I'm in kind of a funk right now. Only knit 8 rows on my sock at lunches all week, haven't touched Robin since last weekend. Yes I have lost my knitting mojo. I'm not doing Sharon's next KAL. Two reasons - first - it's colorwork. I can do colorwork. I've done projects with intarsia, with entrelac, fair isle and stranding. I just really don't enjoy doing it. And I really don't wear it much. I'm more of a texture and pattern through stitches kind of knitter. Second I may possibly finish the second robin by the end of this new KAL and maybe I'll be ready for KAL 5. I kinda knew from previous experience, that once I fell behind finishing was going to be rough. And that's where my knitting mojo went. I want to finish so I'm not going to cast on something new. And none of my other wip's or ufo's are looking good. So tonight I am going toknit on robin for at least an hour.
Since I have no knitting to show you, and people have asked how I do my hanging tomato baskets, today will be a how to post. How to plant your own hanging tomato basket.
Step 1. If you have never done this before, get a metal hanging basket lined with coco-fiber (coir) make sure there is a circle on the bottom not x's or floral shapes - you need to get the tomato through there. If you have baskets from previous years, buy new liners. The old liner can harbor, mold, fungus, disease etc. In prior years I used pre-formed liners, but like an idiot, this year I bought the wrong size and then the store was sold out of the correct size. So I was forced to use these liners.
2. The biggest issue with this type of liner is forming it to the basket. If you were just planting flowers on top, you could fill it with potting soil and that would help work it into shape. So, once you get pot and liner, work the liner into the pot and make an x shape cut into the bottom of the liner. Don't worry if it seems large, the plant and the soil will keep it closed.
3. Choose your tomato plants. I try for slightly willowy plants over stocky ones, and you want to choose younger rather than more mature plants. i don't think it would be a huge issue with a more mature plant, but working the rootball will be more difficult and having the roots messed with may cause stress and shock your plant. This is the plant I planted yesterday. It is a sweeet 100, I also did a grape tomato as well.
4. Take the plant out of the pot and squish the rootball into an oblong, footballish shape.
(that frayed cuff is attached to an equally frayed, "holey" sweatshirt I won't give up from Tony's 1999 rookie season)
5. Work the rootball up ( some books/mags tell you to put the plant through - but I never can do that without roughing up the leaves too much) into the hole, it will push the points of the X up into the basket. Once the rootball is in the basket, the points go back down to secure the stem. DOn't worry about excess soil on the outside - it will wash away after a watering or 2.
6. Fill basket with well draining light potting soil. I mix moisture control ( yes well draining and holding moisture at the same time is a tall order) potting soil by miracle grow, mixed with 25-33% miracle grow perlite. Be very careful at first to get the soil evenly around the roots. Then fill to just over 1/2 way.
7. Get some basil - these 2 pots have sweet basil, others will have lemon basil, thai basil etc. But use what you like to eat. plant the basil in the basket and fill with more soil.
8. Hang water and (sigh) wait.
You Should Work with Things
You are a very hands on sort of person. You like doing physical work and moving around.
It would kill you to be at a desk job all day. You don't like to sit still for too long.
You are very energetic, and you get bored if you aren't able to channel your hyperactivity.
You are good at mastering difficult tasks. You have excellent eye hand coordination, and you are quite graceful.
Welcome to the May 13th version of Thursday Thunks! (which we always seem to post onWednesday) Where we make you think a little bit before you blog!
We pick a subject, and your job is to interpret it anyway you want. Write about it on your blog... simple as that. Maybe you can interpret it as a picture - we don't care! Please only leave a link if you have written a Thursday Thunks post. Please mention us in your post, and link back to the blog here. Don't forget to go visit the other participants' blogs. Read and comment about all their Thursday Thunks! That's what all this is about after all, isn't it? We'll have so much fun and become lifelong friends....
The TT questions are brought to you by Berleen, the color of black coffee, which I need more of and the number 8,299,598,330.
