattern. It's a Sunflower dishcloth (or hotpad) and coasters. You'll need size 7 (4.5 mm) needles and scraps of dishcloth cotton to knit them (about 30 yards for each cloth and 14 yds for each coaster). [Try knitting them with larger needles (maybe 9's) and worsted weight felting wool for felted coasters and hotpads.] Both sunflowers start by knitting a strip of petals. Then you pick up stitches along the straight edge of the petal strip. The cloth is then knit in the round on double points. The coaster's center is knit on straights. Once you're finished you weave the purl bumps together to close the seam. Both are fun and fast projects that will make great gifts.

You can download a free pdf of the patterns on Ravelry. It prints out as a nice little folder printed on the front and back of one sheet of paper. Click HERE to find the link.

Lotus Blossom Bag -- new pattern!

Here's my newest design --- the Lotus Blossom Bag. This is a joint project with my friend Jamie. She came up with some killer embellishments for this bag.

This felted bag features an unusual construction method. The body of the bag is knit sideways in garter stitch. Short rows add a flare to the bag. The bottom stitches are picked up along the lower edge and knit in the round. The pattern is written for a small (165 yards) and large bag (420 yards). It's knit in worsted weight felting wool yarn on size 10.5 (6.5 mm) needles. The purple and red bags were knit with Patons Classic Wool. The pink bag in Galway Paint.

Knit it plain or add flowers, buds, leaves, and vines. Scraps of several colors are needed for the embellishments. Directions are included to for the embellishments. (Psst...the flower pattern makes a cute coaster too!)

The small bag stands about 8" tall and is 20" around. The larger bag stands about 11" tall and is 31" around.

The pattern is available in my Ravelry pattern store.


For more information, visit my Ravelry pattern store to see all my available designs, current pricing information, and purchase pattern downloads.

Weird weather & deer

The month of July here in northern Indiana was the coolest July on record (going back to 1893). Our local TV weatherman said we had only 4 days that were normal or above normal temps. We set 3 record low high temperatures for July and our average daytime temperature was only 67 degrees! You can understand why the warm weather veggies in our garden were sitting there doing nothing. I shouldn't complain about how cool it's been. Other parts of the country have been sweltering in 100+ degree heat.

Turn the calendar to August and watch it change! As our daytime high is going down, the actual temperature has gone up. The last few days we've been in the low 90s or high 80s, much warmer than it has been here since late June. The warm weather crops are making up for lost time. Summer squash, cucumbers, tomatoes, and peppers, are finally coming in. The sweet corn is setting ears and we got our first crop of bush beans. (It also may be the last. Covering the bed with Birdx netting has kept the deer out. Sigh...a bunny rabbit has burrowed under the fence and is working on the plants.) The okra plants have grown noticeably bigger every morning. No blossoms yet.

Here's what I spotted out my patio door one day last week---a doe and 3 babies! The pictures aren't as clear as I would like. I was afraid to open the door and scare them away. The deer are getting quite bold. Usually they would come around at dusk or dawn. The deer around here are getting so used to humans that they come out during the day. This photo was taken about 2 pm. One day driving down a road near us, a mother deer and two babies crossed the road. Thank goodness everyone stopped for them!

I've made great progress on reorganizing my craft room. Strike that, my design studio. I feel that is a much better name for that space. My yarn, fabric, and spinning fiber has been sorted into bins and shelves. I love how it looks! I've thought of posting pictures but I'm not sure I want to share how much stash I really have. LOL!

Hubby looked at what I had accomplished and says, "Why don't we paint the walls, put in new flooring, and a ceiling fan?" I groaned. Why didn't he suggest that BEFORE I did all this work? I told him if he finishes some of the projects he has started around the house (baseboards, finishing doorways, cabinet kickplates, patching holes, etc.) I might consider it next year. Hubby has a habit of starting lots of home improvement projects but never quite finishing them. It drives me crazy!

