I certainly didn’t intend to have such a long blogging hiatus but it happened anyway.  It  started with my summer from hell.  Soon after the lovely birthday party, summer camp started.  Lots went wrong- mostly database issues resulting in registration issues and unhappy parents mad at me- but also 3 staff members quitting in the 1st 2 weeks of camp for a variety of (mostly) understandable reasons and it all made me want to go home and not come back.

Oh, it wasn’t all bad.  In the end almost 1000 kids had a great time and my cool-on-the-outside-freaking-out-on-the-inside demeanor served me well and resulted in what everyone said was the best summer of camp ever.  Yay me.  In the midst of that, I had no energy left to write and once I stopped it was hard to start back up.  I’ve probably written 25 posts in my head but that does you no good.

Since I left you, my garden grew and grew and we canned a whole lot of delicious produce.  We planted giant sunflowers and now have so many seeds!

Buffy, Oolong and Wynonna grew up and started laying delicious eggs.   One hen tried to fake us out by laying 14 eggs in a secret spot before we found them!  Then last month, sadly and suddenly, Wynonna died mysteriously, and seemingly peacefully, overnight.  So we got 2 new hens- Matcha (an Americauna) and Brown Betty (a Welsummer) but they’re not laying yet and I don’t have any pictures of them yet.  Now Oolong is molting so she’s not laying either so we’re down to one laying hen.  For now.

After camp was over we took an fun, relaxing camping trip to Paradise Creek in the Gifford Pinchot Forest in Washington.  We relaxed and explored, ate smores,  hiked on a path to nowhere and admired the pretty colors of the volcanic rocks that were all along the creek.

I’ve  only really been knitting in the past couple of weeks but I have plenty of projects that will show up here in the next few weeks.  The same goes for spinning.

I renamed my business and moved everything over to a brand new shop and website.  The story of why will come soon.  I love my new name and logo and am gearing up for the busy shopping season.

That’s the quick and dirty lowdown.  I’ve got to start small.  It feels good to get some words out there and I’ll be a little more detailed in my next posts.

So far we’ve eaten broccoli from the garden and will have fava beans and snap peas soon. We’re also growing lettuce, garlic, leeks, a million onions, kale, spinach, kohlrabi, 3 types of tomatoes, purple string beans, 2 types of shelling beans, japanese eggplants, jalapeno peppers, gypsy peppers, carrots, 2 types of potatos, basil and a few other herbs. Whew, that’s a lot! I’m really excited about having so much fresh produce right in my backyard! We also have raspberry, strawberry and blueberry plants. We’ve been enjoying the strawberries for about a week now and I just ate my first ripe blueberry this morning. Delicious!

I’m getting ready for some fun craft shows and art fairs this summer and have been working on a new product. I have this french press cover listed in my shop and several more will be for sale soon. Mike and I tested it out and it definitely keeps coffee warm longer and it adds some style to a french press.

Like my other items for sale, it’s made from a recycled wool sweater. This one is actually a wool/angora blend so it has a little extra softness. I tried some different methods of closing it and finally settled on these beaded ties. They wrap around the buttons so it can be closed as snugly as you’d like. It makes the cover a little adjustable so it’ll fit different brands that may be slightly different sizes.

Etsy is having a “yart sale” today through Sunday. It’s like a yard sale, but with art. I have a whole section of specially discounted items and you can search for “yart” on etsy to see what other good deals are out there.

Sesame won’t eat strawberries if I offer them to her at mealtimes while she’s in her high chair, but when she could pick them herself, she tried to eat them all! Despite her face in the last picture, she really liked them and amazingly most of the mess managed to stay off of her clothes.

I made fabulous strawberry shortcakes for dessert tonight. I had some creme fraiche in the fridge so I mixed some brown sugar with it and used that instead of whipped cream. Add some fresh-from-the-oven biscuits and fresh-from-the-garden berries and it was a winner!

