Sunday 8 June 2014

New Toy and Scrap Socks

So...both fibre and garden content today. For those who couldn't care less about garden stuff, here's the pic I promised of the scrap socks I'm knitting.

Caroline wanted neutral to warm colours, so this is just a bit of everything I had partial balls of that looked like it might fit the colour scheme. She even gets four colours that are natural-dyed. The yellow ochre for rib, heel and toe is dyed with rose canes, the black/grey variegated is logwood, the warm brown is walnut and coreopsis, and the dark olive-brown (in the center of the stars above the heel and the ochre/olive band near the toe) was originally dark blue, which I overdyed with onion.

I am digging the socks, and my mother would steal them except for the fact that they're the wrong size and have Caroline's name knitted in. So I expect there'll be another pair of these in my future.

And for the garden content, I just have to share a picture of my new toy. The head gardener at work introduced us to it, and it does almost everything. Officially it is I think a big grip garden knife. She refers to it simply as 'the tool', which is appropriate, since you can do the week's maintenance on a garden bed with only this in hand.

Sturdy as can be. Works as a trowel, a dandelion/taproot weed extractor (it's been super for lawn weeding), soil cultivator, and slices roots and stems. All those edges and teeth are sharp, though, so definitely keep out of reach of children. I did my garden weeding with it yesterday and it went really fast. Sweep under the surface to slice weed roots and loosen soil, use the tip for any stubborn taproots, and the serrated edge for any stems and branches on perennials that need removal, or root balls that need sawing apart. 10$ at Home Depot if you want one of your own.

Out this morning transplanting eggplants, cucs, and tomatoes, lavender and basil. I know it's a horribly hot day to do it (28C high predicted, and before 10am it was already hot to work outside in a t-shirt). But I only have time on weekends, so today it is. I gave everything a good watering, and shade cloth or a screen of some sort for the afternoon sun, so hopefully they will be all right.

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