Still Picking

Honestly, I'm enjoying knitting Marmalade so much, that I'm having a hard time tearing myself away from working on it! The yarn and the colors are just scrumptious! I am starting the shaping for the front/neck and will post an update soon.

The garden is dry and tired and the inevitable bacterial speck and spot are ruining a lot of tomatoes at this point, so I'm nearing the end of the picking. But, here's today's haul of tomatoes!

I've only been to Ikea one time and got some lovely things there, but the most used item other than a full length mirror, is the blue shopping bag! Really, I wish I'd bought several! It is just a great tool for carrying a large amount of produce in from the garden to the kitchen. It can be washed out which is really important when picking tomatoes that leave a yellow residue on everything. You can see it in the above picture.

I do reuse a few shopping bags over and over, but want to do away with them completely. Besides, I don't have many coming into the house anymore as I'm using my cloth bags at the store. A couple more of those Ikea bags would be great.

Lots of cherry tomatoes too.

I have to pick more peppers and start picking tomatillos. I'm hoping to can my favorite Tomatillo Salsa soon!

The zinnias seem to have revived for another big flourish of blooms and each time I'm out in the yard lately I see at least 4 Monarchs and numerous other butterflies too. The big sunflowers are developing seeds and I expect to see the birds attacking them as soon as they are ripe. I have a couple varieties of smaller sunflowers blooming, so they are cheerful to look at.

Saffy and Silas were outside in the kennel today, guarding the yard napping, when they alerted me to the sound of hooves on the pavement and the approach of the mules. There is much spastic barking and excitement over the mules passing by.

Although I'm in a suburban area, there is still a lot of open farmland and the nursery/shrub farms use the mules for some of the work. They pull plows between the rows of shrubs.