I've sorted out 3 bins full of yarn to swap/sell on Ravelry. Check out my trade/sell folder if you are interested. Still to come is a cleanout of all my sewing, quilting, knitting, crocheting, and spinning books and magazines. There's a groaning bookcase full in my studio, plus more in the office and the living room. It's definitely time to pare the collection down to more manageable levels.

Lots of designing is going on behind the scenes. I have a bunch of patterns in the works at various stages. I'm hoping to have at least one pattern finished by the end of the week.

I've submitted a few designs to be used by the Holiday Mystery Gift Along group here on Yahoo. You'll have to wait and see what they are. :) The HMG group is a fun one with lots of things to knit (and crochet) for holiday gifts. The 2009 season of patterns begins on September 19th.

Help name me, critters! & the garden

Designing, knitting, spinning, crocheting, and working on organizing my craft room are keeping me busy. (And I clean my house, shop for groceries, do laundry, cook, and lots of other things on top of this.) I can no longer stand how cluttered my craft room is. Last weekend, I packed almost everything out of the room and started over. I bought a bunch of stackable wire crates and created a wall for my yarn stash. (Three bins worth that I am not keeping are in my trade/sell folder on Ravelry.) I sorted all the scrap yarn I use for cat toys into some stackable bins I got on sale. I still have to sort through bins of fabric and decide what to keep and what to get rid of. Then go through my shelf of craft books (knitting, crocheting, spinning, sewing, and quilting). I have too many hobbies! I'll post some pics when I get everything whipped into shape. It will be nice to have an organized room where I can find what I need and have room to work. :)

This week I've been working on a crocheted triangle shawl. The pattern is finally worked out. I had some difficulty visualizing how the increases needed to work. Now I have to make a full sized version to see how much yarn is needed for the shawl.

Some projects in the works are a new scarf design that without a name. Here's what half of it looks like. It has arrows going up, down, sideways, a zigzag and a lace edge. I knit the sample with only one ball of Jojoland Melody. This will be a charted only design since the lace pattern is so simple. I'm working on instructions for turning the scarf into a stole to as an extra with the pattern. Any suggestions for names? Leave a comment below. If I choose the name you suggest, you'll get a free pdf copy of the pattern when it's ready to go.

Another one is a felted tote bag. Sigh, it doesn't have a name either. (Suggest away!) I'm actually working on several felted bag designs. I have so many designs in the various stages that I'm losing track of how many there are. LOL!

This is beginning to look like a year without summer for us. Our temps are probably 10-15 degrees below what they should be. Everytime we get close to normal temps, they take a nose dive again. We could really use some rain. We did get 4/10ths of an inch last night which helped.

Here's is some of the first veggies from our garden this year. I picked one zucchini earlier this week. I am so missing home grown veggies. By this time last year, we had been eating fresh zucchini and beans for almost a month and I had frozen bags of it. This year, the deer have eaten the tops off our beans. I purchased some Bird-x netting that we have clipped to the fence over the beans. This is keeping the deer out of the beans. Hubby has replanted and the bean stubs that were left are trying to make a come back. I don't know if we will have enough warm weather to harvest them. The deer are enjoying the cucumber plants too. The cucumber in the basket is the first one we've harvested this year. :( The plant it came from is growing inside a wire cage where they can't get to it. We've been seriously thinking about fencing our entire garden. Though a neighbor tells us that even an 8 foot fence will not keep the deer out.

Hubby was happy to see the first two ripe tomatoes. Though the tomato plants don't have a lot of fruit because of the cool weather. The potatoes, cabbages, brussels sprouts, and broccoli love cool weather and are all doing fine. The days are getting shorter and fall is coming. I don't hold out much hope that we'll get much of anything from our warm weather veggies.

Have you noticed how screwed up the weather seems to be all over the U.S. this year? The NE has been cold and wet. I've heard that the potato blight has shown up there. (Isn't that what caused the potato famine in Ireland many years ago?) It's been cool and dry here in the upper Midwest. Texas and points west are hot and dry with crops drying up in the fields. The Pacific NW has been warm too. This doesn't bode well for food crops produced in this country. A smaller harvest also means higher prices at the grocery store. Not something that any of us want to see.

