One Month In

Today is the last day of the first month of the new year and it's time to check on what I've done so far this year.
On the knitting front, I have completed a total of four bears for The Mother Bear Project.

I've added almost a full round to my 10 stitch afghan (that top left hand corner is where I started the year),

added about half a dozen puffs to my collection for the Beekeeper's Quilt, (I looked back and only had a dozen in September.)

and I'm working on the first sleeve of my Hey Teach.

That's not bad progress so far.
In the gardening part of my life I'm also making some progress. We added two beds to our garden area this month.

The strawberries are starting to bloom.

I have a blossom on one of my peach trees. (I tried to tell it that it's still too early, but it didn't listen.)

The huckleberry is getting it's new leaves too.

Everything else is starting to show buds, but hasn't done more than pop out a couple of leaves. There are quite a few patches of a little white flower that I am trying to figure out. I have no clue what it is.

I also got a picture of a tiny bit of the creek that runs through part of our property. The creek gets high with the rain, but almost disappears when it gets dry around here.

We've been feeding the birds and the deer (and rabbits, squirrels and other assorted wildlife that hits the deer corn.)
I'm also preparing for my daughter's wedding. I finally found what I'll wear and if I could magically lose 20 to 30 pounds before the wedding I would be jumping up and down. I put on weight while nursing my husband last year and I'm just beginning the process of taking it back off. It will be a slow process and I don't think that it will be complete by April.
Not much more going on around here at the moment. I've spent some quality "baby time" in the past few weeks and enjoyed it. I'm also enjoying being able to give them back.

And the work goes on

It's been a very busy week around here, but not a lot of knitting has gone on. Instead I have looked at the Huckleberry bushes on our new property and seen the little huckleberries growing.















I've also built some 4 x 4 foot garden beds for the new garden and filled them with soil from the old beds that we took down at the current rental property. I built these from the decking of our old porch. It's not pressure treated and we can't reuse it for the new porch because it won't be covered at the beginning, but it makes nice little beds after I play with the saw and the drill. There are little volunteers in one of the beds already. One is a cucumber for sure and the other one we think is either squash or cantaloupe. Either one works for me. I have tomatoes and peppers that will go in the beds as soon as we get moved.














I also started making rain barrels to water the garden with. I just don't see the sense in wasting perfectly good free water. In this picture they are sitting next to my little garden shed and they aren't complete. I need to set up a gutter with downspout, put the lids back on with a way for the water to get in, connect them together with an overflow valve, and set up two more.






I have been knitting some. I'm still working on the Pi shawl and have many stitches per round, but not as many as there will be before it's done. I'm looking forward to sitting in a swing knitting and looking at my garden when we get moved.
Since I've never done this before I didn't know how many county government departments I'd have to go to or how much it would cost at each of these places. It's getting done one step at a time. Hopefully, I will have more knitting time soon.

Busy, busy, busy

I've been busy around here. I finally got pictures of my woven blanket














and of the Wildfoote socks.














And then I was out at the new property and got a shot of the spot where I want a swing














and my new garden spot.














I'm currently working on the Blueberry Pi shawl (and thinking of where to plant blueberry bushes in the new yard), a pair of socks for one of the granddaughters, and some baby hats. I've also got four hats for MT25 that need to be seamed up and one hanging on my machine.
For those who are interested... swing under tree in that shot. The house will go where the orange clay is. There is a tiny Magnolia that we transplanted out of the way of the house at the front of the garden side of the yard and the property goes back beyond those trees on this side of the property. I'm looking forward to gardening, knitting, spinning, crocheting, and weaving here.