Garden Lessons and Other Wisdom

With our garden now offering up a small harvest, I thought I'd take the opportunity to share a couple of thoughts with you. Kind of a 'lessons the garden taught me' post.

I learned that planning is important, which we all knew anyway, but I learned to take that one step further and have a back-up plan. In this case, in case of unpredicted early frost. You might remember that we lost nearly everything to a frost no one predicted back in the spring. We had to start over with a combination of purchased plants and  whatever we could start from seed. So the lesson there was always have a back up plan. 

Second, fertile soil is of the utmost importance. Without fertile soil you won't get good fruiting, or good leaf production. Without good leaves, the plant starves because photosynthesis is hampered. In our case, we amended the soil with composted sheep fertilizer, peat moss and black earth, but we were starting with poor soil and it all wasn't enough. Which leads me to my next lesson learned.

Compost is king. 
Compost is so full of nutrients it's silly. It's worth every minute learning how to make good compost. That means, no coffee filters (an ongoing struggle at our house), no animal by-products, turning, paying attention internal temperatures and so on. There are so many different ways of making your soil fertile, I won't get into it all here, but it all plays a huge part in the life of your soil. No life, no produce.

Another lesson I learned, be patient. 
Not everything can be accomplished in one year. We had a good harvest of peas, an impressive 4-5 pounds of tomatoes so far with a lot more ready soon, we harvested approximately 6 cucumbers, we have a couple of watermelons that are coming along nicely, a good batch of onions, and perhaps 5-10 pounds of potatoes. I know it doesn't sound like much, but it's a much better yield than we had last year. That doesn't include the tomatillos I hope will come through for me or the tomatoes yet to ripen. Last year, our beets did well, but not the tomatoes and we hadn't planted enough peas. Our zucchinis flowered their little heads off this year but produced nothing else, our basil and cilantro however, produced beyond expectation. The rhubarb everyone said I couldn't start from seed grew and thrived and became part of a bigger patch out back. So every year is a learning experience and we can't expect to be a success right away.

That hasn't kept me from being frustrated that I got 1 pepper out of ten plants. As the edited saying goes, stuff happens when you least expect it, in my case a sprained ankle. So allow for some set-backs and failures and focus on the good that came out of your garden this year.

How did your garden do this year? Let me know in the comments!

Meet Hootie

Thankfully, I have no new crisis to report so I'll share a small accomplishment today.
See the little owl over there to the left? That's Hootie. He was born from a need for something challenging, because my knitting has gotten mindless and easy. He is my first piece knitted from a chart, and the first really successful two-colour piece I've made. I have been trying to cut down on my knitted UFO's (that's Un Finished Objects to you non-knitters) recently, and to that end, I try not to start something that I'm unsure might ever be finished. On my needles lately, as you know is

• an Irish Hiking Scarf for a friend's birthday, 
• the fuzzy baby blanket
• A Dr. Who scarf

A writer/geek friend and I were chatting online one day when she asked me how my knitting has been progressing. She lives out in Los Angeles, not where I would think one would need knitwear, but when she asked me for a Dr. Who Scarf, how could I say no? A few hours later, I researched the scarf, because all I knew at that point was that it was made of a variety of yarns and colours and that it was very long. I discovered to my horror that depending on the year represented, the scarf can be anywhere from 12' to 18' long! Out of concern for my friend's safety, I won't be knitting "to canon" as they say in Hollywood. I'll make hers as close to the colors of season 12 as I can, but likely not 12' long!

So why all this knitting on a blog that started out focused on sustainability and self reliance?

Knitting is not just a large part of what keeps me sane, it's also a handy skill to have. Think about it for a moment, when you can take sticks and string and make clothing from it, damn, you got skillz !(as they say) Serious skills that are not only for one gender or the other, either. Some of the most intense knitters I've heard of are guys! On a forum I follow, the question was raised about clothing manufacture and creation if the world as we knew ended. There was a lot of discussion about "making do" with clothes and putting up supplies of fabric, zippers and thread, hand-me-downs and so on, but of course, the conversation drifted back to knitting. Whether a zombie apocalypse or just a really cold morning at the bus stop, warm feet and hands will make the difference between happy, free-thinking folks or cold, miserable sheeple.
Or on the other hand, maybe it just all comes down to enjoying keeping people warm because I can.

Something to distract me from the always-green tomatoes out in the garden is good too. It keeps me from obsessing over the zucchini that flowered but never produced fruit, or the tomatillos that should not have lived, but did.

What about you? If you could pull off any fashion, any look, with any body type...no restrictions, what knitted clothing would you wear?

Spring's First Trimester

It surprises me how busy we can be here on the days we apply ourselves.
For example, the other day, I made myself a list of things I wanted to do, and instead of leaving the list on my desk in the basement, I left it on the table in the dining room. I walk by it a hundred times in a day, so I figured I'd get something done, right? I got the whole thing done, and then some.
Today, my plan was to finish vacuuming the craft room, which also serves as a basement sitting room. It gets used almost all the time, so it doesn't take long to need some attention. Today was the day to clean that up. I not only got it vacuumed, but I got the cobwebs that had been building up while the vacuum decided to be a P.I.T.A. So the upstairs front hall got cleaned up yesterday,  the board with nails that had served as a coat hanging place for years was taken off and proper coat hooks installed.  Then we swept and cleaned out the closet. Today the carpet in that space got vacuumed! Yesterday also saw the installation of a new set of metal shelves in the living room window for seedlings. So today, we were able to start 12 purple tomatillos, 6 'Alma Paprika' peppers, 9 'Clemson' okra, and approximately 15 carrots.
I'd like to claim more accomplishments, but with the dampness outside, my hands have been hurting a lot more. Of course, that would have nothing to do with the fact that I've been knitting as much as possible! On the needles this month is a panel of small squares, all knit in a row, for a 'Granny Square' style baby blanket. (That's a picture of one of the squares up and left. It's not a wonderful picture, but it's not completed, washed or blocked either.)

Mother Nature has finally relented and allowed us early spring. I don't mean it's come early, just that we're in the early stages of the season. Kind of like the first trimester of the season of green, you know? Everywhere the snow and ice is melting, everything is dripping, or puddled or muddy. I've never been so glad to see mud, it's crazy. Just when I thought we might go bonkers from being cooped up indoors, we have been able to walk comfortably a short ways into the woods, or goof off in the driveway and listen to the ice melt. Or stand outside in  a friend's driveway and talk about nothing while we soak up sunshine.

I know how much work I've signed up for, but I can't wait to have the yard back, no white stuff and days of sunshine ahead!