pjbknit

Knit, Crochet, Plants, Etc.

One of the things is, the Granny Smith apple tree is blooming, later than the other apple trees.

I made a blueberry pound cake from a Cooking Light recipe from 1998. I remembered it all these years. I found some Chobani lemon yogurt and want to try it again.

It has been warm lately, and Belvedere comes in and lies on the cool floor, or near an A/C vent. Here he was tired from gallumping after the UPS truck.

The Bird of Paradise is budding. DH says we need to divide the plant into at least five. We got a truckload of potting soil yesterday. Wonder if he will need the machete?

I think the amaryllis missed the season. These are a some of a collection of Red Lion bulbs in a pot with the Norfolk Island pine, from Christmas presents and after-Xmas sales.

I dug up my fall-planted shallots in order to plant more seeds that are supposed to produce more shallots. We shall see.

I finished Sedona's sleeves to make sure I had enough yarn left for the body. Think I have two skeins left of the Rowan Calmer.

I started a market bag last year in crochet. The single crochet base hurt my hands, so I put it away for months, until I had the idea to pick up stitches around the base and knit the rest of the bag. The yarn is Sugar 'n' Cream.

We have tomato seedlings, plus six more at least this size in the Aerogarden. The short plants are peppers and basil. They are larger and in pots now.

Pears, Honey

Actually, this is pear honey. (I used 2 cups of pineapple and cooked it in a 3.5 qt Crock Pot on High until it got thick) I did not quite have enough pears for a batch, so I had to run out to the tree. I grabbed a limb, shook it and got outta the way as pears rained down. I also didn't have crushed pineapple, so I put chunks in the food processor. Think it looks OK.  The recipe yielded the equivalent of 9 half pints, in a combination of 12 oz, 6 oz and 4 oz jars.

I have finally, finally, reached the sleeve divide of the raglan cardigan Sedona in Rowan Calmer yarn.

Yesterday, I got my Margarita sock yarn package from Woolgirl.  Mine was strawberry, and had all kinds of goodies, includng a pattern, bag, stitchmarker, Jelly Belly beans in drinkie flavors, flipflop notepad, much more, etc. All PINK.

 

 

 

Evidence of Knitting

See I do knit. Actually, I finished this sweater, Zoe from C2Knts, a few weeks ago, but just got around to weaving in the ends and blocking. It is almost dry, then I have to sew on a couple of buttons. The yarn, Cascade Cotton Club, is not that blue, but is a greener teal.

I really like the cable and lace pattern, can you tell?

Look at those purty handmade buttons from Four Eyes Designs on Etsy.

Today for lunch I went out and picked a couple of tomatoes-their production has slowed way down. I made a Tomato Basil Mozzarella Pie, my version of this recipe.

 

Canning and Caterpillars

I saw some decapitated parsley plants, and kept looking for swallowtail caterpillars. I found some in the next couple of days after finding the chewed parsley. They were on the dill in the next planter.  I was wondering if frass serves as fertilizer.The red in the background of the caterpillar shot is the periwinkle (vinca) that DH has nutured through 2 winters.

I left the pupa alone to try to see the butterfly emerge. I always wanted to do that when I was young, but my mother would rather have the parsley and dill plants.

I made real old fashioned fig preserves yesterday. No ginger, just figsm sugar and lemon. I have one Dutch oven that six pounds of figs and five pounds of sugar barely fit into. I cooked it over an hour, which is about how long it takes the canner to boil on the extra burner because we have a ceramic cooktop. I really have to start using the hot water pot.

I also made some more crushed tomatoes today-using the 5.5 qt Crock pot, rather than several. I made some oven-roasted sauce with onions and garlic and fresh basil, rosemary, thyme and oregano for lunch.

Speaking of tomatoes, I picked some cherry tomatoes (below) and froze them whole, after being inspired by this blog post. The Virginia Peach was too pretty to cook today.

In other gardening news, the gourd vine is encroaching on the patio. I have dubbed it the John L. Ells, Sr. memorial gourd vine because my FIL loved to grow gourds and make birdhouses. We think the seed was from one of his gourds. One year, a vine went up the gutter and on the roof and TV antenna.

Look, knitting! I have gotten a lot done on Sedona (in Rowan Calmer yarn) in the past couple of days. DH had gasric bypass surgery Wednesday, and I knitted in waiting rooms and his room. I have the pdf of the pattern on my new ASUS Transformer tablet. It is an Android 3.2 tablet, which looked really different from my Android phone, until the phone updated itself to Android 2.3.  Now they both really look pretty much the same. At least I only have to get used to the new operating system once. Does that even make sense?

