Sunday musings 4/18/2021

Another week has flown by. In the past 14 days, hubby and I have taken walks 13 of them. Our daily walk is always between 2.4 and 2.8 miles depending on which trail/path we walk and our walks are getting stronger and faster. My path to better health has stayed on track. I didn’t go on a diet, not following Keto, Whole 30, or whatever the fad of the week is called, I just cleaned up my act, cut out unnecessary snacks, switched from sandwiches to salads at lunch, and quit taking seconds on anything except green veggies. By eliminating bread, I’ve noticed less discomfort. I am not gluten intolerant, but maybe age is playing a part. Our walks this week were done on 4 different trails, well three, but two different sections of one of them. I am sleeping better. My body seems to react to the solar cycles. In winter when it is dark early and stays dark late, I sleep more. As the days lengthen, I am awakening earlier each day and find I am staying up later at night as well.

The unwell hen, spent two days in isolation and recovered from whatever ailed her. Her comb is vertical and red again, she is out and about with the other hens instead of hiding in a coop corner (until I isolated her in the garage in a crate). She hasn’t started laying again, I don’t think, though I caught her sitting on one of the nests yesterday. She just didn’t produce, though several days this week, the flock of 8 produced 5 eggs each day. It will be another few months before the littles start laying. Unlike the hens, when I open their coop door they come running toward me instead of hanging back or moving away. We have a couple of cold, rainy days this week, near freezing at night, so I think I will wait until after those days to turn them into the pen for the first time. It will be curious to see how the hens react on the other side of the fence when they are out.

Taking the kitchen scraps to the compost during dinner prep, I noticed that there were 5 asparagus up. Only 3 large enough to cut, but they were lightly steamed during the last minute of cooking a couple ears of corn tonight and I enjoyed them as I always do the first ones of the season. I never tire of them and daughter and granddaughter anxiously await enough growing for me to cut bunches for them as well.

The warm days are bringing the carpenter bees out by the dozens. Some have been caught in the bee traps, but their holes are so high up behind the gutters that treating the holes is nearly impossible. The woodpeckers have begun causing some damage to the facia boards going into their burrows to get the larvae. I suspect we will have to replace some facia boards in the next couple of years. You can’t stop them except with thick paint or clad facias. They seem to stick to the first floor facia boards only.

My fiber journey began about 57-58 years ago when an adult friend on vacation taught me to crochet. At some point, maybe 40 years ago, I learned Tunisian crochet, but hadn’t done much crocheting in years. For some reason, I got a bug about relearning that skill, especially Tunisian crochet. It goes pretty quickly compared to knitting and after half a dozen false starts, several Youtube videos, and finally a recommendation of a particular video by a friend, I think I have the hang of it again. Since shawls take so long to knit that they are usually too pricey for craft shows, I plan to continue knitting fingerless mitts and cowls, but making more woven and crochet bags and scarves that when made with my handspun can still be sold at a marketable price.

It still makes an interesting fabric. Don’t look too closely, there is an error near the beginning of this swatch. And there are different Tunisian crochet stitches still to learn. In the past few days, I tried using the tri loom again, I sold the large one last fall because I just wasn’t using it and really never got the hang of it. The smaller one is still here, but for sale. I just don’t seem to be able to do it without making an error that because of the nature of the weave, can’t be repaired. I guess that type of weaving just isn’t for me. I can use a square pin loom and the rigid heddle loom.

The wool for my third breed for the blanket is spun, it still needs to be plied and knit. It isn’t a new third breed, one of the earlier months, I only had enough of the fiber to do one square, so more was purchased. It will be a second square of that breed.

A bit more time has been spent on one of my wheels this week as I finished up some remnants of roving, spun, plied, and bathed, to use for bags for the shop. Pictures of them when I get farther along with this direction I’m trying. My body care products and soap will be made for family and friends that request it, there are just too many people selling those items at the Holiday markets and craft shows for it to work anymore. I enjoy making them and will continue to do so, but not in the quantity and variety I was.

Tater Time and Crossed Fingers

The ones in the box have been morphing from potatoes to aliens. The ones beside the box are some organic russets from the grocer. It was time to put them in the garden bed. There are now 32 potatoes planted and hoping that the spring like weather holds or they stay small enough to cover. Any potatoes from these will be bonuses.

The two beds nearest the old raspberries are challenge, sprouts are popping up everywhere there isn’t cardboard or weed mat down. Every trip over there results in digging out more volunteers. I hope I win the battle before it is time to put the tomatoes and peppers in the bed, the rest are in the blueberries and require carefully digging so I don’t damage the roots of the blueberries.

I have a sick laying hen. She is isolated in the garage and doesn’t look any worse, but not improving much either. It will be several months before the littles are producing. If this hen doesn’t improve, I will be down to 7 layers. An average of 3 eggs a day.

I finally gave up on the Cilantro seed and started a germination test with the seed I used and a different batch. Hopefully I will end up with some sprouts soon. If not, I will have to buy plants when they are available.