The special intro price on the La Petite Fleur shawl pattern is good through July 31st. If you want the pattern, buy it soon before the price goes up.

Someone from New Albany, Mississippi recently sent me a small box of yarn scraps to use for cat toys. I'd like to thank her for her generosity. There was no note or email address in the package. I turn these short lengths of yarn into cat toys for my local, no-kill animal shelter, Pet Refuge. Some of my toys are sold to help raise much needed funds for them. This week I was able to give them $47 collected from the toy jar I fill at my vet's office. Animal shelters are having a hard time. Donations are down and shelters are bursting at the seams with animals dropped off by people who can no longer afford to feed their pets. I do what I can to help. I encourage others to do so too. :)

La Petite Fleur Shawl -- new pattern!

Here's the newest design in my collection of small shoulder shawls---La Petite Fleur (little flower).

This is a three triangle, wedge shaped shawl knit from the neck down. It's an easy knit with a row of flower motifs forming a pretty border that ends in a picot edge. Add beads to make it sparkle. Small enough to tuck in your bag, this shawl makes a quick cover up that’s great for summer evenings or chilly air conditioned rooms. This project knits up quickly and will have everyone asking where you bought it!

Knit this fun flower bordered little shawl with with one skein of sock or fingering weight yarn (350-400 yards) using size 6 needles. Great for showing off handspun yarn. Options are given for adding beads to the lace border (see picture) and edge and enlarging the shawl. This is a four page pattern with written line-by-line instructions and a lace chart.

The pink shawl was knit with Fleece Artist Sea Wool (382 yards) and the green one with Miss Babs Bamboo Baby Sock Yarn (400 yards). The green shawl is a test knit by my friend Jamie. The picture is used with her permission.

The pattern is available in my Ravelry pattern store. Have fun!

For more information, visit my Ravelry pattern store to see all my available designs, current pricing information, and purchase pattern downloads.

Critters

You would think we live way out in the country (instead of a bustling suburban area) from all the critters that have visited our yard recently.

For example, this week:

Foxes are now living under our neighbor's shed to the east. They must have run off the ground hog who was living there. On the bright side, they won't eat our garden and may keep some of the other critters away who do. We had noticed a strong musky smell around a few times lately. And several weeks ago a rabbit had been killed in our front yard. Nothing was left but fur. We had suspected that a fox did this.

Raccoons are living under our neighbor's shed to the west. Early Thursday morning, hubby saw two raccoon babies on the wrong side of the fence. The momma raccoon was hollering at them and they didn't know what to do. Hubby got a shovel and carefully dug a hole under the fence (with mama and babies watching) so that babies could get back to momma. As soon as they were on the right side of the fence, momma grabbed them by the scruff of the neck and towed them back under the shed.

A ground hog is still living under our shed. :( This after being run off by another one several weeks ago.

Last week, a mother deer and a fawn were in our yard. (During the winter we sometimes had 7 deer visit our bird feeder.) Mama deer jumped the neighbors fence, leaving the fawn behind. She was too small to jump that high. She ran up and down the fence hollering until she figured out she could go around the end.

Pookie and Boo like to go outside during the day. Yesterday, when I went to check on them, I found two big dogs coming up to the house. I ran them off. Boo and Pookie were hiding in the bushes. They came in as soon as the coast was clear.

Hubby and I have thought several times about fencing our yard. It would be expensive and probably would not keep all the critters out. We also like the open space and the view we have.

I can't resist posting another picture of Pookie. He was intrigued by a fold up crate that I usually keep in the trunk of my car. He decided it was a good place to lay down. Love the glowing eyes through the crate handles! LOL! He seems to like having his picture taken.

I finished this crocheted baby blanket last night. I call it Sunrays. It's an easy pattern to crochet. I'm working on a shawl version of this using 4 wedges instead of 6. My original idea was inspired by the lace pattern in my Wings to Heaven shawl. I wanted to see if I could reproduce it in crochet. It took about 5 tries and lots of ripping and crocheting before I got it figured out.

