Thousand Flower Farm

Delphiniums

2012-02-01T15:41:00.000-08:00

Today I planted my delphiniums seeds. these seeds benefit from a cooking period of 3 or 4 weeks so the flat will sit outside in the cold frame until toward the end of the month. then I will bring them into the greenhouse to warm up.

Peace Breaks Out, Sort of

2012-01-28T13:34:00.000-08:00

I blogged a couple of weeks ago about our new cat, Marvin, who has decided that of all the houses he's lived in on the island ours is the one he wants to live in, at least for the moment. As you can imagine, our other two cats, Chas and Fang, weren't all that happy with his decision. But for the most part hostilities were limited to glares and the occassional hiss. The only exception was when Fang, for some unknown reason, leaped into my lap when Marvin was lying there and all @#$$% broke out. I do hate cats fights whern they occur on my lap!! For a week after that those two, seen above, would skirt each other with as wide a margin as our small cabin allows. Fang absolutely has refused to take any responsibility for his rather dumb act and was sure that Marvin had attacked him (and vice versa). All my insistence that it was an accident fell on deaf ears.

So imagine my surprise when I came into the living room and saw both Marvin and Fang sleeping on the same small sofa. Not touching and as far away from each other as possible, but not hissing or even glaring. There's hope.

Marmalade

2012-01-25T12:14:00.000-08:00

Once again I've been making marmalade. I got a case of Seville oranges from Ripe to You
I shared a 16# box with a friend and half of the box made 20 pts. The recipe I used called for a navel orange which I didn't have so I just substituted another Seville. I also realized too late that I had used up the last of the whiskey in the fruit cakes so had to leave that out this year. It tastes wonderful.

New Blog from a Friend

2012-01-19T16:21:00.000-08:00

My friend, Mary Ann Dow who has been sewing up my fabric into her beautiful vests has started a blog about it http://sewnbymdow.blogspot.com/. Follow us.

Gypsy Cat

2012-01-15T17:38:00.000-08:00

Friday night Marvin, the peripatetic Waldron gypsy cat showed up on our porch meowing pathetically as if he hadn't eaten for WEEKS. Does he look like it? Marvin has been on the island for 4 or 5 years. His first owners moved off and gave him to someone else. But he prefers wandering around the island from house to house between bouts of living off the land. He has been sitting on all our laps watching movies with us, sleeping on Siri's bed with her, and taking over the sofa whenever he can. Our other cats, Chas and Fang are not amused but no fights have broken out. We're curious to see how long he plans on staying. He's a huge cat, bigger than any of our cats, so we'll have to stock up on more kibbles if he makes an extended stay. Meanwhile he is completely welcome. We're enjoying his visit.

January

2012-01-13T09:14:00.001-08:00

And there they are, the first snowdrops. We haven't had any snow yet, but that is predicted for this weekend and next week. We've been enjoying a visit from youngest daughter from New York and eating the fantastic cake that she made. And it is obvious that little by little the light is coming back.

Boating in January

2012-01-04T19:21:00.000-08:00

I'm sitting in the boat in Friday harbor. We had a rocking and rolling trip over late this afternoon. The town was so pretty as we came in just at dusk. The Christmas lights are still up. I appreciate that in the dark days of January.

Fang and Chas, pictured above, are probably curled up on the sofa just like that in the dark. The house will be a bit cold but they have each other. I feel bad when we leave them over night, but here, this time of year, we can't always get everything done in the daylight hours. They will look at us as if we are strangers when we invade "their" house tomorrow afternoon.

I like traveling by boat. I'd much, much rather do that, even in the wind, than travel on the freeway. No traffic, no drunks (at least not this time of year), no deer on the road. Just a good sturdy dependable boat. And I like to sleep on it in the port here. You can feel the bow waves from every ferry that comes in. The wind rocks it gently, well mostly gently. It's a small cabin, but cozy. Not a big enough boat to actually live on for any amount of time, but a nice comfy camp aboard.

Tomorrow I am getting another pair of prescription glasses. My 3rd pair in 20 years. They usually last less than a year before I loose them, break them, or drop them off a boat. So I much prefer simple reading glasses from the drugstore. When you drop a $4.00 pair of glasses in the water it's not much of a tragedy. My Dad was always dropping his glasses overboard, too. He finally simply wore two pair of reading glasses, one over the other. I think my dropping glasses off boats may be genetic. Time will tell with these new ones. Wish me luck.

2012

2012-01-01T19:13:00.001-08:00

My goodness, it is actually 2012. I was glad to see that the first part of The Hobbit is schedule to be shown on December 14 a week before the end of the Mayan calendar. Although I am sure that if the Mayan culture that created the calendar still existed craftsmen would be busy all year carving new calendars to start the next cycle.

I started this blog several years ago to follow a year in the life of the farm. Every year on the first of January I find myself wondering what I am going to write this year. Things don't normally change a lot and the sort of things that excite in my daily life don't always make for great reading. I tend to start watching the ground under the birch tree for the first shoots of the snowdrops, for example. Not earth shaking stuff.

But there is a rhythm to my year and the first of a new year finds me planning what I am going to weave and knit for this upcoming season. I want to figure out some new things but also need to fill up the stock of the dependable standbys such as potholders, placemats, rag rugs, hats, etc. So I am tying a new warp onto an old placemat warp to start a new batch

of hats. I knit up a lot of them and wait to do the felting until spring when I am about to start selling them as it takes up a lot less room to store them in this shape. I am about to put in an order for my favorite yarn from Webs filling the gaps in colors in the hats I have left from last year. And I need to order more rug warp for making rag rugs, placemats, and potholders.

And, of course, there are the seed catalogues. I actually filled in a couple of blanks on an order form this morning. But there is a lot of work to be done inventorying the leftovers from last year and combing each and every catalogue for something new and exciting as well as the best price on the old standbys. A new year is opening up. I love it.

Much More Comfortable

2011-11-13T19:07:00.000-08:00

I have come to realize that I often put off working on a project on my 8 harness Harrisville loom because it just isn't comfortable to work at. The bench that I got with it is just too high and my back and legs get sore too quickly. On my other big loom, my 4 harness Oregon Trails, I have a rocking seat Harrisville bench. I love it. I can weave for hours at that loom with very little discomfort even at my age. So I finally bit the bullet and broke down and bought a rocking bench for the Harrisville. It makes all the difference. I've been working on the scarves below and there just isn't any of the old backache from that loom. Yay!! You can set the seat on these benches so that it tilts slightly and rocks back and forth as you move your body. So you aren't sitting in the same position for hours. And it doesn't cut off the circulation at the back of your legs because of the tilt. Having good tools is not a luxury but a real necessity.
So, now that I am comfortable this is what I'm working on for the Thanksgiving Crafts Fair in Friday Harbor. These cotton scarves are supposed to pleat when you wash them. The twill pattern in the colored sltripes and the black strips go in opposite directions. I gather that is why they pleat. We will see and I will report. I found the technique in an old Weavers magazine.

