As in 47,940 stitches later, I am finished knitting the linen stitch shawl “‘secret” project.

It’s about 54 inches long by 20.5 inches wide, 255 stitches by 188 rows.

Now I need to get these buttons on, somehow! I’m thinking a crocheted edge, and building the button loops into that.

Aren’t they great? From Obie at the fair. He mostly had stone stuff, including granite and labradorite buttons, but these glass ones looked best.

And then there’s the ends… 188 strands times two ends.

Yikes!

I’m thinking my options are

1. tie knots tight up against the fabric and trim the fringe to an even 2 inches or so
2. braid the ends
3. sew in all those ends

I don’t see #3 there as very realistic…

I think this is still a secret project… the recipient doesn’t know. She had some wicked foot surgery today, which went well. Tomorrow the perineal block (?) wears off and she’ll be in for a rough day. Since she’ll be off her feet for 8 weeks, I figure getting it to her this weekend will still be good!

Another year at the Common Ground Fair! I worked 37 hours between Friday and Sunday, and I went to work today for most of the day (what was I thinking??), so I’m a little crispy.

The fair set an attendance record on Saturday, and it was a busy day! 24,500 people. Our booth saw a good number of people, so we did a good job getting out the word about invasive plants. Here’s our two interns, Chris and Gwen,

Silly me, I brought the blank posters, so on Friday we didn’t have the big showy pictures. Good thing we got them in for Saturday! They really make people stop and look.

The big news at the fair? Can you see it?? The blue sign behind the kid’s daily parade?

Coffee!!! At the Fair!!!! This was big news. I’ve got electricity at my booth (for the laptop slide show), so, after purchasing two coffees (it was good, but it was not inexpensive), I continued to make my own.

A highlight for me was meeting and talking with Donna of the Wednesday Spinners. Here she is talking about dyeing with fungi. And some hats made of yarn dyed with fungi (and lichens-the purples).

She brain tanned her buckskin and doeskin, and it was soft and very pleasant. DH brought her some fungi on Sunday, and she was pleased. I’m seeing this as a good thing, his fungus obsession, and I can start experimenting with it for dye (in addition to the lotion). I already know the sweater I want to overdye with the superconcentrated chagga tea I made.

I didn’t make any fiber purchases, but enjoyed gabbing with Bill Huntington of Hope Spinnery (who has this great hat pattern that he hasn’t published yet, soon, soon!!!), Nanney Kennedy (the temptress) of Sea Colors, and Pogo of Friends Folly Farm.

The people were fun to watch, and the animals were beautiful.

Oxen, I’m still a little unclear about what these are. Castrated boy cows used as draft animals not as beef animals… but are they a distinct breed?? They get big!

Beautiful draft horses,

Donkeys.. the owner said that these creatures bite him, so watch out. I didn’t hear anybody yelp, but honestly, would you go petting a creature with big teeth and a large mouth when its owner said it bites him?

Sunday rained all day, and attendence was down, but it was still beautiful… sights, smells, and sounds…

i totally got caught

On Saturday, I was walking around the back of the fair, and passed a youngish, tallish, relatively attractive man, in a utilikilt, and my mind was wandering: oooh, a kilt, damn, I want one of those, how come they don’t make the utilikilts for women?, would it look so good on a woman, specifically me? and look at those boots, yowza. He must’ve seen some look on my face, so he says something like “have a good day” in this wicked accent (Scottish? Aussie?), and I realized he had the wrong idea. I was telling Bill that I almost told him it was his clothes I was lusting after, not him… but why spoil it.

and then I fessed up

Then the next day I saw a man I though was him, and asked if he was wandering around in a utilikilt. Yes. So I told him he caught me lusting after his clothes, and I thought maybe he’d gotten the wrong idea. He laughed, and looked at me like I was a nutjob, and said “have a great day!”. If you go next year, he works the Trillium Soap booth…

Can you tell that when my brother and I played Batman and Robin, I was usually Robin? (And he was the Penguin or some other nefarious criminal who had me tied up and requiring some sort of rescue)…. Anyhow…

The “Bat Light” was shining today at work…

summer in a glass

Since it’s now fall and all…

I have no idea what this is called, but it is incredible… basically a basil/lime/gin cocktail. nummmm nummmmm……

• “some” basil leaves
• 3/4 parts simple syrup
• 1 part lime juice (key lime juice is better than real-lime, and fresh is great too)
• 2 parts gin (something decent… tanqueray, bombay, hendricks, or see here for other gin recommends)

Muddle the basil leaves in a cocktail shaker. Add the liquids. Add some ice. Shake. Serve over ice.

You can also do the simple way and muddle the leaves in a glass, add the liquids, add some ice, and stir. But I think shaking it on ice is way better! I’ve also made with sugar versus the syrup and it’s good too.

colors of fall

On Saturday a friend and I went out, supposedly to do a bit of kayaking… but it was wickedly windy, and we spent some time checking in on yet another friend (seriously… did the phone die because of the battery or because something horrible happened…thankfully it was an issue of the battery, but things are rough for her now, so send out some good thoughts to her!)

Fall colors of watershield, yellow floating heart, some water-lily, and who knows what else at one of the two boat landings at the dam in Mt. Vernon.

Common Ground Fair!

The Common Ground Fair is this weekend… I’ll be there with our Invasives display (though it has changed since last year)… If you go to the fair, come visit me, I’ll be in one of the two environmental concerns tents.

and ye all thought the day got away from me…..

ye all scalliwags who created this quiz need to be walkin’ the plank, what’s with this shoddy alignment???

The shawl project is coming along… maybe 25% done. The color is someplace between the two photos,

I really like how the colors and textures play with each other,

It’s mostly mindless. Once in a while I’ll start a row and not like the color, but for the most part they all do well together. The trouble is the basket that the yarn is all in… it quickly becomes a tangled mess! I end up tipping it out all over the couch, and sitting there amongst the balls and skeins and bits.

walk in the woods

On Sunday, we went to Vaughn Woods in Hallowell, aka “Hobbit Land”. We did a poke about for fungi and whatever…

The water was lovely at the lower bridge on the creek,

Jewelweed (aka “touch-me-not”) was in flower,

(great flower close-ups here). The seed pods are wicked entertaining… touch them from both ends and they pop… clever little seed distribution scheme.

Check out what happens to the leaves when you put them in water,

it’s like quicksilver.

Not a mum,

Not rare,

We got a lot of phone calls about this one this year… it’s Indian Pipe. It’s interesting though… not green but is a flowering plant. It may be parasitic, saprophytic, and certainly has symbiotic relationships with mycorrhizal fungi. Read more about its parasitic ways and other oddities.

There were lush mosses… and I even remember the names of some of them,

Anomodon attenuatus, the attenuate anomodon… no real common name. But, see how its branches start larger and get skinny to the tips? Dead give-away. mmmm hmmmmm….

Do you think I have a career as a mushroom model?

At one point I wondered… why are these leaves jumping around?

Because that leaf is a frog. But I don’t know what kind. A brown leaf frog?

chew much?

Somebody has a little oral fixation….

Not me! (zuzu)

yeah, so? (gracie)