This week is supposed to be the Sterling reunion (for real this time)  and I'm even more excited now that I know it's supposed to include a sheep shearing demo and a carding/looming demo.  Also there's a contra dance on Saturday night.  Neil and I are waivering on whether we stay in Craftsbury or come home in the evenings.  We don't live that far from Sterling, but we'd probably leave the chickens in the coop anyway since we wouldn't get home in time to shut the door and close out the preditors.  We'll figure something out!

It's supposed to be chilly and rainy this weekend though, and that always makes me inclined to knit.  Probably I'll bring my knitting to Sterling, I'll fit right in!  Watching some girls knit hats on double pointed needles was actually one of the things that finally pushed me to get a friend to teach me to knit in college.  I know some people are scared by DPNs but I was facinated!

I'm starting to think about wrapping up my garden for the year.  The winter squash and cabbage will probably grow plenty more, but the tomatoes are really upset about the recent cold (it's been 42F the last two night) and my edemame isn't much happier.  I got a decent amount of corn for such a little plot, but with corn once the ears are gone you know the plants are done.  The green beans are thinking about putting out another round, but they may be in a race with the temperature.  I've decided that next year I'm going to plant my green beans, edemame, and peas down in the square that is corn this year.  They should help enrich the soil in that plot.  I think tomatoes will probaby go into the raised bed that's holding the legumes right now (they should love that) and I'll put the coles (broccoli, cabbage, kohlrabi) in the bed that's currently tomatoes.  That seems smart because they're not susptable to the late blight (which I'm still hopefully warding off, but for next year I'm thinking better safe then sorry)  All that leaves me putting the squashes either along the south edge of someone else's garden bed or back in the one they're in now.  Either choice seems ok, especially if we put the winter compost into that bed all winter.  I do think I'll make another garden bed next spring so the corn has a fresh spot to go, and several of my smaller garden beds might get combined with the one they're next to for next year.  The 2ft x 3ft garden beds aren't good for much besides lettuce as it turns out.

Well, the Sterling College reunion isn't until next weekend.  We didn't figure that out until Saturday morning either!  But at least we figured it out before driving out to Craftsbury.  And I'm even more excited for the reunion now that I've learned it will include a sheep shearing demo and a carding/weaving demo.  Also there will be a contra dance.  Sometimes I think I should have been a Sterling student, but then I remember they're a bit light on the science classes.  (Neil's suggested more then once that I could become a teacher there and help fix that problem, but the commute from home would be as long as my current one, and without a bus!)

So this weekend I did some summer seasonal activities.  On Saturday I went out to pick blackberries with our dogs.  We've gotten permission to pick the shrubs growing in our neighbor's sugarbush.  Sugarbush maintenence seems to encourage great blackberry brambles...  The berry picking went very well, it's only just the beginning of the season, so I think I'll go again later on.  The boys were very well behaved and never ran further then I could hear them.  By the time my bucket was full I had followed a four-wheeler trail so far into the bush I figured if I continued to follow it (it seemed to have curved and started heading downhill again) that I should come out on our road - either close to home or just past it.
But nope!  I had, without realizing, followed the path over the crest of the ridge and down to the road in the next valley over.  From there I decided to walk home and ended up doing a 2 mile walk alongside the road (after what had to be about 2 miles in the woods)  It wasn't a bad little hike except that I was wearing heavy pants (to protect my legs in the brambles) and hiking on an 85 degree day for 3 hours With No Water.  The boys were very well behaved, even off leash, on the road-hike back.  I think they'd exhausted themselves in the sugarbush and then I made them hike another 2 miles.  At least they could swim in all the little streams to cool off!  After it all I ended up with 2.5lbs of blackberries and a mental note to bring a nalgene the next time I go berry picking.

Sunday I cleared some of the scrub in the front yard, worked on some knitting (I should have another finished sweater soon), and put up a lot of veggies.  Corn, more green beans, broccoli, and shredded zuchinni all went into the freezer.  The blackberries are in the fridge - I'm going to make wine and pie this evening!

And for some of us (Neil) it's the end of summer.  He has his first classes at Johnson State tomorrow, and he's back at work at Laraway this week as well.

Not last weekend but the one before (boy this post is late)  I went to the first annual VT knit and fiber camp!  Putting the event together started through a ravelry group, but our fearless organizer posted fliers around the state as well.  The idea behind it was that while there are lots of great knitting events, retreats, classes, conventions out there they all cost money - more money then some of us can really justify (it would seriously cut into my yarn budget) 



VT knit and fiber camp was a simple get together of like minded knitters at Kettle Pond right here in VT.  We had a pot luck the first evening, and otherwise everyone brought their own food, camping gear, etc although there was still plenty of sharing going on the rest of the weekend!  The $12.50 fee covered two nights in some really nice lean-tos and s'mores the second evening.  I tried a variation on the classic s'more - this one uses cookies instead of graham crackers, reeses peanut butter cups instead of plain chocolate, and a GIANT marshmellow.  It was delicious, but horribly sticky... 