Next Step for the Dahlias

2011-11-11T21:02:00.000-08:00

This year the leaves from our big maple tree have come down nice and slowly. There hasn't been a lot of wind to blow them all into the marsh behind the tree. So it seemed like a good idea to get them raked up before the wind start to blow (and it is blowing out there right now) and get the dahlias mulched for the winter.
I don't dig my dahlias because I don't have a really reliable place to store them without having the tubers freeze. Covering them with a heavy mulch has worked just fine for years. And it was fun to rake up all the leaves and then dump them on the dahlias.

Last Dahlias

2011-11-02T22:03:00.001-07:00

I know this pictures is kind of blurry but there aren't any more dahlias in the patch so this is it for the year. I picked these just before the first really hard frost killed the plants. We've been enjoying them inside for several days now. I leave the tubers in the ground covered by a heavy mulch of hay, leaves, grass clippings, sawdust, whatever I can find and it works most years. If it doesn't I get to indulge myself in selecting new ones. There are so many gorgeous ones out there and I never get to grow them all.

Nuts

2011-10-24T18:23:00.001-07:00

I love having nuts in winter. Joel's Mom, Millie, has several filbert trees and a big English walnut. Today we went down and helped her shake the trees and gather the nuts. We'll sit by the fire and shuck them and then spread them on racks to dry. One of our favorite things to eat is roasted filberts in salad. We crack a few nuts and then put them on a pie pan in the oven until they are slightly toasted. Yumm. And don't ask about oven temperatures or time, with a wood range I just "cook until done".

I am about to make my annual fruitcakes. Needed the nuts to do that.

Potholders

2011-10-12T20:58:00.000-07:00

I'm working madly to get ready for the Christmas sales. My stock is always depleted by this time of year and I need to fill the holes. Potholders are one of my standbys. I make them out of leftover bits of cotton flannel fabric from rug making. They work up quickly and are good sellers. I'm using a point twill pattern this time that making a sort of starburst. I'm quite happy with the result.

No Frost on These Pumpkins

2011-09-28T17:28:00.001-07:00

WE are in a very low area and it feeling rather chilly out there this evening. If we don't get some cloud cover and/or a breeze tonight we could get our first frost. After all, it is almost October. But that means doing things like bringing in the pumpkins which are in a very low area

and spreading row covers over the tender crops like beans, basil, squash, and peppers that we hope to get through a few more days of ripening.

Weaving

2011-09-27T21:24:00.000-07:00

I am so happy to be back to weaving. I hardly get a chance to touch a loom during the summer. I'm working on some cotton chenille fabric and as soon as I get this piece finished I have 3 different placemat warps to weave up.
This time of year this is what I see out the studio window as I work at the big loom. It's so beautifully green.

Drying Time

2011-09-19T09:25:00.000-07:00

Every year we dedicate one of our 3 hoophouses as a drying shed. Here we spread out the onions, garlic, dry bean plants and any seed crops. This year Joel is growing seed from purple sprouting broccoli and Purple Cape broccoli.
A new dry bean for us this year is white cannellinis. Last year we had trouble getting these to germinate in the cold wet soil so we saved the seed from the few that did survive hoping to breed some cold soil resistance into them. It was cold and wet this year again and we got a good crop so maybe it is working. The best reason for saving your own seed is that you end up breeding strains that work really well in your garden, in your microclimate.

Now that I will have these beans to cook with I have to expand my bean cooking repertoire. I make great chili and taco beans but want to learn to make baked beans. I love my chili but I am sort of stuck in a rut.

Blackberry Whiskey

2011-09-18T17:32:00.001-07:00

I've made enough blackberry jam for the next couple of years but there are still beautiful lush blackberries out there. So I made up a batch of blackberry whiskey from fellow blogger The Weaver of Grass from Yorkshire, UK's recipe. It's 1# each of blackberries and sugar and a bottle of cheap whiskey. Let sit for 2 months shaking now and then and then strain out the berries. It's good to sip before a winter fire.

Hot and Dry

2011-09-12T18:19:00.000-07:00

Okay, I haven't lost my perspective. There is no drought and the temperature has not been 103. But ask my broccoli what it thinks. It hasn't rained for several weeks and the temperature has been in the high 70's and low 80's. A serious change from our earlier summer weather. So although the brassicas are not happy the pumpkins and squash are ripening up. Above are some Long Pie pumpkins. They look like hugh dark green zucchinis at this stage but they ripen up to bright orange and are the best tasting pie pumpkins we've ever grown.
Equally happy are the Cinderella, or Rouge vif d'Etamps pumpkins. They are huge this year.
And it is great weather for drying beans
and harvesting the wheat.

Brickworks at Last

2011-09-10T20:21:00.000-07:00

Our Farmers market moved to its new site today at the Brickworks in downtown Friday Harbor. Many, many volunteers have been working on getting this place ready for use for over a year and it was so very exciting to actually hold a market there. Setting up such an event at a new place is always confusing so we got there really early this morning. Things went amazingly smoothly.
The customers found us and people appeared to be having a good time. The new place has a lovely feel to it. Our old place was arranged in a straight line with vendors on both sides. This is more of a circle and it had a friendly feel to it.

It's right in downtown Friday Harbor in easy walking distance of the port and just off the main street.
This is our new booth setup with our flowers, vegetables and some of my rugs. Sales were good. We had a great day.

Last Day at Roche Harbor

2011-09-06T18:45:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was my last day out at Roche Harbor for the season. Some of the artists will open their booths for a few more days in September, weather permitting, but I need to get back to the farm and the loom and start thinking about the winter markets.

We gave each other gifts, traded our art, Barb, the candy lady melted down the last of her Belgian milk chocolate and we poured it over ice cream and added the nut crumbs from the English toffee to make luscious sundaes. I always miss the other artists during the rest of the year. We have a great little community out there.

Blackberries

2011-08-25T21:15:00.000-07:00

It's 9:00 PM and this is my third batch of blackberry jam today. I won't have any time next week to deal with them and the blackberries are lovely right now. Usually they get ripe Fair week and I am scrambling to get a few batches of jam made and deal with the Fair. This year everything is late and so they didn't really start getting ripe until this week. They seem to have been happy with the extra rain and cool weather as they are big and lush and beautiful. Blackberry jam is one of our favorites. The bushes are really a noxious weed most of the time but I forgive them when the berries are ripe. Last year I also made a batch of blackberry whiskey from a recipe from The Weaver of Grass in Yorkshire. I'm going to do that again.

County Fair

2011-08-18T21:15:00.001-07:00

We rushed home this evening from the San Juan County Fair so we can harvest vegetables tomorrow for market. I've been having a great time there. Joel and I entered a bunch of flowers and vegetables and weavings.
I picked the last spray of my beautiful Altissimo rose and won a Best of Class with it. It was quite a sacrifice but so many people stopped by the Wool Shed where I was working in the sales booth to compliment me on it that it was worth the sacrifice.
I also helped set up a loom for the public to weave on and this young man spent a long time making a beautiful mat. Then he helped another young man learn to weave while I stood back and watched. It was a great day.

