#25: get red tomatoes this year

Still in progress!

peppers on the left, tomatoes on the right. i think that the paper cups are the best bet for my growing standards. the little toilet rolls need to be watered all the time, and they're molding. it's annoying.


not tomatoes, but gardening anyways! arugula and some lettuces. baby cilantros are sticking their little necks out too. must weed some more, pull all the arugula (it's already starting to bolt!! and i want to make LOTS of pesto..but i'll keep some arugula for seed). it's so good. in salad or whatever. yip!

working for the weekend

i'm at work, it's lunch time and i'm going to try and work through my lunch. i'm mowing down on carrot sticks and port alberni radishes *yum!*. i didn't get my plants in the ground this week and anticipate putting seth in his bouncy chair, heading outside, and planting my tomatoes and peppers tomorrow. on saturday night i will soak the beans i have to plant and then plant them in the raised bed on sunday AM. i'm still so new to growing (year 2) that i'm giving myself lots of room to learn about what's happening and make mistakes, rather than get stressed out about soil ph, type of dirt, etc. it's like when i was learning to knit and didn't jump right into understanding how cables work (i still don't). i should also get my potatoes growing in their little tires and get the chicken wire up and running soon. oh, and the deer fence! jeez, having a garden is a lot of work (but so worth it).

this week has been a complete write off. seth was SO SICK and such a handful. one night at 3am he was bawling because he had a fever and we were going nuts, i was trying to get him into the bath to relax, cool down, and feel like he was having fun and i said to stewart, "can you imagine some people have babies who do this every night for months?" and we both shuddered. i couldn't imagine having to experience that. i definitely want more kid(s) around but there ain't no way in hell that they're going to be babies because i'm just not going to take the chance to deal with that. no thank you. (and a big woop to the parents who have had to deal with that: you amaze me).

the only other thing i've focused on this week has been roller derby. any extra seconds i've had have gone to developing our code of conduct or our policy manual. we have our first board meeting tonight at my house to give people work to do. i'm excited because we'll hopefully have full buy in from a total of 7 of us, which will make the work load that much easier and lighter on everyone. there is no way i could've taken on a league with a smaller board or even doing a bunch of the start up work and then pulling people in. someone else is going to organize the first meet up. someone else is going to take over the facebook group. someone else is going to make registration forms and membership databases and sort out the insurance. and the seven of us will have founded a derby league together. this is going to be amazing!

last but not least,  i've been looking longingly at my list on the left and wanting to accomplish some things faster, you know? so many of those things are long process activities or i need something else to get them finished. a number of them, too, i know won't happen which is a little discouraging, but just a fact of life, i guess. next year i'll probably do a list with more little goals and i already have some in mind (like no eating out at a restaurant for 3 months and sew myself a piece of clothing every month or something like that)... but must focus on the list i have now! i'm going to order rennet this weekend to make the cheese, go this afternoon and get my birth certificate so i can submit my change of name forms when i get paid next, next week i'm cooking another pasta, and will probably get two or three more in by the end of the month.. you know. get on it?

have a great weekend! XO

Seed Saving Squash Edition

From getinthegarden.com

Seed saving. This is something I've never actually done outside of trying to sprout an avocado pitt in a cup of water balancing on some toothpicks. I'm not even sure of the ins and outs, other than that you gut your vegetable and clean your seeds, dry them from the moisture, and put them away (labeled) in a paper envelope or something and out of the sunlight.

But, to me it doesn't seem that easy.

i have the riff from a sleigh bells song in my head

Happy Monday!

I'm so impressed with this teenager!

The article in the NY times is a good portrait of the self-imposed farmer life of a young woman. She wanted to grow food as a summer job and started a little buying club (CSA) and has turned part of her family's yard into an every producing garden. SO COOL. so fruitful. so wonderful! go youth! I look at her garden and I know she's feeding the neighbourhood but I wish I had a better garden. at least my tomatoes now have more than one flower! one year at a time me thinks!

in other news last week we received this letter from the federal government saying we weren't privy to a bunch of the sweet tax breaks canadians get for not having much income because last year stewart and i broke the 50K mark (just barely). so while i want to jump for joy at getting into the middle class (hahahaha) i totally wept because i thought it meant we weren't getting ANY of the sweet benefits! this year my income has gone from 34K down to 12K and we're getting by just fine, but the tri-monthly GST/carbon tax/HST credit would be nice. you know, to float us a bit. but i thought it meant we wouldn't get child tax credit. and lo and behold we do! YAY! so the first thing i did with our child tax credit was buy yarn! i haven't bought yarn since April (when i spent $20 on the patons to make my stripey cardigan) and then not since the holidays. the rest has already disappeared to groceries and gas to fill our tank for the month as well as face wash (i've been using bar soap for months) and some canning supplies so i can make jam. anyway, i got the yarn from KnittyDirtyGirl, who you should shop from right now.

seth is 9 weeks today which means that it's time to get his vaccination. we're going to hopefully do it tomorrow or wednesday. which means we'll need lots of sleep just in case things go awry and he's super sad. in the meantime we're going to watch hot tub time machine and eat really expensive ice cream. YAY! xo

"we'll both be sorry let's take it easy"

between 3pm and 6pm it was 35degrees outside! no wonder my little man refused to have his afternoon nap. that means that he really only had one 2.5 hour nap today. and slept in small chunks this afternoon. it was super annoying/frustrating as the afternoon wore on because seth just was so cranky and hot and wouldn't sleep when he normally would. it was a lot of work. we did his bath an hour early, though, and he passed out pretty much immediately. and he hasn't woken up. success.

