Saturday, May 20, 2017

My husband has been very weak today.

Here are the doorstep pictures. I need another hour or so out there before we can slouch back and just worry about watering and feeding. The trough on the left, with the dead broccoli, needs to be cleaned out and replenished with fresh compost and the sowing of salads. That’s the big job, but there are a couple of others. Notice the strawberry pot.




The excitement, at the moment, is the quince tree in the upper right. I have had it for about a year – I have always wanted a quince tree. It bloomed beautifully and abundantly. I was out there with my soft brush, helping pollination along.

Many of the faded flowers have fallen. But many others have not. I don’t need a large crop – half a dozen quinces would probably be more than enough. I’m thinking Middle Eastern tagines. So I’m holding my breath over those un-fallen flowers.

As for knitting, I have advanced the Polliwog to the point where I am going to start the short-rowing for the back on the next row. One of those situations where one thinks, is that about it? Or should I rib two more rows? The leitmotif of an anxious day.

I also watched a bit more Andrew & Andrea – I’m up to the end of 2016, and have already cherry-picked a lot of the 2017’s, so – not much more. I’m currently watching the interview with Deborah Newton: most interesting. (Why do I know her name so well?) She has published two books relatively recently – “Finishing School”, about finishing; and an equally clever title about measuring and swatching and achieving fit.

Maybe those are the books I should buy, instead of Arne & Carlos on knitting birds. (But Pom Pom – comment yesterday – if you have the slightest interesting in knitting birds, this is clearly one for you. Knitter magazine, mentioned yesterday, has a fairly routine pattern for a tea cosy from A&C, with a – European – robin perched on top. For the robin, and it’s delightful, you have to buy the book.)


But I doubt if I have any ambition to become a couture finisher, any more than to knit birds.

10 comments:

  1. Jean, Deborah Newton 1998 Designing Knitwear
    https://www.amazon.com/Designing-Knitwear-Deborah-Newton/dp/1561582654

    See you in a few weeks!

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    1. Anonymous4:19 PM

      I too can recommend this book, having bought the first edition in the early '90s. There seem to be quite a few bargain-price used copies available, at Amazon US at any rate.
      -- Gretchen (aka stashdragon)

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  2. We have a flowering quince in our backyard most years we get a few quinces on it but they never ripen. They just stay green and hard as rocks then fall off the branch. Hope you have better luck with yours.

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    1. But quinces are hard as rocks (and sort of yellow-green) when fully ripe. Maybe you should cautiously try a couple in a stew.

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    2. Years and years ago I made quince jelly from rock-like quinces. They were so hard and difficult to deal with that I just hacked them into chunks with my strongest knife. The results were very good.

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    3. Thanks for the info I'll give it a try.

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    4. I was waiting for them to get "apple" like. You can't buy them in a regular grocery store here in Toronto and except in a jelly I haven't eaten one.(that I know of anyway) Hopefully there will be a few this year for me to experiment with.

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  3. Deborah Newton had a sweater in almost every VK for years, I think, then quit for a while. The front step garden looks interesting. Is that a rhododendron?

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  4. Going over to order it now😂 Thanks for the push!

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  5. Your front step is beautiful. So nice to see such greenery after my own long and dreary winter and extended spring.

    Your comments on Arne & Carlos' birds prompted me to share a few pictures with you as I have been quite smitten with the wee beasties recently. I so wanted this book that I very nearly ordered it before the English version was available. Thankfully, I was able to wait and since it arrived, I have been spending time with it each day.

    http://zehnplus.blogspot.ca/2017/05/birds-by-arne-carlos.html

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