Camping Adventures

2011-08-02T06:45:00.000-07:00

With Siri home for a couple of weeks we took off Saturday night after market for a camping trip to the Canadian Gulf Islands. It turned out to be a ittle more exciting than we had planned on. We got to Patos Island, which is a US state park, fairly late in the day, watched a beautiful sunset and roasted hot dogs over a campfire in the dark. Siri and her friend, Raina laid out their sleeping bags under a nearby tree and Joel and I crawled into our old tent. In the middle of the night we all woke up to a heavy rain. We had brought along a couple of tarps so the girls laid one over their sleeping bags and Joel tossed one over the top of our tent. Nevertheless in the morning we were all WET. After a sort of damp breakfast we took off the a boat decorated with drying sleeping bags, pillows, socks, etc.

The weather for the rest of the trip was lovely. Sunny and warm. We spent the next night at Portland Island, a Provincial Park in the Gulf Islands.
But when we started home the boat engine started to overheat. We had picked up some seaweed in the intake for the cooling system. Joel spent 5 hours trying to get us up and running again and finally jerry rigged together an intake system out of a table leg, blue masking tape, a bunch of pieces of hose, a c-clamp and a tuna fish can which got us back across the border and home. More serious repairs will require taking the boat to the boat yard in Friday Harbor. The trip wasn't quite what we had planned but it will make for great story telling for ages.

Update on Ducks

2011-07-17T16:04:00.000-07:00

Joel built the little ducks a ramp to get into the "pond" he made out of the bottom of a big plastic barrel. They love it. They trot up the ramp and jump into the water. Fang, the cat, thinks they're pretty interesting, too. That's why they are running around loose on the lawn. Eventually, when they are big enough they will be moved out to the real pond. For now we move them around every day in the duck tractor. They are delightful little creatures.

Ducks

2011-07-14T09:38:00.000-07:00

We have 5 new additions to the family, little Khaki Campbell ducklings. They are currently residing in a new chicken tractor until they are big enough to go live out at the pond. Hopefully they will eat slugs which love the banks of the pond and migrate into the garden from there. And give us duck eggs.

Out at Roche Harbor

2011-06-29T16:40:00.000-07:00

I just spent the last two days, Monday and Tuesday, running my booth out at Roche Harbor for the first time this season. I have two partners, Pat McDole who does watercolors and jewelery and new this year, Beatrice Childress of Laughing Bird Beads, who does incredible bead woven jewelry.
Pat had set the booth up the last couple of weekends and I love the way she's mixed our things.
I also brought a bucket of sweet william and stocks. It tried to rain on us but it was mostly just a bit of drizzle now and then and not unpleasant. Now I'm home catching my breath. I'll be out there 2 or 3 days a week through Labor Day weekend.

Roses

2011-06-26T20:35:00.001-07:00

This warm weather after all that rain this last spring has created the nicest roses I've had in years. Above is small pink flowered Bonica.
And the oldest known rose still in commerce, Rosa gallica officianalis, dates back to the Roman empire. These flowers just glow.
Probably my most favorite rose of all is Abraham Darby, a huge English rose of impeccable shape, color and scent. It makes a huge bush. I love it.
This year the honeysuckle and Gloire de Dijon rose are blooming at the same time. They are about the same color and the combination is lovely.
And the big bush of wild multiflora roses is in full bloom and full of little bumble bees. It scents the yard and fills it with a constant buzz. I love it when the roses are all in bloom. I give myself rose tours of the yard every day.

2011-06-23T17:04:00.000-07:00

It's warm, it's sunny, my camera is working again. In the hoophouse the tomato plants are bigger every day and even have little tiny green fruits on them.
The beds of lettuce are beautiful.
And I'm growing watercress this year. A friend grew it last year and I was determined to try. I will have some for market this weekend. Life is good.

Herding Snakes

2011-06-07T19:25:00.000-07:00

I haven't been posting recently I know. Too busy trying to catch up now that the weather has dried up and warmed up. but also, my camera has died. I want to put pictures of what we're up to and can't. I hope this doesn't mean buying a new camera but it well might. I hate being without one.

In the garden we got the corn planted finally and the tomato and pepper plants are going out tonight or tomorrow. Squash is planted through holes in black plastic in an area that has become infested with Canadian thistle. The black plastic works in two ways: it heats up the soil for the squash and kills the thistles at the same time. We get several years out of a sheet of the stuff as we get heavy duty type and so move it around. When we picked it up today to move there were lots of garter snakes under it. They love black plastic so it actually does triple duty by providing shelter for the snakes that eat slugs and other bugs. Anyway, the snakes were all slithering around frantically as we moved the plastic so I found myself herding snakes back under it when it was laid out. Several got up on the plastic and then just couldn't get anywhere. They were flailing around but without legs couldn't get a purchase on the plastic. These I gently picked up by their tails and showed them how to get underneath. So I spent a delightful time this afternoon herding snakes.

Apple Trees

2011-05-30T18:45:00.000-07:00

It's finally gotten a bit warm and it hasn't rained for several days. The apples trees are all in bloom and the native polllinators are happily out and about. The trees are buzzing when you walk under them. I don't really know what all the bugs are but there are some kind of little bumblebees. I haven't seen any actual honey bees so far. There are a couple of hives on the island but they must have enough to eat closer to home.

The tree above is an Enterprise apple. This has become about our favorite apple. It is crisp and juicy and keeps on the porch until March in good condition. What else can we ask for in an apple.

A bit later than the domestic apples are the native crabapples, Malus fusca, nartive only to the area west of the Cascade Mountains. They are all over the farm. When fully mature they have a lovely round shape and in the fall are covered with tiny little yellow apples that the birds like.

The place came with an orchard planted about the time the house was built, about 100 years ago, but they are slowly dying out. We've been planting new apple and other fruit trees around the place for the upcoming generations.

Wet

2011-05-16T21:17:00.000-07:00

It started raining again just as we got everything loaded into the truck from the boat on our way home Saturday. And then it rained all Sunday. Really rained. the ditches in the garden are full of water again.
And so in desperation we planted a bed of green beans in the hoophouse as there is simply no ground dry enough for something like beans which require a dry, warm soil.

This afternoon the sun came out finally but now this evening it is getting cold. Phooey on the weather.

GREEN

2011-05-11T18:21:00.000-07:00

I went for a walk in the rain this afternoon. This spring is so wet and cold and miserable in a lot of ways. We can't get into the lower part of the garden as the soil is just too wet. But everything everywhere is just so GREEN. The grass and bushes in the woods, the trees, are all loving all this moisture. The woods are so lush. Makes me feel a lot less crabby about the weather.

Petunia

2011-05-10T08:41:00.000-07:00

I'm not usually a petunia person. Much more into cut flowers or vegetables. But when I saw this one at the grocery store I had to have it. So Joel bought me 3 plants for Mothers' Day. It's called Pinstripe and is a dark velvety black with fuschia colored stripes An amazing flower.

