Forgive me...

but I'm going to brag a little. This has been a highly productive week for me and I feel like sharing. On Monday we went on a field trip to Tulip Town as part of the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival. We went early in the morning to avoid the crowds and had a great time. We even got our picture in the newspaper. I let Ethan use my point and shoot camera and he had a lot of fun taking pictures. Here is my favorite of the ones he took:

Here is my favorite that I took:

You can find more of the photos we took that day on my Tulip Trip Flickr set.

Tuesday we had library day and swim lessons. I took all our garage sale leftovers to the thrift shop.

Wednesday we went to grandma's where Ethan got to see the chickens and plant his very own row of onions in the garden.

Thursday I worked my little tail off and broke my single day production record and produced 1220 lines of transcription. Before 3:00 p.m. Ethan also had swimming again.

Friday I helped my mom load her wares for the local Garden Art Show into her car. While I was at her house, I helped myself to some of the anaerobic digester compost (very rich, dry, not stinky compost) she got for the garden. I turned the dirt in our garden at home and added in the good compost so we have a place for our tomatoes and peppers. I planted potatoes, onions, lettuce, spinach, mesclun, basil, parsley, and cilantro in containers. Cliff built a potato box last week, so that is what were growing our potatoes in this year. He painted it black to help retain heat and protect the wood. Here is a photo of the potato box:


I took more items to the thrift shop to donate and found the *perfect* bookcase I needed for our school room. Well, it wasn't perfect; it was 8 feet tall (I have 8 foot ceilings) and only 8 inches deep, but it was only $20 and everything I'd looked at so far was $80+. I couldn't even make it myself for that. The books can hang off the shelf if necessary, and I had Cliff cut the top 2 feet off for me.

Saturday I sanded, filled, and primed the new book case, mowed the lawn, took the kids for a bike ride to the park, and started lining a knit bag that I've been avoiding for almost a year.

Sunday I sanded the book case again, and painted the first coat in the color Ethan chose (dark red). We took our lunch to the beach and the kids played at the playground. I ran two clothes lines and am looking for a sewing pattern for a clothespin bag. Right now I'm soaking beans to make my white chili later in the week and I still plan to mix a batch of artisan bread dough. oh! I finished lining the cabled bag! Here's a final photo:


All this and I still worked every day, cooked a full dinner from scratch every night, cleaned the house, and did laundry. It must be spring.

oh! Fireplace update. The new mantle is framed in, the pipe has been run in the chimney, the electricity is wired in, and the new stove is sitting in its new spot. Hopefully, the project will get wrapped up this week.


Phew! I think I need a vacation.

Camera Lenses

I’m an amateur photographer at best, but I think I am finally growing beyond my “kit” lenses that came with my camera. I’ve been shooting with a Canon Rebel XTi for just over 2 years now. The camera came with 2 lenses, an EF-S 18-55 mm 1:3.5-5.6 II and an EF 75-300 mm 1:4-5.6 III. Until now, they’ve both served me well and I have no doubt they are great beginner lenses. I’m sure I will continue to get a lot of use out of them as there is still a lot I don’t know about photography and about the camera.

Yesterday, before the rain returned, I was outside attempting to take photos of my flowers and I couldn’t get the photos I was visualizing in my head. Part of the reason was because the blooms were all pointed downward and I was lying on the ground, on my back, having a hard time getting the angle I wanted without manipulating the flowers. The other reason was I couldn’t get the narrow depth of field I wanted. The light was heavy overcast natural outdoor lighting. I opened the aperture as wide as I could, which was only ƒ4.5 or ƒ5, and used as long of an exposure as I could keep still for, which isn’t long (1/125). Here are the photos as they were, straight out of the camera:




The colors are bold, but something about them looks kind of “blah.” I was aiming for a blurrier background (bokeh I think its called), and slightly brighter. Yes, I know I could manipulate them in Photoshop, but I don’t like to do this more than necessary. My thinking is if I need to alter it that much, I should have taken a better photo in the first place. Don’t get me wrong, Photoshop totally has a place, but I want to learn how to take a better photo and not rely on Photoshop too heavily to fix the problems.

I guess what I need to find out is do I invest in a higher quality multipurpose lens with a slightly wider aperture capabilities, a fixed focal length lens with wider aperture, or a true macro lens. I do like macro photography and this is definitely something I would like to do more of, but I need to do a lot more research and maybe find some knowledgeable help.

Spring has sprung!

I'm sorry I've been so quiet, but I've been really sick for more than a week with a nasty cold/crud that apparently is going around. I couldn't even knit! Today I finally feel somewhat normal and I get to spend the next two days working at the yarn shop. Yes! I work a couple days a month at my LYS, Knot Just Yarn. I don't think I've actually mentioned that here before, and I don't know why, but I've been working there for about six months now. This weekend is the annual shop retreat and I get to stay in the shop and hold down the fort.

It is officially the first day of spring, and if it weren't for these:

you'd never know it around here. We've been having weird bouts of snow and rain and wind...yes, I know i live in Washington but the rain and wind like this is usually reserved for November.

I started my first lace project and so far I love it. The yarn is Kauni, and the pattern is the Northern Lights Shawl.
I don't have enough done yet to really show much, but I'll post a photo when I'm further in. Links to the project on Ravelry are in the sidebar.

My baby turned 5 years old this week, on St. Patrick's Day. This kid is so smart and so full of energy some days I wonder, did I really give birth to him? I knit him a pair of socks for his birthday but he hasn't gotten them yet because his party is on Sunday. I'm sure there will be photos to share.

We have chickens! I've thought about raising chickens for eggs for a while now but we just don't have the room. One day my mom called and said, "what do you think about raising chickens?" The first four lived with us for a couple days so Ethan could handle them and play with them. He even took photos of them:

They've since moved back to my mom's, where they will live permanently. Just this week, she picked up four more, for a total of 8. They are all Barred Rock Hens (hopefully) but we got 8 in the off chance one is a rooster. Mom has been building them a chicken tractor that can easily be moved around the property and garden, and next will come the coop/run with nesting boxes. Come this fall we should have fresh eggs on a regular basis. I am pretty excited because not only do I know exactly where my eggs are coming from, but I can use this as a great educational tool for Ethan. He named the first four and has grown particularly attached to one he named 'star' (she has a little yellow diamond shape on her head).

Happy Spring!