Garden pics

In non-knitting, non-cupcaking news, this is what I've been up to:

(apprehensive dog for scale)

I've been growing a mini-garden on my back porch.

I've got 2 tomato plants (one regular, one upside down), a basil plant, a very sad looking hydrangea, an avocado tree sproutling, and some morning glory/beans.

Tomato #1 is in the picture above. While it's very large and bushy, it has no tomatoes. It had quite a few flowers but they seem to be infertile. I'm curious to see if maybe it will get some later.


Tomato #2, I'm growing upside down.
I drilled a 1.5" hole in the bottom of a 5 gallon pot, put coffee filters around the hole so the dirt wouldn't fall out and threaded a (much smaller) tomato start through. It did okay like this for a while but then decided to rebel (red lines show how the stalks are growing):

It grew down for a bit but then did a u-turn up to the right. The fork to the left is actually just a really big branch coming off the main stalk. Both are growing in a decidedly upward fashion.

And while it's definitely an "interesting" looking plant, it was the first one to make one of these!
There are currently 13 tomatoes growing on the upside-down plant with many more pregnant-looking flowers that I'm sure will turn into tomatoes soon. :-)

The Vines are not cooperating. I had this vision...the bars on the side of the porch covered in beautiful vines sharing their bounty of morning glory flowers and green beans with me. I planted both morning glories and beans in smaller pots and spaced them out along the fence.


This pot didn't get the memo:
Since I took this picture last week, the beans have since flowered and are growing mini-beans....but they forgot to climb. They're just hanging out near the pot. The morning glories in this pot were trying to climb the beans so I tried to re-direct them to the rail and now thery are being grumpy at me.

This is the only pot of the 4 which is doing what it's supposed to:
The bean in this pot is still short, but at least the morning glory figured it out. I've got quite a ways to go to get to my "wall of vines" look I was going for. *sigh* oh well.

We're looking to buy a house so hopefully this time next year, I'll own dirt that isn't contained in pots and my garden will be behaving a bit nicer.

Swaps!

If you've never done a swap, they are addicting. They're a bit like secret pals. I have a few swaps I'm truant on posting pics of my goodies.

TEAL APPEAL
This is part 2 of the swap. Purdy stitch markers:


Stitch Markers Swap

This is my second set from this swap. From Lisa M.:


Etsy Tools Swap
This is a swap we set up over in the Ravelry Etsy Shops group to swap tools. If got both packages on the same day.

The first package from Chris at SugarBeeStudios:
(the "no PC" tag on the sheep has to do with her non-PC yarn names. Pretty stuff, though. Go sheck out her shop)

My second package cam from Sarah (SLOrnamentals on Ravelry). The Package had a knitting needle case (with an embroidered cupcake):


And inside were cupcake knitting needles and stitch markers!

chicken sure is expensive

I saw this the other day as we were driving home from visiting my dad. I know food prices have gone up a lot but this is ridiculous!

I'm so proud

My little sis just started an Etsy shop here.

It's still under construction, but she sure has some cute stuff!

Stuff

I do so much other stuff online (mostly Ravelry, etsy and flickr) that sometimes I forget to blog until someone like Kortney or my sister says something to the effect of "blog about something. I'm bored."

So here's a bit of collaboration of what's going on in the other online venues which have caused me to neglect said blog.

The Cupcake Factory

Yarn. Lots and lots of yarn. Here are some pictures of the yarn I've been making:

Frosting (worsted weight merino. Dyed in such a way as not to pool):

(the orange one and the last teal/purple ones are still available...the others have sold. I've 2 more skeins waiting to be photographed and listed in the morning)


Buttercream (Really soft superwash merino/nylon sock yarn in purdy colors...currently sold out)

Sugar Paste (merino/silk blend sockyarn. The purple one is still for sale)

Fluff (American Wool Roving)


(I like this one a lot. If it doesn't sell soon, I may end up spinning it myself)


And Finally...Meringue (a light, airy lace weight).
It's pretty, but I'm not sure I'm the biggest fan of dyeing lace weight. I've got 2 more blank skeins and depending on how they sell, this might be the end of this line.

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So there's all my yarn. I've done some other stuff but I realized I'm lacking pictures (will need to fix that later). Anyway, if you like yarn you might be interested in my very own iGoogle gadget that I made yesterday. It looks like this:

If you add it to your iGoogle page, you'll automatically get pictures and info on my newest yarns fed straight onto your screen.

Right now, it's available by invitation only, but if you e-mail me at carissamarie[at!]gmail[dot]com I can hook you up.

I guess that's it for now. Have a great night everyone!

New Free Pattern!

I just finished writing my pattern for "Jill-Walker socks." They resemble the Jaywalkers of late Mag Knits fame (sorry....no link since Mag Knits has bitten the dust) but in a prettier, girly way. Kind of like the socks Jay's twin sister Jill might wear.

I'm making the move away for posting raw patterns on the blog and will be uploading exclusively to Ravelry...since really, if you're a knitter, you need to be on Ravelry. And if you're not, go join the waiting list right now!

If you can't/won't/don't want to join Ravelry, but still want the pattern, leave your e-mail address in the comments and I'll e-mail you the PDF file.

For those of you who are on Ravelry, you can find my latest pattern here.

I got some new markers

I'm part of the Spring Stitch Marker Exchange and I got these From Debbie at http://fruityspirit.com:

They're even prettier in person. I especially love the "just for you" stars. Thanks, Debbie!

OH!
I almost forgot.....I got this cute little sticky note holder, too! I'm pretty sure she made it herself.

I am never going to hear the end of this

One of the things that drove me nuts about Massachusetts was how late Spring starts there. While the rest of the country gets the start on Spring (marked by the arrival of tulips, daffodils and cherry blossoms) in late February and through March, in Massachusetts, the large piles of snow have yet to start melting by that time and Spring usually waits until May to make its debut.

So back here, in the Pacific Northwest, I've been relishing in the Spring time weather... beautiful flowers, warm weather (it was 80 degrees last week). While there has been the April shower here and there, for the most part it hasn't been too bad despite the meteorologists saying that we've been having record wet weather.

Apparently in the Pac NW, the weather has the same moto as the residents...Go big or go home. Last night, not only did the weather set a record for the latest it has ever snowed in the Puget Sound area, EVER (since they've been keeping track anyways, which has been 100+ years), but this isn't even standard snowfall for Winter in this area...which is somewhere between a light dusting and 2 inches. What did we get instead? 6 crazy inches of snow. The picture above was the view out my window when I woke up. How insane is that?!

Joe is never going to let me hear the end of it.

Wordless, um, Monday