We had a yarn swap table for people who brought yarn they were willing to trade, and one person brought the leftover stock from a relative's out of business yarn store - so we had a huge table of 40% off yarn and needles as well!



There weren't a lot of plans for the weekend.  We had cabling and spinning demos - but mostly we had an entire weekend of sitting around the campfire with our knitting and spinning where we talked about yarn, fiber, gauge, works in progress, each other's socks (sock summit came up) and no one felt bad for not doing chores, and no one rolled their eyes at us about our stashes, and no one's face glazed over when someone started discussing the merits of certain kinds of knitting needles over other kinds (I passed around my signature knitting needles - everyone loved them and totally understood how awesome they were)  Good times all weekend.  I can't wait for next year!

I said goodbye to my mystery project this afternoon.  It was hard letting it go, but I'm excited to see what happens next!  Also I finished a sweater this morning.  I have to sew on the collar and weave in the ends, then there will be pictures!

This weekend the music festival was wonderful (and exhausting)  Neil and I ended up being the trash and recycling volunteers.  This meant instead of 4 solid hours of volunteer work followed by freedom we were both on duty and off duty all the time.  It was fun because it meant that we could listen to whatever shows we wanted and hard work because it meant I couldn't just find another barrel any time I noticed a full trash or recycling can.  The smoothie vendor did give us a free smoothie though!  And Neil got to drive the golf cart buggy thingies which made him very happy.

I think Neil is starting to absorb knitting knowledge through osmosis (diffusion actually, since it's not water)  He's not interested in learning to knit - but the other day a random passerby commented "knitting?  cool, but it's the wrong season."  After they'd moved on he gave me a confused look and asked how there could be a wrong season for knitting?  Also, once the mystery project was done and blocked I had it ready to go, but Neil asked to see it again because "after it's blocked is when it's really finished."  And honestly, I'd never expect a non-knitter to understand the difference between a completely finished but not washed and laid flat item - and one that's exactly the same but washed and laid flat to dry (except with lace, that difference is obvious) 
It's like when I discovered that he knew not to put my bras through the dryer.  It's not that I don't think he can learn these things, but that I barely know that's a bad idea myself!  He might be much more observant then I am...

I have no idea where the time went! Last weekend we had a fun saturday followed by a very quiet sunday to make up for it.


The Rattlin' Brook Bluegrass Festival was last weekend - we go every year. It was pretty nice weather (it didn't rain - which it almost always does for this poor festival) And the turnout was great. The bands were good, the company was fun. I didn't ace the boccie game this year but I guess I can't have everything.


I did have homemade snacks, beer, and some lovely knitting. This is the shrug for which I found The Perfect Yarn, and it's coming along wonderfully. I've made very few changes to the pattern. I'm about 14 inches across the 22 inch flat back, and I'm finally bored. Bored as in - too boring even for TV knitting. I know because I kept stopping without realizing it last night! It's not the project's fault, I just can't handle this much stockinette all the time. This will take a nap at the back of my closet - but the yarn is much too lovely for it to never re-appear.


The beetle thought so too. I think this closeup shows A) the subtle color of the yarn and B) how well the beetle matches.


See that? I've tried to take that photo three years in a row, but I've never had a camera up to the task of taking photos in dark corners of old wooden structures... Every year there's a bird nest in the lady's bathroom - and every year I worry about the little babies, 'cause mom seems to vanish while there are so many people around. But this year I decided that probably if she keeps returning she must be successful in raising the babies. I hope so too, because I think there are 6 in that nest.

And I've been collecting chicken pictures without every getting around to uploading them. So lets have a baby chicken update, shall we?

About 2 weeks ago their primary feathers started coming in (other then the ones on the wings)


And now they look like this - all their primary feathers are in, except for their fuzzy little heads. In my experience with both the araucanas and sussex their feather patterns will change once more before they reach adulthood - but on one of them (not photoed) I'm already starting to notice some sussex speckles coming through. They've started exploring more on their own, and mom has started letting them. She'll even eat some bread crumbs in the morning before she starts sharing. They're really mixing in with the adult flock now too, it's pretty cute watching them dive in and out between the big ones when there's a special treat to be eaten!


I'll be interested to see how they look as grownups - the araucanas have pea combs while the sussex have pointy standard combs. I did notice in just the last 3 days their legs have started to go from yellow to the green tinge that the araucanas have. There's a lot of feather variety in both breeds though, so I'm sure we'll get some unique looking birds.

Oh, and hey!  It's our 4th wedding anniversary!  Craziness huh?