Sunday, April 24, 2011

Life in a day, indeed...

Started the day with coffee and a walk around the local reservoir - it was super foggy, couldn't even see the other side of the reservoir.  But the birds were singing - dozens of them, great symphony.  Worked on a bit of knitting, I'm making socks this year - yup, socks.  I've made holiday stockings a long, long time ago but have been wanting to make socks.  Scored some small balls of angora yarn last week at the library book sale (the local knitting club set up shop as well) and decided nows the time.  here's the beginning of the first pair of socks.                                                                                                                                           Knitting seemless socks requires using 4 double pointed needles - you just go round and round and round until its time to make the heel - which is where I'm at - more on that later.

Since it was finally a lovely Spring day, after days and days of cold, wet vacation, the garden called - so I answered.









The garlic is amazing!  Over 400 plants ready and waiting - still eating our way through last years harvest of garlic, so ladies, take your time...









Thrilled to see these little guys up - spinach that is - in three weeks or so these will be on sandwiches, or in quiche, or salad... 



Which brings us to these lovely little Amish Speckled lettuce - hoping they will be ready with the spinach...we'll see.


During a break in gardening I was passing the pond and decided to check out what's going on down there - on approach several squealing frogs lept in the water and I noticed the Iris' reaching out of the water which reminded me that last year when I was trudging about in the pond, looking for signs of life, I came upon an unusual sight floating around - so I stepped into the pond (not too far, I only had my gardening boots on, not my thigh-high waders) and started stirring up the muck on the bottom.  Sure enough, up they came!  Look!  These little round, wood-like discs came floating up.  The more I stirred around the more they came up.  Last year I cam to the conclusion that they are the seeds of  the yellow and blue Iris plants that come up every spring.  What facinates me is that they are such lovely colors - like little wooden beads, just floating around on the water.  I gathered them as they came floating up and put them on a shovel to dry in the garden.





They kind of look like coffe beans, don't they?  Once they are dry they look and feel just like little wooden beads.  My sweetheart always asks, "what are you going to do with those?"  Not sure really, but when the idea comes, I'll keep you posted.








Here's a close-up.  They're really quite beautiful.









And just so you don't think said Sweetheart is a slacker, here's the sight he's cleared  to build a wood shed.  Year after year our wood sits under a plastic cover, barely keeping dry - not this year...


Doesn't look like much but...yes, I'll keep you posted.





Here's the wood that will go into said woodshed - once its cut and split.





Yup, thems big logs!  Many little birds and animals have been hiding in this pile all winter - much to the frustration of our cat, Ruby.



That's all for today.

To blog or not to blog, that is the question...

The answer is because it seems like fun.  Maybe it will keep me on track, when I say things out loud, sort of, maybe it will keep me goning on the dozens of projects that I always seem to have going.  We'll see.  At present I am renovating a schoolhouse built in 1850.  Its a mess.  A few years ago I gutted it, almost 2 tons of debris; walls, ceilings, junk into a dumpster.  The design of the building allowed this as all of the loadbearing is on the outer walls.  Under the sheetrock that we removed I found original paneling and doorways that had been covered - an arched ceiling above the sheetrock ceiling.  The arched ceiling was cool but chunks of plaster were falling down and the expense to replace it would have been crazy - so I tore it down and we replaced it with tongue and groove pine - looks fine but remains unfinished...here are some old pics I took in the attic - #1original post and beam construction
#2 ceiling beams and joists with ceiling removed.
#3 notice the beams and joists are pegged with wooden pegs!