Primrose Path

2011-05-02T20:24:00.000-07:00

This is one of my favorite place in the garden in the spring. The path used to go over to the neighbors about half a mile away, when their daughter and our youngest daughter were school kids. Now it basically peters out at the well just beyond this photo. Once, long ago, I raised and showed primroses and I still love them.

First Lettuce

2011-04-28T19:47:00.000-07:00

This evening we had a salad with the first of our very own lettuce this year. This plant is one of several seedlings that came up in the lily bed from seed spilled last fall. The seed was from a bed of Brune d'Hiver lettuce Joel was growing for seed and it survived the severe cold last November, probably because it had a bit of snow on it. Even so, we are going to plant a bed of this variety in the late fall this year to see if we can winter it over on purpose.

2011-04-21T20:10:00.000-07:00

In spite of the fact that it is still Cold, things are progressing in the garden. Above, the Sweet William, planted last summer as it is a biennial, is beginning to show flower buds.
In the hoophouse, the greens are big enough to harvest tomorrow for market on Saturday. There was a cold wind blowing most of the day but when Joel and I went out this evening to plant beets it had stopped and it was almost warmish and there were bugs out, a sure sign that things have warmed up a bit. I also got a bed of little stock plants in the ground this afternoon. Stocks are one of my favorite flowers, I love the scent

Finishing

2011-04-16T19:29:00.000-07:00

Next weekend is the first weekly Farmers Market of the season. We don't expect to have a lot of vegetables as yet so I'm thinking of setting up a crafts booth next to the vegetables to hopefully sell a few things. Our Farmers Market doesn't have room in the summer for more than 3 artist/craft booths a week so we crafters share them on a lottery basis. However, in the early part of the season and at the end, in October, there aren't all many farmers and food vendors so we can set up craft booths more often. To that end, I have been finishing up a lot of the things that I have been weaving for the last several months and stashing here and there in piles. The fringes on the wool rugs need to be tied up,
fringes on the tale runners twisted, flowers sewed on hats, rag rugs hemmed, etc. and then, I need to put tags on all of them and write them up in my inventory book. That will take a couple of days alone.
So today I twisted the fringe on the table runners that I made with the placemats. My warping frame allows me to wind warps up to 11 yards long. An 11 yard warp will make 12 placemats approx. 20" long plus hems and then I weave up the end of the warp in a runner to match. The placemats are hemmed but the runners have fringe. To keep it from being destroyed in the wash I twist it. It makes it both sturdy and pretty.

Shearing

2011-04-13T20:01:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year again. Having spun up most of last year's fleeces Joel has started shearing our small flock of sheep.
Since he does it himself and by hand he shears a couple of sheep at a time rather than try and go through the whole bunch at once. The sheep are so funny when you turn them back out after removing their wool. The lambs can't recognize their mothers and the mothers are disgusted because they can't see any reason that their children are running around bleating pathetically. It takes up to an hour for everyone to calm down.

Hats, Hats, Hats

2011-04-09T18:29:00.000-07:00

Having finished knitting up most of the grey and brown wools that I had bought early in the year it's time to order another box of yarn but this time in colors.
I've been gradually getting those neutral colored ones felted and finished.
After opening the box of new yarns I dug into my stash of novelty yarns to find ones to embellish the felted hats with. I love matching up the yarns, playing with the bright and glitzy fancy yarns and then getting down to knitting more hats.

New Batches of Wool Rugs

2011-03-31T18:11:00.000-07:00

While the garden outside is beginning to grow I've been inside a lot working on getting the wool Joel has been spinning woven up into rugs. The first warp of 5 rugs was a linen colored yarn that I wove up with various shades of grey wools.
Then I tied on a black warp and wove it up with the dark black/brown wools.
Today I started tying on a white warp to weave up with white wool. Looks like I'll have enough wool left over for one more warp of 5 rugs so I'm designing one with stripes of white and various tans and greys as the wools will be leftovers from all 3 batches above. That will give me 20 rugs to start the Farmers Market season. Then I'll get back to working on rag rugs and scarves for the summer sales out at Roche Harbor. I'm having a great time.

2011-03-30T20:05:00.000-07:00

In spite of it continuing to be cold and wet instead of warm and sunny (sigh) the garden is beginning to be planted. Joel put out the first 2 flats of little lettuce seedlings today and covered them with row covers o give them a bit more warmth and keep the golden crowned sparrows out of them. Those little birds love to eat small vegetable seedlings.
Then he put in a bed of spinach.
And, to my great delight, the sunflowers I planted in the hoophouse as an experiment in early flowers are staring to come up.

After We Open the Packages

2011-03-20T20:30:00.000-07:00

Today both Joel and I dealt with the packages that came yesterday. I spent the day winding rug warps from the new yarn. I wound three warps, one of linen colored yarn which I will use for the grey wools most of which have small flecks of tans and browns in them, one of black yarn for the really dark black and brown fleeces and a white one for the white and light grey wools.
Meanwhile, Joel was outside planting the onion plants.

Boxes of Things To Do

2011-03-20T09:22:00.000-07:00

Joel picked up two UPS boxes from the dockhouse yesterday. Above is our 30 bunches of onion plants from Dixondale Farms. that's about 2500 plants. Today they go in the ground.
And a box of rug warp so I can get going on the wool he just spun.

2011-03-18T17:56:00.000-07:00

With all this wet and windy and cold weather we have been spending a lot of time inside. Joel has been spinning up our fleeces so I can start weaving wool rugs. He spins the wool straight from the fleece
into skeins and then I wash the skeins. We have a nice lot of really dark fleeces this year. A couple of our sheep have stayed dark after the lamb fleece was sheared. This isn't common as most dark lambs are grey after they first shearing.

When can we eat them?

2011-03-16T16:43:00.000-07:00

This winter was so very hard on the garden. I hate to admit it, but we have been buying lettuce at the grocery store. Sigh. But there is hope. Today Joel moved the two flats of new little lettuces from the greenhouse into the cold frame to start hardening off. i planted asters, ornamental amaranths and ageratums in the greenhouse to replace them.
In the hoophouse the peas are coming up. We are trying to grow them there to see if we can thwart the golden crowned sparrows who have decimated the small pea plants almost every spring for several years.
It is warm enough at night for the frogs to start their spring singing I found this one under a board in one of the hoophouses.

2011-03-09T19:37:00.000-08:00

It was almost warm today. I went out and weeded the perennial cut flower beds and got wonderfully muddy. It felt so good to work in the dirt. All around the flowers are sure it is finally spring. There's a first little daffodil, one of the February Golds, almost out.
And the forsythia branches are laced with yellow buds and one or two flowers already out. By tomorrow there will be lots of them.
And everywhere crocuses are in bloom. The Varied Thrushes are starting to sing in the mornings and the female red winged blackbirds showed up yesterday. The males have been here since January but the ladies are late this year.