I’ve been knitting this mess for a while and I finally have all the pieces done. After knitting this a while back, I didn’t think I’d do it again but, well, a knitted toy is hard to resist. All these pieces will be this cute little crab (Ravelry)! That’s the body, 8 legs, 2 claws and 2 eye stalks that you’re looking at. It’s for baby Lucas, whose mother is Cindy, one of my best friends but they live all the way in El Salvador so I don’t see her often enough. I hope the little cutie likes it.

The pattern isn’t written too well and is quite fiddly, for lack of a better word, but I’ll share more about that later. Speaking of patterns, I’m going to write up my loose pattern for the soaker skirt since several have asked for it. Look for that soon! In other housekeeping news, I’m hoping to add some stuff to my shop soon. With all the birthday madness, and my job starting full time next week (eek!) I have been neglecting it a little.

When I was older, I was in 4-H and I had animals so I practically lived at our county fair. I accumulated boxes full of ribbons and my grandpa and uncle were embarassed every year when I made them drive me to the fair to pick up the boxes full of stuff that I had entered.

This is a long intro to explain to you how excited I was to see that Larissa started a State-Fair-Along! I entered some things in the Oregon State Fair for the 1st time last summer (I am not a native Oregonian) and was excited to win a blue ribbon for some cookies but was disappointed at the lack of competition in many of the categories, including knitting. So was Larissa. There are so many crafty people that aren’t entering things in their fairs! So fellow Americans, knit, sew, bake, make something to enter in your local fair this has started a summer. It will be fun!

I just made this skirt but it is not fair quality. It’s summertime-fun-in-the-sun quality and that’s all I was going for. Please forgive the wrinkles, the white fabric is linen and I have been wearing it all evening. I used some of the fabric previously seen here.
So, what will I be knitting for the state fair? After much deliberation, I have decided on this:It’s the ogee tunic from Knitting Nature. I’m using Knitpicks merino style in tide pool and I am already almost done with the 1st sleeve! Pretty exciting, huh? What could be more exciting than a partially finished sleeve? A package from my secret pal! I was so excited to get this in the mail! It’s 2 skeins of knitpicks laceweight merino and a pattern for a shawl. The blue yarn is Cascade Pastaza-wool and llama! I’ve been fondling this yarn for a while now and have been wanting some. How did you know, secret pal? The colors of both are gorgeous- just what I’d choose for myself. I also got some great chocolate and fabulous stitch markers so I don’t have to use those cheap plastic rings anymore. Thank you, thank you!

After knitting this pattern, I realize that the book’s directions are a bit sloppy. Every decrease is a k2tog and the finishing directions are lazy. The apple holder was to be knitted in 4 flat pieces and then sewn together. That seemed like too much work so I knit it in the round, added paired decreases to make it a little neater and modified it some. I used size 8 dpns and some yarn left over from this project.

I went to the craziest place yesterday! The Bins, aka the Goodwill Outlet. Yes, Goodwill has an outlet. I guess it’s all the stuff that hasn’t sold in the regular stores and is an inch away from the landfill. I’ve been hearing about the place from my friend Rosie a lot and finally decided to go see for myself.

It’s a warehouse filled with huge plastic bins. Fabric items and books are seperated from everything else but that’s as far as the organization goes. People dig through these huge bins looking for treasures and most things are sold for $1.29 a pound! It’s insane and a little disturbing. They have signs cautioning the shopper (aka bargain vulture) that there could be sharp objects in the bins. I spent a fair amount of time dreading the used syringe or dead rat I was sure I’d come accross in the next bin. I even saw some “professional” bins shoppers wearing gloves to sort through the stuff. I’m not exaggerating. This is how some people make money. With enough determination, there is some valuable stuff to be found and purchased for $1.29 per pound.

I came out feeling grimy and dirty and $9 dollars poorer. I got several sweaters I’m planning on felting, some linen fabric I’ll make into a skirt. a really cute, old apron and one of those woven grass mats people take to the beach. This is what I did with one section of the mat. With some hot glue and scissors, I transformed my old, ugly, plastic planter to the new, improved tiki planter!
It now holds mint and chamomile plants. Come join me for some sun tea later this summer!