Updated cat pictures

Some pictures of kitty Christmas presents; or otherwise.  Gremlin is in the tent, Bandit is on the chair on the Christmas blanket, Scooter, the orange cat went to the vetenarian today as part of his Christmas checkup.  the other picture is Princess laying in the new cat scratcher/lounger, Gremmy rolling in catnip and Elfin in the cat bed.  All new.

Friday afternoon in November

The top picture is my husband hefting two of the mature tromboncino squashes, each weighs around 20 to 30 lbs.  So far hanging in the gazebo is around 10 mature squashes hanging, and on the vines are many more.  I don't know how long he will let them stay on the vines as he is getting antsy to prepare new plantings for the brussels sprouts and other cruciferous crops.  There are a couple knitting pictures taken at a restaurant we enjoy, one tiny shawl in brown will be one of the flower basket shawls; the picture of the vinca was all washed out and not pretty, and the rainbow one is knit by my friend Colleen and I am making the same shawl in the same yarn and colors. The bottom picture is me in the squashes; I am about 5'5" now so you can see how long the squashes get.

garden

Garden today before I pick more of the brandywine tomatoes, and squashes and those shrubs of basil.

Oh, and Bleu likes to hang out in the cat carriers; each cat seems to have a preference, although there are three that look the same to me.  Gremlin sleeps in one at night, when he isn't laying between my lower legs holding me hostage all night long.


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Yarn I have tried to show off

This was a gift from a friend for my birthday and I have had trouble uploading it from my photo program, but maybe now my Mac will let me put it there.

Some yarns to make shawls

I  have been acquiring yarns to make shawls; I still love to knit socks but I have lots of socks already.  I will see if I can show the patterns I want to knit, but am on the Mac so who knows :)

oops, forgot to say...

If you are a knitter, you will plainly see that I did NOT follow the pattern correctly on that previous post. It should be a diamond shape, not diagonal. OOOPS, not right but still not bad to look at.

long time again between posts

Sorry it has been so long since I last posted, the garden is still going strong, the tomatoes are slowing, which is a good thing as I don't feel all covered in tomato juice all the time, the squashes are awesome, someday I will take pictures. The chilies are amazing, I even gave away a couple of varieties of chilies to the Sears guy delivering the newest freezer today. That new one is awesome, has compartments so hopefully we can track food by either dates or cuisine; like the Asian in one compartment, Italian in another; the beef and the pork overflowed into other compartments; guess we won't have to shop for a good long while, and the pantry is much the same. Handy in this economy. It got to the point in tossing food out (lots of chili and soups and stuff like that) that my hubby started tossing my cherished tupperware out and I wasn't even fighting to keep it. I have no idea how many chicken tortilla soups are in there. Knitting wise, I am trying shawls; not well but trying. I have gorgeous yarns and patterns. Wish me luck. Oh, and I had to order another set of Harmony Needles to accomodate the larger sizes needed for shawls.

Tomatoes and more tomatoes

I wish I had a clean kitchen, I really do because then I would take pictures of all the pretty colors of tomatoes. And these are the ones that were saved out from the fire roasting of the night before. Those are awesome smelling and then we re-roasted the serranos and jalapenos and we tossed all of them together. I need to get the mouli mill out to get the tomato skins off and the seeds out. Then can them up.
The Brandywine tomatoes are still going for Guiness records I guess; the green ones are still about 7 inches or more across and shocked the friend of my husband who grew Mortgage Lifter and other big ones and never saw tomatoes so large. The squashes are growing and while we pollinate them ourselves due to a dearth of bees, some of the pollinations didn't take but others have. I have visions of tromboncinos that are the baseball bat size yet again.
That is it for the garden report; time to put stuff away.

My Trekking 100 socks are not done

I didn't finish the socks in time for the Ravelympics; I still have the foot and the toes to do. But it will be done; the cats seem to approve of the socks.

It isn't my fault, of course

For Weeks I have wanted to take pictures of the garden (mess) that I have going but the major problem with an incredible small space is not being able to back up far enough to get pictures of tomato plants that are 8 feet and more; some much more but they are not getting any more staking than that. The tomatoes are producing extremely well, all the heirlooms are producing better than they ever have. All the volunteer tomatoes are ripening, we have been eating grape tomatoes that are red, but I am still waiting to see if any of the yellow ones show up. I have huge trusses of round tomatoes that seem to be the type that are used for the "tomatoes on a vine" that one buys in the markets. I wouldn't be surprised, my cutting board that is a juice catcher would keep the seeds for the compost pile so who knows what is growing where they popped up? Tonight for dinner, we used the so far, biggest Cherokee Purple for the chicken tacos. I loved that they were not so juicy that they were hard to handle and not totally full of seeds. The size of the seeds reminds me of the Black Plums so I don't want to eat those in case they taste like them too. The Cherokee Purple tasted great and now my husband is even happier with having trellised and re-trellised more of them today and saw how laden they were with fruits. Last nights' Greek Salad had the Box Car Willie Tomatoes in it and they were extremely tasty, more so than I had been led to believe.
I asked my husband to take one of his fancy-schmancy cameras out to the garden to try to capture not just the size of the plants, but the size of the fruits. He has all sorts of lenses for all his cameras as he will probably go pro again. Oh, and he picked all kinds of chilies today, so that made him purchase mango, papayas, pineapples and who knows what today. I don't know if he plans on using the passion fruits that keep dropping like little bombs out front. Husband will make hot and sweet killer salsa that would hurt most mere mortals but is excellent with chicken and fish. Thank goodness for the pressure canner, besides the fish he catches (this is albacore and mahi-mahi season) he makes salsas, and I want to can up tomatoes and pickle some of my spicy peppers. Most of the red jalapenos are going to be packed in tuna for pressure canning but otherwise I love them as cheese poppers.
My thai basils are growing sooo incredibly well, time to make more Thai dishes. Oh, and I can't even go into how many tangles the various varieties of cucumbers have gotten into, but luckily it didn't keep them from producing well. A bit too well. A pickling cucumber that is 9 inches long will have to probably be made into antipasto mix with peppers and cauliflower and stuff. The Tromboncino squashes are running wild and free over the trellises and the hops are in close competition. Whew.