Time to Turn the Soil

2011-03-07T18:09:00.000-08:00

It's still a bit chilly out but the season is definitely under way. Joel has been out spading up the first garden beds. This is some of our precious high ground and as it is still rather wet spading it is better for the soil than the rorotiller. Later on when we get into the main garden and get to readying larger areas we'll use the tiller. Meanwhile he enjoys the first turning of the soil by shovel. There is a special smell to soil that is starting to come alive after the winter.
And serious seeding is under way. Broccoli, cauliflower, gai lon, onions, leeks, kale, peppers and tomatoes for the hoophouse. I've planted stocks, yarrow and lupines for cut flowers.

Fish Fabric Placemats

2011-02-28T16:39:00.000-08:00

This is the fourth and final placemat warp. I've tied each one to the previous one to save time. The sheets I'm weaving with here had bright colored fish all over a background of blues and purples. I've found sheets in this particular pattern at the thrift store several times. I love them. No matter what color warp I use with them they are always neat.

Snow Again

2011-02-23T08:11:00.000-08:00

About 8:00 this morning the NE wind slammed into us and it started to snow. Again. We are right on the Canadian border with lots of water north of us and the cold winds from the Canadian interior come down the Fraser River Canyon, across that open water and slam into us. Noone is going anywhere for a couple of day. There'll be no mail. We'll just hunker down.

So it Begins Again

2011-02-13T18:23:00.000-08:00

The year is beginning to pick up speed. About time. I get tired of vacation after a while as much as I appreciate it at the beginning. So while I was in the studio working on a set of green rag placemats today,
Joel was out in the greenhouse planting the first flats of lettuce. He did say something about questioning the sanity of someone who has seeds for 70 varieties of lettuce. But lettuces are so beautiful, and tasty. And he grows them so well.

Lavender Chenille Fabric

2011-02-06T18:23:00.000-08:00

I've started weaving on the next piece of cotton chenille fabric for vests. This one has a warp of 2 shades of organic natural colored cotton in a golden brown and a pinky tan and a darker thread of mercerized perle cotton in 10/2.
The weft is an organic cotton died with low impact dyes in a pretty pale lavender. It is weaving up beautifully.

Imbolc, Candlemas, Groundshog's Day

2011-02-02T17:09:00.000-08:00

We're halfway between the solstice and the equinox, the celtic first day of spring, Imbolc, or Candlemas or Groundhog's Day. You can really see the difference in the light, both the quality and the lengthening days. So I celebrated by planting two small flats of delphiniums seeds. Delphiniums germinate better if they get a period of chilling. You can do that in the refrigerator but if I plant them now I can count on several weeks of cold enough weather to let them think they've gone through a winter. After being outside for about 3 weeks I'll bring them into the greenhouse warmth.
On a wander through the garden I discovered the first shoots of rhubarb sticking their heads above the mulch. I can taste the first rhubarb crisp as I write.

Fancy Twill

2011-01-27T20:01:00.000-08:00

The 8 harness fancy twill warp for this scarf has been on the loom since last summer. But I kept having more pressing things to finish and as this is an experiment I kept putting off working on it. But I have been weaving yards of plain weave cotton chenille fabric the last few days and not only am I ahead of schedule on that but I am tired of the monotony of plain weave. So I slipped over to the bench of the loom with this on it and got started weaving. The treadling pattern is long and complicated but I discovered that if I wrote it on a piece of paper in 3 to 5 treadling repeats and then checked each bit off as I did it I could keep track of it reasonably easily. And it is so pretty that it inspires me to keep working at it.

The Blues

2011-01-21T11:06:00.000-08:00

I got started recently on the new cotton chenille fabric for vests. I seem to be on a blue theme as
I also warped up one of the little table looms with a pale blue rayon chenille warp for scarves.
And in my kitchen window is a pot of paperwhites, a present from a friend, with two little blue glass people that were a Christmas present from Siri.

2011-01-18T16:49:00.000-08:00

Two more lambs this morning, both ewes.
Joel docked their tails while their mom looked on and commented. We didn't dock tails when we first got the sheep many years ago until we discovered what a nasty mess sheep's tails can become. Not only does it make shearing hard but the dung in the tails attracts flies and can create skin infections. So now they go right away. The sheep don't seem to notice.

First Lamb 2011

2011-01-17T16:16:00.000-08:00

Once again, granddaughter, Iris, was here visiting for the first lamb of the year. This year's first is a big black and grey ewe lamb. It's named either Amy or Laura (she hadn't decided when they went home today).

Current Weavings

2011-01-14T17:06:00.000-08:00

I've not just been spending my time making marmalade. I made a batch of what I have to admit are marmalade colored rugs. I had a stash of yellow and orange sheets and a friend who wanted a yellow and orange rug and voila...! I'm going to let her have first pick of them and then the rest go in the stash for summer sales.

But my big project is to make more cotton chenille fabric for my friend, Mary Ann, to make into more vests. This warp has 3 shades of organic low impact dyed cotton and I bought two colors of variegated chenille on ebay for weft. The next warp will be organic colored cotton with similar colored chenille. I'm excited about this collaboration.

Marmalade Madness

2011-01-13T19:02:00.000-08:00

I've been churning out batches of marmalade that last couple of weeks. Above is a batch of blood orange marmalade. Our local grocery store had bags of blood oranges this Christmas. I've never seen them here in quantities like that and grabbed a bunch of bags for presents and for this lovely red marmalade.

Then I found this citrus website Ripe to You and ordered a box of Seville oranges. I love the bitter Seville orange marmalade and before the current restrictions on things like that on airlines have been known to bring back a dozen jars from England. But again they're not common in this neck of the woods. So much for local food. I ordered a box and am in the throes of several batches. Oh, this stuff is good. The last batch had a tablespoon of whiskey added at the last moment. I expect to get 16 to 18 jars out of my half box (I shared with a friend). Now how's that for food security.

2010-12-29T20:05:00.000-08:00

More snow. It snowed heavily for a while today and now it is clear and the stars are out. It's going to be cold tonight and tomorrow night. Oh, well, everything in the garden that isn't truly hardy was killed by the last freeze.

We had a good Christmas. A series of gales almost kept us from going to the mainland to our daughter's house but the day before Christmas the wind had dropped a bit and Joel said let's go for it. It was an exciting trip to Friday Harbor. But we had a wonderful Christmas and now that we are back again it is our time of year to laze about a bit. The seed catalogues are all here and Joel is sitting by the stove with a bunch in his lap. I wander into the studio and weave a bit now and then. All the looms have warps and projects on them, but I am mostly reading English detective novels and eating Christmas cookies. It is a peaceful time of year here.

Lots of Rain

2010-12-12T11:28:00.000-08:00

It has been raining hard for about the last 24 hours and the low parts of the garden are inundated. First the freeze and now the floods.
So are the lower parts of the fields. Joel has been out opening up ditches directing the water toward the pond.
Which is now full and flowing out the overflow. We'll be grateful for all this water net summer when we need it for irrigation.