Are you a Facebooker? Are you addicted to those stupid games that suck a person in at the drop of a hat? Would you care to share your Facebook identification link so that we may all stalk you be your friend? Nope, no facebook - btw those of you into facebook, you may want to look into how they are screwing with the privacy policy. I am on twitter however.
If you had to be magically transformed into an animal that you loathe, which one would it be? And don't give me those "none" answers...I would be a crocodile or alligator. ( have a serious weird phobia of them. since I was a little kid I was convinced I would die by getting eaten by an alligator)
What is the strangest thing you have said to:
* get a job?To get my current job, the words minions & megalomaniac were used.
* get a date?"stardate: (forgot the numbers) you, me, galactic exploration, starting with dinner?" PS it worked. ( I was a sci-fi geek and the guy had a [I thought then very cool] conversion van that was airbrushed with star wars scenes)
What cartoon character do you find the most sexiest?When I was a kid I had the HUGEST crush on Lion-o from the Thundercats. yeah I was a sad geek.
When dog food is new with improved tasting, who tests it?Let's hope they use finiky eater dogs..
What does OK actually mean?FROM allexperts.com
short for any of several different spellings of "all correct", including "Oll Korrect", "Orl Korrect", and "Ole Kurreck". There was a fad in the 1830s and 1840s involving the intentional misspelling of common phrases, and referring to them by the resulting initials. These may have been influenced by the Low German phrase "Oll klor", which would have been spoken by emigrants from Northern Germany. The fad included many other briefly popular abbreviations such as OW, "oll wright" (all right) and KY, "know yuse" (no use), none of which has survived. The first recorded use of "OK" in this sense was in the Boston Morning Post on March 23, 1839
If a person owns a piece of land do they own it all the way down to the core of the earth?That would depend on whether or not they owned the mineral rights I guess. Although if they did and a major earthquake started on a fault line under their property could we sue?
When you were in high school and were sitting in math class... when the day came to learn about 3.14, did you get hungry?I learned about pi before high school. But um, no. I didn't start celebrating 3.14 ( pi day) with pies until college.
Have you ever been on the radio?No, but I did make a wrong # phone call once to a guy who turned out worked at a radio station - and ended up going out for a month or so.
Beans, beans the magical fruit The more you eat, the more you toot The more you toot, the better you feel So let's have beans at every meal! Why do people say that when beans are vegetables?Sigh, why do so many thunks force me to lecture. Beans are a fruit. They are formed from a flower, and they are/contain the seeds of the plant. They are in good company with cucumbers, tomatoes, corn, and pumpkins which people erroneously call veggies. True veggies - broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce, collards, celery - are from the parts of the plant, stems, leaves, roots, flowers even. Now the Rhubarb, which most people call a fruit ( mmmm strawberry/rhubarb pie) is actually a vegetable.
What about tv? And I don't mean physically on top of the tv either, you silly people. Same goes for the radio question.A long time ago when my high school softball team made the state championships. ( I'm such a haz been)
Do you think Adam & Eve had belly buttons?Yes, I understand Genesis to be a creation poem, popular among the people of the region - all the cultures from that time period in the area had one. It contains a lot of symbolism - let's face it who's to say how long a day is to God, and people then were just developing basic math, so if the poem said and the first 1.8 billion years god created the stars and the galaxies, and the first generation stars had to live and burn out and die so that the heavier elements could be created, so that the next generation of stars could be born and create light. and the next billion or so years, those heavy elements from the first stars could coalesce and become the dry land, and then comets from the creation of the star that the dry land circled smashed into the land repeated ly delivering the water to form the seas...... I don't think they would have understood.
If you were going to own a liquor store or a bar, what would you name it? Whiskey Lullabuy
How about you own a grocery store - what's it's name?I think the liquor store/bar would be more fun.. How about Southern Comfort Food? Haven't had a good source for good southern ingredients around here.
If you could only watch one tv show for the rest of your life and no other, what would it be? And yes, it's going to be in series form so you don't actually have to watch the same episode over and over.NASCAR races.
