Knittinggarden

We have some dwarf fruit trees in our yard and they usually have a moderate amount of fruit on them.  The cherry tree - birds eat them all; the pear tree - a few small pears that don't get ripe; the apple tree - if I don't put little socks on the apples they usually have apple maggots; the yellow plums - there's usually quite a few of those but they're small and don't get much attention; the little old Italian Prune tree - I love these and pick and eat as many as I can.  This year?  Lots of everything.  I've brought in some pears to try to ripen them up and picked some apples to see what shape they're in.  The Italian prunes aren't quite ripe, but it looks like I'll get some. The yellow plums are amazing.  There are so many plums on this little tree I don't know how it stands up.  I've been picking them and giving them away for a couple of weeks and today it still looked like no one had picked any.  So I found a local food bank to give a bu...

The Evergreen State Fair started yesterday here in Washington.  For the past few years (2 or 3?) I have entered knitting and spinning into the needle arts competition.  I love to go and look at everyone's work and it's cool to win ribbons, too.  Even though it's a point system like school (90% is blue ribbon, 80% is red, etc., so there might be a bunch of blue ribbons in your category) it's still very fun to see your work adorned with ribbons.  However, it's best to see your work adorned with "special" ribbons - the big, colorful rosettes - and I only have one of them, for "presentation".  And I don't know what that really means. Anyway, a couple of weeks ago I drove out to the fairgrounds to turn in my entries.  I entered a Pi shawl made from Wollmeise lace and my Earth and Sky shawl, also made from Wollmeise, into the knitting category.  My plan always is to enter my sock yarn blanket and really wow them (big rosette, yeah!) but somehow ...

I know I've been MIA these last two months. and I'll have a lot to catch up on at some point.  Aside from the Tour de Fleece, which I participated in and spun every day during, my attention has been taken up with the wedding of the Princess.  Yes, my little girl was married last Sunday, July 29th.  It was a spectacular event down to the smallest detail and was amazingly beautiful and fun.  My introverted personality was tested as I had a houseful of people for ten days, hosted a rehearsal dinner for 40 or so people, and then hosted the wedding.  I was lucky enough to have great help and was able to enjoy myself all the way through to the "after party" planned by one of the bridesmaids that continued after the wedding at our house into the wee hours with many young people and a big bottle of tequila.  Who says knitters don't know how to have fun? Professional photos aren't available yet but a few of the kids have provided iPhone photos.  You can get a...