in other news our garden is doing well. the potatoes are growing at such incredible speeds. i really look forward to all the potatoes we're supposed to reap. and more of my tomato plants are sticking it to the ground. well, stewart rented slammin' salmon and i'm gonna have a donut and knit. xo

baby i got your money

this weekend my sis came up from victoria and i really should've taken more pictures. can't believe i only took one picture. but it's a good'un. stewart dug out our raised beds this weekend and i'm going to be planting tomatoes in one of them (i've decided to get more cages, break down and make the investment, and then replant my tomatoes) and then plant potatoes in the other. just need to shovel some compost in there, buy the seedlings, and then throw some hay on top. oh, google, thank you for helping me be a farmer!

eden's heading back to victoria here in short order and we'll continue about our day/lives. keeping on top of house work, finishing this mei tai (dear god, so close), and trying to get food in our bellies. oh, the life! xo

"im singing the same song every day"

so i finally got my shit together and planted my enormous heirloom tomato plants that i grew from seed in the window sill, outside in the ground. now, being all on EI and stuff that i am, i really only had enough $$ to buy 2 cages. so i split the plants in half and put each in a cage. so there's a gazillion plants per cage (more like 8?) which is about 7 too many. but, what's a girl to do? really. i have enough plants to fill an entire raised bed, but only had enough good soil in about 10% of one of them. so not only did i not have enough cage i also don't have enough land. we'll have to see how this one goes! it's an urban farming experiment. that's what i'll say!

i've also transplanted my basil into larger containers and they're growing strong and big. i'll probably have to transplant the two smaller ones out of their zebra containers (still carrying them around from our wedding) and into bigger planters for the window sill. i love gardens. i love fresh produce!

two days ago i finished helvetica's sweater. it's a little big, but i like the short sleeves. i'm going to pair it with a chocolate brown hoodie for winter wear.

"it was all of my energy more than i wanted to give"

this past week at work i knit a sockhead hat! i'm currently stash knitting (and so thankful that once upon a time i had $$ and just stocked up on yarn b/c now i'm using it all!!!) and the sockhead hat seemed like such a great opportunity to use up some of this enormous stash of sock yarn i have. here is the link to my project on rav. the pattern was really easy and it was such a quick knit (at work). i also knit it shorter because i do like slouch, but i didn't want to much slouch. the araucania was a little rough, but i think it'll soften up nicely. i even have enough yarn left (it only used 1/2 a skein!!!) to make a baby shirt that i've been eyeing over on ravelry.

in other news a few weeks ago i transplanted my houseplants into bigger pots using some potting soil that my mom had outside.


and lo and behold the dirt was full of this weird yellowish fungus. the plants seem fine but i will need to transplant them here in short order. shake all the dirt off the roots and put them in fresh potting soil. i don't want to traumatize them because they just were transplanted, but it's the weirdest fungus i've ever seen. and i didn't see it in the dirt when i planted the little guys so who knows? regardless, they're still growing and fast. maybe it's a majic growing fungus?

in more other news i'm into my 3rd trimester now and we're into the countdown, closer together midwife appointments, meeting with doulas, etc. i'm going on leave in 2 weeks and 2 days or something like that. which means more knitting, hopefully unpacking, getting to garden, and coming to prince george. where i will hole up with a., engage in serious cuddling with loki, and knit and eat with all the lovelies for a few short days before departing back south to wait out the last month! things of strange right now are a stomach up on my emotional chakra and this consistent kicking at my lower esophagus. blarg.

"nobody better pinch me, bitch i swear i go crazy"

my grandma and grandpa on my grandpa's bday. he got a lottery ticket (not a winner) but was excited!

things have definitely been busy around here. and i don't even feel like i'm doing very much! oi! i've been knitting up a storm for friends and helvetica...and am going to cast on matching booty shorts for stewart's birthday hat! very excited! a few things have come up in the past week that i'm getting psyched about and working on (aside from my need for a gazillion hours of sleep every night).

first is definitely the weather! my little widget says it's 7C out! wowza! and it's clear and sunny! we can see the mountains and a sea of blue sky. i love it. the rain over the past few weeks has also caused everything to start growing. we have this neon-green moss growing all over the yard and crocuses and small little purple flowers are growing EVERYWHERE. i've just repotted my house plants too (stew got me an aloe and a jade plant for vagina day)! yay for spring! i'm also getting further into this gardening thing. i need to find some dirt (for free!), shovel out our garden boxes and get newspaper seedlings started inside pretty quick.

the other is that i met a handful of amazing people on the weekend at a party and i've gotten my hands on some volunteer opportunities at a local family treatment centre *hopefully* writing youth programming policy!! yay! i also have a NDP hookup that i have yet to call and will probably do next week when i'm on my new schedule (nights th-monday but tues and wed off!!!) and a bit more sane.

lastly, this weekend we're going to victoria albeit just for the night to see my beloved YACHT. i can't wait to party down dance whatever and enjoy one of my last shows and latenight slurpee foibles before being a parent (and then having to worry about sitters and travel with a kid and blah blah blah). speaking of: i only have about 6.5 weeks of work left. OMZG!! i leave you with a live yacht video. xo