UPS brought me a new canner. I broke down and ordered the Ball Elite stainless steel canner. I could hardly get my graniteware pint canner's lid to close yesterday with six pints of fig preserves. It does better with half pints.

I did not can anything today because I had a bad headache, plus, after it was gone, I spent time getting that label off. I peeled part of it off right away. I should have listened to the reviewers and either set the box outside for a time, or used a blow dryer on the glue. I refused to use Goo Gone and bring back my headache, so I tried soaking it in soapy water, and got the paper off. Then I Googled, and tried rubbing alcohol. Then I found the Simple Green and sprayed the glue and let it sit. Then I was able to get the glue off with an old  toothbrush and elbow grease.  There is a Ball logo above the label. as well as on the glass lid. It has a flat rack, which allows more jars to fit. I  need to pick figs.

More Maters and Stuff

I am still knitting on Sedona from the denim color Rowan Calmer yarn.

Yesterday I made pickled tomatoes with the Yellow Pear and Golden Gem cherry tomatoes. I found the recipe in a Better Homes and Gardens cookbook. I also used BHG jars.

Today, I picked a couple of baskets of assorted red tomatoes, and  cooked tomatoes in three Crock Pots-started out with 9 quarts.

Most of them were transformed into six quarts of crushed tomatoes in three slow cookers

  
 

Knitting and Jamming

So I have made jam/butter etc. out of stuff from the yard and the garden: tomatoes, peaches, figs, and blueberries from the freezer.

yellow and orange cherry tomato jam

blueberry butter is a little thick, but tastes good.

oh yeah, made a pound cake in there somewhere

We also took time to bathe Belvedere. Boy, does his fur feel better. He likes the washing part, and especially loves drying, but hates rinsing. He escaped once with shampoo all over him.

We had a few peaches left on the ground, for a little jam

Saturday, I made pesto, tomato sauce and fig jam (above). The figs are just starting to ripen, and the mockingbirds are happy, though not wth me.

I actually did a little knitting, startng on Sedona wth Rowan Calmer yarn in a  denim color. It's in the container with the parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme, hee hee.

 

 

 

Multi-hued Tomatoes, Teal Sweater and Red Flowers

I finished the Zoe cardi, out of the Cascade Cotton Club yarn. I made the body a little shorter and the sleeve a little longer. I stll used almost all the 7 skeins of yarn. It still needs ends woven in and blocking. It is teal, a little greener than this flash photo.

We have tons of green tomatoes, and a few are getting ripe. We have big ones and little ones and yellow, red, green, and orange tomatoes. The Brandy Boy here is larger than my two fists put together. On the left is a Cherokee Purple, what I think is a Better Boy, and on the right is a Costoluto Genovese

All three plants in the Topsy Turvy tree are loaded with maters too.

I think this is a young ladybug on the edamame.

My hairdresser gave me a little bitty perwinkle (vinca) plant for Mother's Day last year. It got really big and broke in half during a thunderstorm. We put the halves in two pots and now both are blooming their heads off. DH has been nursing them through the winter.

 

 

In Which We Go for a R-i-d-e

DH made the mistake of asking Belvedere if he wanted to go car-car. So he was excited for a couple of days. Belv needed routine shots and was limping. I think it is from a broken toenail-but he wasn't letting the vet look at it after he stuck needles in his back. I have to get heavy duty nail clippers, as I could only trim a little bit of the nail.

Anyway, that morning Belv looked very disappointed when I went grocery shopping without him, so when DH went to clean out the back of the truck cab, he was determined to go in the truck. So we got to the vet early. Most of the way, Belv had the front part of his body and legs on the center console between us. He was a pretty good boy, even when a  brave Chihuahua yipped at him. Belv always attracts a lot of attention, and people want to know his weight (187) and how much he eats.

He knows where we are-but he likes going to the vet.

OK, I will get off the console. He lay down, with his nose between the console and the passenger seat.

Yes, I have been knitting, still on Zoe. The yarn, Cascade Cotton Club, is a little greener than this.

More Assorted Stuff

I have been knitting on the Zoe card, and I have finally reached the sleeve division. Now the rows are shorter, and I only have 2 lace/cable sections to keep track of. The yarn is Cascade Cotton Club.

All of the tomato plants have gone nuts after having rain almost daily, including the Patio Hybrid ones on the patio in the Topsy Turvy.

These are the Greek Nachos I had the other day. They have pita chips, tzatsiki, cucumbers, tomatoes, lamb, and feta cheese.

More Stuff

Belvedere's usual position these days

Here is the second project named Zoe that I have started. This is Cascade Cotton Club yarn, a cotton/acrylic blend. Below is cable/lace detail

Here is the Heirloom tomato in my office Aerogarden. I need to prune, I think.

My birthday pedicure. Ali's Big Break is the OPI color