I planted Baptisia in the garden last fall which is one of the techniques I read about, then put more seed in the hydroponic garden. I’m hoping it comes up in one place or the other.

The tomato starts continue spending most days outdoors on the deck and in the south windows at night and until the mornings reach 50. Daughter and I want too many different varieties of peppers, so I am hoping for healthy starts from the nursery in about another few weeks.

On a non gardening note, I finished my second breed for the blanket and knit two squares.

I have realized that have been too obsessive about trying to get two or three breeds for the blanket done when the requirement is for 1. This has resulted in not getting anything else knit or woven. If I am going to have anything in my shop in the fall for holiday shows, I am going to have to cut back and get some other items done.

First Hummer

I finally spotted my first Hummingbird of the season on the feeder this morning and didn’t have my camera and it would have been taken through a screen anyway.

It was spotted as I cracked windows and doors to turn on the self clean feature of the oven. I don’t need a house full of smoke and that was what was happening every time I used the oven above 350f. I can get it clean and the first thing I cook in it will spill over and the problem begins again.

After dinner last night, I decided to try the hens loose in the yard again, hoping they would all return to the Palace by dark. Without taking down the fencing, I just made a 3 foot wide opening and let them go. Again, they ran straight to the old coop and run area and peck around outside it, but by dusk, they had all returned to the safety of the Palace. Seven perched on the ladders and one still exploring the food and water options. This morning, I removed the wire roll and reconfigured the poultry mesh to give them a pen with an opening and let them out. The opening is large enough for the hens to come and go but will deter our dogs, though I don’t think they will bother the hens as the hens are used to seeing them and don’t run from them.

The chicks now all come running toward the open door with me standing in it when I go over to give them treats or refresh their food and water. All but a few will peck treats from my hands. I am hopeful that they are seeing me as the giver of good, not evil so they will come to the shaken treat cup when they are big enough to let out in the yard. All 15 still seem hale and hearty and I find them perched on coop frame as well as perches when I go over. The two smaller Buff Orpingtons are catching up in size, but one of the Marans is still appreciably smaller than the rest.

The treat giver cometh.
The small Maran is at about 11 o’clock in this picture, between the the cluster of browss and the three larger Marans.

They are beginning to look like small chickens with pretty feathers, not the gawky adolescents they were just a week or so ago. The big girl feeder and water dispenser suit them well. I wish the couple that are still shy would come around before I start letting them into the pen. Late this week, we have a couple of cooler nights, not freezing, but I’m glad to see rich feathers on these gals.

While I was putzing around in the kitchen, I spotted this shoot. It looks like one of my succulents is blooming.

A few days ago, I spotted a very alien looking sprout in the succulent nursery, it wasn’t a succulent. I pulled it out and there was as much under soil as above and attached to the bottom was an almond shell. The holiday nut bowl had been on the counter behind them. I guess one dropped and sprouted several months later. I didn’t bother to keep it or pot it, but it was curious to see. When the dishwasher installer came, I found 3 almonds and a pecan still in their shells under the old dishwasher. That was even more curious as the dishwasher had a kickplate on the bottom that was so close to the floor, it was difficult to remove.

When Daughter and her kiddos came for Easter dinner and the egg hunt, they brought me a bouquet of flowers. On Saturday, I bought a small bouquet of tulips from Stonecrop Farm at the Farmer’s Market. Today, what was still thriving from the Easter bouquet were added to the tulips to decorate the dining table.

I haven’t wanted to cut the daffodils that I just planted this spring from prestarted bulbs, so it is nice to have some cut flowers in the house. Two of the stems from the Easter bouquet are dried or ones that will dry, so they were removed to a small pottery jug without water on the mantel to look pretty next winter as well. As other ones come in the house that can be dried, they will be added. I am hopeful that the Baptisia will germinate and grow enough to produce the pods that can be used to dye fiber blue like indigo, those pods are pretty dried as well.

I want to plant a Pussy Willow in the yard. I love when the catkins come out in the early spring and then turn to white flowers that look almost like small Magnolia flowers. I didn’t get any branches with catkins this year, just watched them develop along the Huckleberry Trail during our walks. I also want to add a second Hazelnut so maybe we will get nuts. Though they are a native shrub here, there must not be another anywhere nearby as the one we planted has never produced nuts.

Only a couple more hours of the nasty oven cleaning smell, though not as bad as chemical cleaners, then the noise of the vents and fans can cease, the oven cool down so it can be wiped clean.

Soon I will plant potatoes. The Virginia Extension site says they can go in soon. There are sprouted Kennebecks left from the fall purchases at the Farmer’s Market and about 10 sprouting chunks of Russets from a bag of organic potatoes I purchased at the grocer. I must pull out the spacing instructions and we will have to purchase more soil. They are going in the bed that is built on cardboard over the hardpack part of the garden where I couldn’t get corn to grow. It is filled deep enough to get them started with bagged soil and compost from the bin, but as the potatoes grow, I will continue to fill that box side dressing them until there is a good layer of soil in it. I think that box may be my winter crops as it has the deepest sides and I can make a mini hoophouse out of it in late fall.