Design by Tidying

2010-12-07T20:35:00.000-08:00

The selling season is just about over for me. I will set up my fiber things at the last Farmers Market of the year the 18th but otherwise I won't be doing any crafts fair type things until next May. So it is time to clean out the studio. That involves dragging out my collection of old sheets for rag rugs, and the bits and pieces of leftover yarn. Best of all is designing rugs and placemats based on what I have left with the rule that I can't buy anymore yarn or sheets for these projects. So today I sorted sheets in boxes of colors for projects and wound warps out of the bits and pieces of yarn. I made several warps, none very long as that would have meant ordering more yarn, but interesting. These match several plaid flannel sheets that will be basis for the rugs. I don't know how tidy I got things but I sure had fun.

Winter Kill

2010-12-02T19:38:00.000-08:00

When it goes down to 10 degrees F this early in the season it is hard on the garden. Not only is that colder than we usually get, but the plants haven't had time to really adjust to winter. The above is our chard patch. Chard is only marginally hardy at those temperatures. Some of these plants will survive and start regrowing but not for quite a while. We will save seed from any that do survive and thus increase the hardiness of our own home grown strain of chard.
One reason for planting several varieties of a plant (other than just for the fun of the different colors and leaf types) is that that increases the chance of one or more varieties handing whatever stress the year throws at the garden. In this case our Savoy kale, came through the storm virtually untouched. In front of it is one called Russian Hunger gap which, in spite of its name, did not come through well. Time will tell if the roots are dead or not.
Most of the cabbage also survived as did the overwintering purple sprouting broccoli, the Brussels sprouts and all the collards. the Romanesco broccoli didn't nor did the early fall cauliflower. The overwintering varieties of cauliflower look better. They have lost outer leaves and so will probably make smaller heads but they look like they will make it.
The carrots were under enough snow to survive and the potatoes were covered with a mulch of maple leaves and are fine. The big Three Root Grex beets originally looked like they had gotten frozen but after a few days look perfectly normal.

So we take note for future winter gardens, harvest what we can for market this weekend and wonder what else winter will throw at us this year.

New Ventures

2010-11-29T16:23:00.000-08:00

We had a great Thanksgiving weekend. There is a big crafts fair in Friday Harbor that weekend that we have been going to for about the last 20 years. We set up our booth and go out to the local community Thanksgiving dinner with several artists friends. This year I added my new Christmas stockings to my products and introduced a new venture.
My friend Mary Ann is sewing vests and jackets from my handwoven fabrics. The fabrics are made from cotton chenille woven on a warp of 8/2 cotton.
Mary Ann did such a lovely job of designing and sewing the vests. We are both excited about doing this and as soon as the holidays are over I am going to be weaving more of this fabric.

Apple Orange Butter

2010-11-23T09:11:00.000-08:00

It's COLD here. 16 degrees this morning. Not much we can do but huddle by the fire. So making up a batch of apple-orange butter seemed the thing to do. I found the recipe in a blog I read from England, The Cottage Smallholder. We have a couple of boxes of apples sitting in the bedroom to keep from freezing and I had a couple of organic oranges. She cooked hers in a slow cooker but I just set it on top of the wood range and let it cook slowly for several hours. It's really good.

And Winter Came Roaring In

2010-11-21T12:13:00.000-08:00

It was quite a trip to market. Arctic air was roaring down the Fraser Canyon in British Columbia and across President's Channel which we have to cross to get to Friday Harbor. It was cold and rather nasty out there Friday afternoon. We are very grateful to our Albin boat who handles this sort of thing very nicely.
We got there with all our boxes of vegetables and had a great market. In spite of snow on San Juan Island the customers turned out for Thanksgiving vegetables.
We got home Saturday afternoon to several inches of snow on the dock and at home.
Joel went out in the dark with a headlamp and picked the very last of the tomatoes in the hoophouse. We hope the mulch we put on the tender things and the snow on top of it will protect them. Meanwhile we are cozy in the house with the fire crackling. Winter is truly here.

Anticipating a Freeze

2010-11-17T17:00:00.000-08:00

The weather reports says we can expect temperatures down to 25 degrees F next weekend so that means it is time to mulch the tender plants. We cut all the dahlias down although they still had a few surviving flowers on them, mowed down the tops of the glads, and Joel hauled a couple of truckloads of maple leaves from the sides of the roads. They make great mulch and a couple of other people have been out there getting them as well. They are considered a very valuable commodity here. Tomorrow we will harvest what we want of the potatoes that are still in the ground for market and then put leaves over the rest of them.

Winter Farmers Market

2010-11-14T19:41:00.000-08:00

The indoor winter market at the high school started the first Saturday in November. There was an abundance of luscious winter vegetables. This is such a good climate for winter vegtables. With all the brassicas like broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, kale, Brussels sprouts, and collards. and root vegetables like carrots, beets, parsnips, and celeriac. And storage ones like onion, garlic, and winter squash along with the surviving lettuce and celery and the good old standby hardy leeks, we made quite a show.

Bright, Gaudy, and Totally Unnatural

2010-11-07T12:53:00.000-08:00

Okay, I know I am known as an organic farmer, lover of natural colored home grown wool from our rare breed sheep, weaver with organic naturally colored cotton yarns, etc. But every once in a while I find myself falling for something wild, gaudy, plastic and totally unnatural. Like the skein of drugstore yarn in the picture above. This skein just jumped off the shelf of the drugstore and into my arms. "Do something with me" it cried. Shortly thereafter a friend gave me several skeins of a bamboo rayon boucle yarn (okay, so that isn't made from a fossil fuel) in about the same colors and a set of boas was born. I love them. They are BRIGHT, and GAUDY. And it was a huge amount of fun to make them.

Late Fall Flowers

2010-10-27T12:10:00.000-07:00

The frost has killed the zinnias and the dahlias, most perennials are all through blooming and most places in the garden look rather ragged. But here and there in little corners the hardy cyclamens are beginning to bloom. I started a bunch of these from seed over 20 years ago and they have reseeded themselves here and there. I often dig up a plant and move it to a quiet shady spot where it will show up in the fall.

Old Apple Tree

2010-10-24T10:45:00.000-07:00

Thursday night one of the branches of our 100 year old King apple tree fell down. We were in the house and awake and didn't hear a thing. It must have gone down slowly. There had been a crack developing between the several main stems and we had been worried about it.
The three main stems had been held together by a graft made by twisting small branches together. This has to have been done when the tree was quite small. The angle between the trunks was too narrow to be strong and whoever did this hoped to give strength to the tree. Well, it did work as the tree lived to be over 100. One of the remaining two trunks may be salvageable, we'll have to see. Meanwhile we are planning to plant a new standard sized King tree this winter a ways away from this one so when the last of the old tree finally goes we will still have King apples. I grew up with a King tree and my mother made applesauce from its apples. To me the taste of applesauce from King apples is the way it is supposed go taste. We have gotten many, many boxes of great apples from this tree over the years and we will miss it.

Fall Grapes

2010-10-21T13:24:00.001-07:00

The huge grapevine that covers the front porch is covered with grapes. The light shining through it this morning was so pretty. I'm afraid the grapes probably aren't going to ripen this year. there just hasn't been enough heat, but the birds will be happy. They don't care if they are ripe or not.

