Busy, Busy, Busy

So much has been happening this last week.  Blocking, winding, knitting, cooking, where to start?

Lets start with the blocking.  This was my first time blocking.  I wound up making my own blocking boards, which I will cover in more detail in a later post.  Since I am blocking wool, I decided to do wet blocking.  For those who are reading this because I write it rather than because you are actually interested in all this craft stuff, blocking is when you pin a damp or wet piece of fabric so that it dries to a specific shape and size.  It took about one week for me to block all 52 squares once I finished the blocking boards.  The next step is to lay the blocks out to decide how to arrange them in the final afghan.

Since blocking is not very labor intensive (set and walk away), I found time to finish the first ball of yarn for my socks and wind the second ball for each.  The winding process being greatly facilitated by my mother's willingness to act as a human swift.  For some perspective, this is what 618 yards of yarn look like a balls (309 each).

This is what 618 yards of yarn looks like as socks.

I am very glad I decided to invest in a yarn ball winder.  This making 3 balls of yarn I've wound on it, each yard cost roughly $0.02 at this point.  Having wound more than a few by hand before I got it, I think it was worth every penny.  A simple yarn swift may be one of my next investments.

Our garden has also been busy producing lots of fresh vegetables.  I must admit, a good number of those veggies don't even make it into the house.  A cherry tomato still warm from the sun and fabulously sweet is one of my favorite things about having a garden.  This year, we are growing pumpkins for the first time.  So, it is our first time trying make pumpkin pie from an actual pumpkin or roasted pumpkin seeds.  The pie was my sister's domain, the seeds were mine.  The pies came out delicious.  The seeds took a little more trial and error.  For example, if you are doing seeds in the oven, a little oil goes a long way.

I guess that does it for this week.  Until next time!