One of these days, I'll get some more patterns ready to post. I'm on a felted bag craze. I have about 3 designs that I need to test knit.

Gardening, new patterns, and more

Our normal spring temperatures can swing wildly between cold and hot. The clash of these air masses can and has produced severe storms and tornados in our area. This year has been different, one of those springs that comes once in a blue moon. We've stayed in the cool range with a few nights even getting down into the upper 30s. Not good for warm weather plants but great for us. Flowers have bloomed like mad with no storms to knock their blossoms off early.

These cool nighttime temps have made it hard to get our warm weather veggies planted. The last few will finally go in this weekend. We need some 80 degree days and warm nights for the corn, squash, cucumbers, tomatoes, and beans to do anything but sit there. The weatherman says that next week we will start to see some of those warmer temps. Here's a peek at the potatoes coming up.

As usual, we have ground hogs living under our shed and our neighbor's shed. Early the other morning, my hubby called me to come watch what was happening in the middle of our garden. Two big ground hogs were fighting and screaming at each other. It looked to be a territorial dispute over our garden. They both must be males. They ran around the yard rolling, biting, and screaming at each other. I've never seen anything like it before!

We make cages out of heavy gauge fence wire to put around individual plants like broccoli that ground hogs love to eat. If we don't, they will eat them to the ground. Ground hogs don't share. Fencing the entire garden doesn't help. We've tried it. They dig under the fence and eat until they are stuffed. One of the cages hubby put around a broccoli plant this year was made from some flimsy wire. The ground hog has managed to get it off the plant and chewed it down to a nub. We've bought more wire that we will use to build more sturdy cages this weekend to put around vulnerable plants.

The mystery shawl kal I hosted is over. Though I loved seeing the shawls knit from my design, it was a lot of work and took up too much of my time. The shawl kits and other prizes have been awarded. All packages were mailed on Monday, June 8. I've received email from two people that their packages have arrived. The one that went to Denmark will take awhile to arrive. Crystal Garden is the name I've given this shawl design. The pattern should be finished sometime this summer. It's going to take a lot of work. The entire shawl has to be charted (and the instructions written up). There are no motif repeats as there are in most shawl patterns. It will require me to use a new charting method as my current software program can't handle the size charts I need.

I have a few more patterns almost ready to release. The Lotus Blossom felted bag (pictured at the botton of my May 8 post), a Blossom Coaster (like the Blossom Facecloth), and Le Petit Fleur (a small shoulder shawl with beads and a flower border) are in the final stages. Test knitters are working on them. I need better pictures too.

My spinning wheel has been busy. This pink and peach merino I finished last week. My Rav friend, Jamie, dyed the fiber. It was a joy to spin and made a laceweight 2 ply yarn---4.2 ounces and 926 yards! This will be saved for a special shawl project. Jamie recently got a drum carder for her birthday. I sent her a box of fiber from my stash to help her get started. In return, she's sent me these batts she made as a thank you. I was overwhelmed by her generosity and so excited. Lots of fun spinning ahead! (Psst, don't you think she should sell some of these beauties?)

My fiber arts group is having our second all-day retreat on June 20th. I'm helping out with it. We couldn't do it without volunteers. One member found us a venue. Another one has worked hard since January contacting various companies for donations for goodie bags. I can't wait to see what she's come up with! Another member is teaching a top-down sweater class. Plus we'll have a demo about Ravelry and how it works. I'll be putting together some notes and a handout for that demo. Several vendors will be there selling yarn, fiber, and other goodies. Lunch is an all-you-can-eat buffet downstairs in the university dining hall. Members are encouraged to bring along things for a sell and swap table. It's a lot of fun!

Finally, I'll post a picture of Pookie. Here he is all relaxed and asleep. We humans could learn something about relaxing from kitties. He's found a catnip plant growing in on of my flower beds. Look at how big the leaves of this plant are! That's my hand next to the leaf for comparison. Pookie loves catnip. :)