Squash

2010-10-17T17:09:00.000-07:00

We came home this morning from a couple of days in Friday Harbor to find that several nights of real frost had killed all the tender things in the garden. The squash vines, the zinnias, zuchinni, pumpkins plants and any tomatoes and peppers not covered with row covers were toast. This meant it was time to bring in the winter squash. Only a few of the fruits were actually touched by frost and we will eat those right away before the frost damage can cause rot,
but we found that the rats had gotten into several squashes, especially a new to us one called Uncle David's Dakota Dessert Squash famed for its sweetness. If the choice of the rats says anything these must have been doggone tasty. I think we got one to try for ourselves.
With our usual good help we brought in several wheelbarrows of squash to stash in Siri's room in the attic and sell and eat all winter.

Pumpkins Again

2010-10-11T10:08:00.000-07:00

It's pumpkin time again. We have been a bit worried that the cool summer weather might mean that the squash and pumpkins wouldn't have time to ripen this fall. But thanks to quite a bit of Indian summer sunny days and nights above freezing it looks like we'll have a crop after all. We harvested a wheelbarrow of pumpkins before the last market. I love it when the vines finally start dying back so that you can see into the pumpkin patch and finally see what's growing there. It's like a large Easter egg hunt.

2010-10-06T12:30:00.000-07:00

I had a great time this weekend participating in Artstock, Friday Harbor's fall studio and gallery tour. I was a guest artist at Kristy Gjesme's studio in town. My studio, after all, is a bit hard to get to if you don't own a boat.
We had a wonderful flautist, Pam Presley, playing for us and visitors signed the guest book from Germany, the Netherlands, the UK, and of course, from Friday Harbor. My things sold well and I had fun. What more can I ask.

Beautiful Corn You Can Count On

2010-09-28T19:20:00.000-07:00

This wasn't a good year for our sweet corn. We have had none to sell and only a small amount for our own eating and that from one bed that was planted from seedlings started in the greenhouse. All the direct seeded corn germinated at such low rates that Joel tilled it under and planted cabbages. That said, our flour corn, Painted Mountain, did great. This is the shortest season colored grinding corn available. Not only does it make great corn meal but it is BEAUTIFUL.
Harvesting it was like opening christmas presents. We kept saying, "Look at this one!" It comes in a wondrous variety of colors, reds, dark pinks, orange, marooon, blues, teal, green, yellow white, speckled, spotted. Joel's favorite is one that's a mixture of maroon and orange, mine is the ones above in blues, teals and greens with a touch of pink.
Joel tied them to strings which will hang in the house to dry. They make a beautiful fall decoration as well as potential cornbread.

Pumpkins

2010-09-21T23:13:00.001-07:00

With all the rain and the cloudy days we have been worried about whether or not our winter squash and pumpkins will mature before we get our first frost. The plants are so huge and lush that it is really hard to see what is going on in there but I poked around in the pumpkin patch today and found several nice orange Neon pumpkins and one white one sitting on top of them. Looks like there'll be something for Halloweeen.

Fall

2010-09-20T09:47:00.000-07:00

I love fall and this poem evokes the season so beautifully.

by John Keats

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too -
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river shallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft,
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

Placemats in Greens and Blues

2010-09-16T13:38:00.000-07:00

I have had a couple of lovely days weaving and weaving. I finished a batch of placemats in blues and greens and a bit of yellow and tied a new warp of reds and purples and oranges onto it. I am about to hem up the placemats so I can take them to the Farmers Market on Saturday. The basket of rag strips above was for a runner that I made on the end of the warp. Hopefully this evening I will get the fringes twisted on that.

Fall

2010-09-08T12:48:00.000-07:00

Well, fall is really and truly here. I've closed down the booth at Roche Harbor, Labor Day is over and the market will start slowing down. Things are ripening in the garden. We may not get much from our outdoor tomatoes, but the ones in the hoophouse are in full production. And the fall brassicas are looking good. They don't mind rain and cool weather. Above is a Calibos cabbage plant. It's the only pointed red cabbage we know of. Only one seed company carries it so Joel is growing his own seed. When one of our favorites becomes scarce we know the time has come to do that.

End of Summer

2010-08-26T12:27:00.001-07:00

Things are starting to calm down a bit here. The family are all gone (though I miss everyone of them!), the Fair is over and the weather has warmed up a bit. Enough to ripen the first melon and the tomatoes in the hoophouse.
The Sungolds are dripping with fruit. We are still worried about winter squash and the outdoor tomatoes and the basil has turned brown from a cold night a couple of days ago,
but the flowers are beautiful. These are annual gaillardias in the cutting garden.

Crazy, Wonderful Summer

2010-08-15T17:20:00.000-07:00

It's been a crazy, fun summer. All three of our daughters and all 4 granddaughters have been here off and on. We had a big wedding at the farm and next week is the San Juan County Fair. We did take time off to go with one daughter and friend to camp overnight at Patos Island north of here which is a State Park with a really neat lighthouse. I will have lot of pictures and will try and get them up next week. Life always calms down after Fair Week.

Upcoming Generations

2010-07-30T13:19:00.001-07:00

The above photo shows why I haven't been blogging much lately. I have all three daughters and 4 granddaughters here. It's been a long, long time since I had little tiny clothes on the clothesline. We are all having a wonderful time but I'm not spending much of it online. I'll be back later in the season.

Carnations

2010-07-18T20:32:00.000-07:00

I have the most beautiful carnations this year. I've finally figured out that growing them as biennials works better here than trying to get them to flower in one season. This way I get great flowers and really nice long stems. And they smell so good.

Warm Weather at Last

2010-07-15T21:33:00.000-07:00

The weather has finally turned hot and sunny after a long cold and wet spring and early summer. The warm weather vegetables are so pleased. You can almost see the basil and squash and pumpkins growing. Joel got the last of the hoophouse tomatoes tied up today and we had a few little Sungold cherry tomatoes in our salad tonight. It won't be long before there are lots of the

New Chickens

2010-07-11T21:50:00.001-07:00

We have been raising 6 little baby chicks that were a Father's Day present from our daughter, Jennie. Today they went out into their pen outside. They are fully feathered and the weather has warmed up. Hope they stay warm tonight. They had a great audience for their move. The girls loved watching them run and fly up and down the pen. They've never had this much room as they have been living in a large animal carrier in the house.

Pretty Plant

2010-06-30T21:50:00.000-07:00

A bunch of lettuce seed got spilled around the garden last fall when Joel was cleaning lettuce seed that he grew. A lot of it ended up in various places and so we have had volunteer lettuces here and there. This one has bolted. I haven't pulled it out of the lily bed because I just think it is so pretty.

Back at Roche Harbor

2010-06-28T20:21:00.000-07:00

I spent my first day of the season out at Roche Harbor manning our booth. One of my partners has been opening it on weekends in June but now that we are open 7 days a week the three of us will share the work. I do enjoy being out there and seeing the artist friends in other booths some of whom I don't see all winter. I will be running back and forth from island to island a lot in the next two months.