What was the name of your 3rd grade teacher?I had 2, one was miss Florio, I think Mrs Froeschle was the other? They both started with F.
Do you know how to parallel park? Don't you?? Yes I can parallel park. And my daughter is an awesome parallel parker - thanks to my friend to C.
What kinds of cereal do you have in your home right at this very moment? Corn Pops, Basic 4, 4 different kins of special K, multi grain cheerios.
If you were to have a garage sale tomorrow, what is the first item you own that you would say "I'm selling THAT!"? my ice cream maker - not as much fun as I thought.
You Are a Crocodile
You are fierce and strong. You go after any prey that is in your sights.
You have a take charge personality, and you are quite dominant. You are not easily intimidated.
It's likely that you've had to struggle for survival in your life. You've had to develop a very thick skin.
You can be brutal, but you can also be tender. You tend to have two sides to your personality.
The basics:
Haiku is simple! It is 3 non-rhyming lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables respectively (a great way to use your fingers!)
This week’s theme is: Karma
What comes around will
One day bite you in the ass
Karma for dummies.
I'm not really sure about the all of humanity part. I kinda think most of humanity is a bunch of dumbasses who annoy me. But I guess the rest is close!
You Are Love
You find it easy to love. First of all, you love yourself - and that's extremely important.
You truly love your friends, and you even have a special love for all of humanity. Other people mean a lot to you.
You find it easy to express your feelings and get close to people. And while no friendship is perfect, you've mastered the art of forgiveness.
You are affectionate and caring. Your love can be anywhere from platonic to passionate, but it's always strong.
So here's some random stuff from the weekend. IF MOCKERY IS GOING TO OFFEND YOU YOU MAY WANT TO CLOSE THIS WINDOW NOW, AND TRY AGAIN TOMORROW! This is my official disclaimer! No complaints about the mockery if you actually read the whole post! Also - NOT EVERYTHING in this post is mocking. Please be intelligent enough to know the difference.
So on Friday, I got my swap package from my hockey swap. Apparently I need to wear more green and purple as the last two swap packages I got included green and purple based scarves!
On Saturday, Curt went to one of his computer nerd conferences, so I did a lot of laundry. Blech, I hate laundry. I was getting ready to relax and watch the race when a little past 6 our power started blinking. ( Did I mention just how windy it was this weekend?) then out power went out completely. Now my laptop battery is kinda shot - and I'm not entirely sure if my woreless would work at the wall without power anyway. I did use my phone a bit longer online, but decided to shut it off as this new phone of mine seriously sucks power. I mean my last phone I used constantly and I charged it every 2 or 3 days. This phone, I think I need a car charger for as it is on yellow or red each day when I get home. Fortunately, the transformer that our power is on, is also the transformer that runs the traffic light on the corner of Main St and the highway. SO the cops were directing traffic, which obviously pushed our problem to the top of the power company's list. I have to give them credit, they had the power back up in under 2 hours, closer to 1.5 hours actually.
Back to Sunday. The track wasn't very crowded, but there were still a bunch of "don'ts" there.
First, the should be extinct, but is merely just endangered - Mullet
Dude - it's seriously time to cut the tail.
Pit Lizards?
Finally - this is for "you know who you are" It is seriously annoying that you read my blog, never deigning to comment on it. You also don't have the nerves to tell me yourself, your opinion of my blog and/or its contents. Do I actually care? Do I ever care about any of your "correctness" opinions? Realistically - you do not need to read my blog. You can keep up on Angie much more directly if you chose. but if you do read the blog - please refrain from telling A to tell B to tell me your opinion. because I don't care. If you had actually read Thursday's blog post ( and if you are going to read my blog I would consider the Thunks a surprising choice of posts) It asked what the oldest picture in my house was. Not for ALL the old pictures in my house. Nor did it ask for the oldest picture of my parents in the house. But to make you happy - Here is a picture of my father, my grandfather and my great grandfather ( whom I called grey grandpa, because I thought it was grey for his hair - yes I was so dumb it could be confused with cute)
Or how I froze my butt on Mother's Day. Curt and I drove (forever) down to Millville on Sunday morning. We stopped at the Club Dinerin Bellmawr, NJ for breakfast. Ever since we decided to leave early to beat shore traffic one weekend on our way down to the track, and look for breakfast closer to south Jersey, this has become our breakfast stop. It's a cute small diner, very friendly staff, and a great breakfast. ( although being from North Jersey, the "pork roll" on their menu makes me shudder) Previously, we got off at a different exit of the turnpike and drove about 40 miles down 295 to stop at the diner. the exit after the diner is the one that takes you to 55. For whatever reason, maybe Curt programmed it as a way point on his gps, the gps took us to exit 3 on the turnpike and the diner is like right in between the turnpike and our next exit on 295. YAY!
