Blogiversary!

It's been one year since I started my blog. I guess that makes this my blogiversary! I remember finding a couple blogs a few years ago and I loved seeing what other people were working on and the beautiful pictures they'd post. I started finding more and more blogs but I still thought it was a fairly unique kind of thing that only a few people had. Last summer a friend encouraged me to start one. I can't believe how many blogs are out there now. And, I can't believe how much fun I'm having with mine and reading others. I get inspired by seeing the amazing and wonderful things other people are working on. I'm encouraged by seeing so many things that we have in common. I'm motivated to complete projects to post. And, I'm challenged to try bigger and better things. Hooray for blogging! :-)

Back to knitting...


Here's a picture of my Olympic project and the progress I've made. It may not look like a lot but, trust me, it is. This is knit with size one needles so it hasn't been growing very fast. And, it's been challenging. I know I won't be completing a pair of these by the time this Olympic challenge ends. But, I'm happy I decided to participate and challenge myself with these. It's so exciting to see yarn transform into this! That's what makes knitting seem like magic.


Here's an update on my Crescendo Shawl. The last time I posted a picture it was probably only about six inches wide or so. Now it's about 28". It's slow but moving along. I love how it looks complicated but it's really quite simple. It's a great project to work on when I go to a knit gathering. The fairly neutral color should work well with a variety of outfits. I'm knitting it with 100% alpacca so it's really soft.

Garden Update...


Our garden hasn't done well this summer. We had an idea that seemed great...fill an old metal watering trough with good soil for a raised bed garden. It would be tall enough to keep the dog out of it. A nice height to work on. And, most importantly, have excellent soil that was mixed just for growing great things! We didn't realize that the metal sides would heat up so much that the soil would be too hot to grow things. We didn't figure that out for a while. We kept thinking it had something to do with watering or the plants or ??? We kept adjusting the water and fertilized and....nothing. Just spindly little tomato vines, the pea plants only grew about three inches...they made some tiny pea pods but then died. Even the radishes weren't growing and they're usually really easy. Then, one hot afternoon my husband started digging around in the soil and figured it out. The soil was burning hot! We've had a beach umbrella in the trough ever since and it has helped the peppers quite a bit and the tomatoes a little. We're still trying to figure out a solution that will allow us to use the trough because it still seems like a great idea and it looks really cool...except for the beach umbrella. :-)

Other than that, the herbs have done fine and we enjoy them in homemade salad dressings, sauces, and other dishes. And, our fig tree didn't do too bad this year. The figs are small but they're sweet and delicious and we got more this year than ever. This is a picture of some that I picked this morning.