Weave On

2010-06-23T20:50:00.000-07:00

I am almost finished weaving this batch of placemats. The fabric colors are working really nicely with the 9 colored warp. I will have 12 placemats and one runner out of this. Should be finished tomorrow.
And I did get 16 of the mug rugs that I was weaving on my new little table loom finished and labeled and ready for market. I have finished weaving wool rugs for the season having woven up all our wool and am making these out of little bits and pieces leftover from those. I've got 3 shades of grey wool and white. These are great as coasters as the wool is really insulating and keeps heat from whatever they are set on.

Nice Little Table Loom

2010-06-16T18:24:00.001-07:00

Last summer one of my Farmers Market customers came by my booth to tell me that she'd found a table loom at a garage sale for $10 and bought it thinking of me. It came with a bundle of flat shuttles and lease sticks that were worth more than $10 themselves. I said sure, I'd take it. I can always use another loom (!).

Well, it's a sweet little table loom. I've never seen one like it. I can't decide if it is commercial loom as it has no label or just a very nicely crafted home made one.
It has a unique sliding beater that makes the beater always 90 degrees to the warp which is really nice, and bright color beads that lock into slots to raise the harnesses.
The brake consists of a peg that fits into little holes. If anyone has ever seen one like this and knows what kind it is I'd love to know. I'm weaving little wool mug rugs on it to try it out. I had to replace most of the cords. It came with an old cotton warp on it padded with newspapers that referred to Nixon as President. It is weaving very nicely.

Birds

2010-06-13T20:12:00.000-07:00

I took my camera on a walk today and came upon another owl being mobbed by robins. This time it was a Great Horned Owl. It sat there so patiently while the robins dived at it and scolded.
On the way back I walked through the pasture and watched the cowbirds ride around on the backs of the sheep. These birds apparently developed with the herds of bison on the Great Plains. They fascinate me as do all brood parasites. How do they know how to be cowbirds. They don't grow up acting like warblers or wrens or whatever sort of bird raised them. All nature and very little nurture here.

Playing with Color

2010-06-09T12:38:00.000-07:00

I haven't been keeping up the blog. Last week I was hustling to get ready for the Studio Tour and this week I'm digging out the house and recovering. I had a wonderful time and sales were great in spite of it raining hard most of Sunday. I sold a bunch of rugs including the two on the screen in the back in the picture above. I also sold a lot of placemats so that my stock of them is seriously depleted.
So I woke up in the middle of the night thinking about the sale and placemats and thought I'd make up a batch of placemats similar to the rug on the far right above. It has 9 color wheel colors, interspersed with navy blue. So I just finished winding a log cabin warp of navy blue and 9 colors and digging out poly/cotton sheets in 9 colors to make sure I had everything I need to do that.
And, while I was at that I started thinking about the colors I was working with and decided to wind a couple more warps, one of the blues and greens and one of the reds and oranges. These will be symmetrical with yellow in the middle. I had a hard time deciding what to do with the purples but ended up with the blue purple with the greens and blues and the purple and red purple with the warm colors. Think these will work nicely. I'll weave the latter two warps with print fabrics in similar colors.

Peonies

2010-05-31T20:13:00.000-07:00

A couple of years ago we planted a 40' bed of peonies. We bought a variety of colors from white through pink to dark red. This year they are starting to bloom in quantities that we can cut and sell at market. However, a spate of rain and wind knocked these red ones over and so I got to cut them for the house instead of for market. Not sure I'm unhappy about that.

2010-05-29T21:03:00.000-07:00

Coming home from the mainland last weekend I photographed this cormorant sitting on a nest in a clump of pilings at the ferry dock in Anacortes. The birds have found the niches in the piling structure as good as cliff faces for nesting. There were dozens of them. You can see an egg under this bird.

Mulched Lilies

2010-05-26T18:53:00.000-07:00

I finally got the lily bed all mulched again. Every year I rake up the lawn clippings and mulch these Asiatic lilies with them. That's all the fertilizer they have ever gotten and they are thriving. I do have to treat the bed with Sluggo to keep the slugs under control. When I first moved to the island we only had to contend with the native banana slugs. They were enough of a problem but 10 or so years ago we were invaded with European slugs, an invasive species that makes the banana slugs look like pets. These guys are voracious eaters and fantastic reproducers. They have to be dealt with.

We mow the lawn not to keep a suburban look but to keep the jungle at bay and to produce mulch for the perennial flower beds. If we let the lawn go for a year the blackberries and rose bushes and fir trees and plum seedlings and snowberries and....would be back in spades. When we moved to this place it had been abandoned for bout 40 years and all of the above were crowding the house. It took about 5 years of hard labor to push it all back to the edges. I expect that when we are gone they will just take over again.

Dark Wool Rugs

2010-05-20T21:40:00.000-07:00

I am finally started on the last of the wool rug warps for this season. I have enough of the really dark first year lamb fleeces for 5 rugs. I've put on a black cotton warp and will weave some with grey or white stripes. We never get a lot of this color from the sheep because most black lambs turn grey after their first shearing. So these rugs are special.

The Owl and the Robins

2010-05-19T13:33:00.000-07:00

I heard the robins out in the woods making the call they make when an owl's near and went to see if I could find it. It was a barred owl sitting on a branch about 10 feet above the ground.
The robins were shrieking and flying at it. Half an hour later they were still at it.

A Warm and Cozy Place

2010-05-14T15:25:00.000-07:00

The tomato plants have been moved out of the greenhouse and out to the hoophouse to either be planted there for the greenhouse crop or hardened off for later outdoor planting. Chas discovered a warm empty bench that was a great place for a cat's afternoon nap.

Warm at Last

2010-05-13T19:29:00.000-07:00

Okay, I know there's not a lot to see here, but the soil finally got warm enough to plant things like green beans and corn which want the soil to be at least 60 degrees F. So today we planted two varieties of dent corn for corn meal, 5 types of green beans, 3 kinds of dry beans, and the last of the Stuttgarter onion sets. And I set out my delphinium and lupine plants. After having frost two mornings last week it was great to be out in the garden crawling around in the dirt wearing a short sleeved t-shirt. I think the growing season has arrived at our place.

A Great Mother's Day

2010-05-11T08:12:00.000-07:00

I had the greatest Mother's Day. We went down to Seattle to visit my middle daughter and family (and pick up a load of fertilizer). My youngest granddaughter, who just turned one a week ago, climbed up on the dining room table after dinner and stood up by herself for the first time. She had a great and appreciative audience of parents, grandparents and big sister and she wowed us all. She was so pleased with herself.

The Season Progresses

2010-05-06T10:06:00.000-07:00

Our very first lettuces are almost ready to eat. Alright, we robbed the cradle and had one for dinner last night. We will have a few bags of lettuce mix for Market this weekend and in a week we should have actual head to sell. Yippee!!
We have been setting out transplants. The soil is finally drying out enough. Above are little statice plants that I set out last evening. Joel has been putting out all sorts of brassicas and 3, 60 foot beds of onion seedlings. We hope to have LOTS of onions this year.