We got to the track early, for qualifying and tech inspections. 20 cars registered, but only 8 showed up. ( hey top ten finish for everyone!) Here's the start of the line for qualifying laps.
"My driver" is Tomy Drissi. his car ran a Marmaduke movie paint scheme.
This ATV cracked me up. The honda ATV with the Jaguar logos from Rocketsports. BTW - for those of you who follow racing - the guy with his back to the camera is Paul Gentilozzi - of Rolex, Trans-Am, Grand am and Imsa fame. Better pick later.
Drissi - debriefs after his qualifying run.
RJ Lopez, Drissi and Tony Ave wait for their cars to go through tech. After looking at Ave's lack of grooming - I really don't want to hear anyone picking on Stewarts scruff anymore.
The temperature for most of the day didn't get out of the low 50's. When we had first arrived the temperature was 45 degrees. Add to that a very windy day, with gusts reaching 40 miles and hour, and you will understand how I spent most of the day frozen. Do you know how you kind of hunch up a bit when you are really really cold? I was doing that all day! My shoulders were soooo stiff when I woke up this morning I had to spend an extra 5 minutes just under the hot water in the shower! Garage bathroom - picture for Min
After the race - and we were near turns 12 and 13, we had to seriously hustle to get to the victory lane podium.
Drissi, Lopez and Ave really were the class of the field - it was like watching 2 separate races.
Gentilozzi in victory lane - dude your car won, lets not get too excited.
Of course my camera takes so long between pictures I missed them spraying the champagne at each other, but oh well
Ok this post is long enough, that if you "accidentally" scrolled this low and you didn't want to see Robin's progress it's your own fault.
So here is a close up for clue 4. i did make it 1 20 row repeat smaller, because it is getting longer than I would consider a "shawlette" and because the beginning 3 clues leading up to this section used one skein. SO I am assuming the end piece will use one skein. And I really didn't have enough from skein 2 to do another repeat.
I do realize this picture is not the kind of gorgeous florist flowers you find on Mother's Day cards. It isn't even the flowers in my garden you usually see here. But trust me when I tell you these flowers are more impressive than any of those. And they are a better representative of most mothers than any flower grown in a hot house under perfect conditions.
I was at New Jersey Motorsports Park today for the Trans-Am race. (don't worry I'll post about that later) Let me describe the parking lot for you. Dirt. Dirt that is pretty much a mix of sand and clay - no loam, no top soil - just sand and clay dirt. Dry dirt. Gusts of wind created mini dust storms. This dirt has been driven over by countless cars in its usage as a parking lot. Dirt that is as hard as concrete. The little tufts of grass like plants struggle to maintain a footing. A very difficult even hostile environment. Today was windy and freezing cold. When it rains the lots turn into a muddy sticky mess.
And yet among all this harshness, these tiny little daisies bloom. Their stems are less than 6" high, their flowers are barely 1/4 to 1/2 inch across. It is very easy to overlook them as you walk, I wonder if anyone there appreciated them at all. But there they were. In that dirt, flowers looking up to the sun, little bits of happiness among the harshness.
Mothering isn't easy. The environment can be harsh. There can be very little appreciation or recognition. And yet among all the difficulties, mothers hand in there. Smiles and loves on their faces. Despite all the adversity, they are there.
