Garden – Page 2 – Damselfly's Delights

Woof!

August 8, 2019 damselflysdelights4 Comments

We’re well into the dog days of summer here. I can tell because I feel like I should be panting with my tongue out like a dog! Hot. We spend half our lives watering the garden and the other half hunting for ways to use up all the beans and zucchini. Perhaps I planted too many but you never know how well they are going to do. Extra is better than not enough, right?

I have 6 different kinds of beans so they’re rather pretty together:

Too bad the Burgundy ones cook up green and the speckled Dragon Tongues fade to yellow in the pot! Currently I have about 10 pounds worth in the fridge. We’re eating them as fast as we can because I won’t use them if they’re frozen or canned or pickled. Fresh is best!

So my studio has been rather steamy even with the big fan on but I have been persevering with the sewing anyway. In a switch from green I’ve been working on this brick red poly twill fabric that’s been lurking in the Deep Stash for who knows how long. I tested out the downsized version of Grainline’s Farrow dress with long sleeves.

This is a much smaller size than I made the first time and I like it much better. Not nearly so voluminous. Now I want another sleeveless one too! Putting it in the queue.

With the leftover twill I cut the outer layer of a slightly revised Sew Liberated Metamorphic Dress. The underlayer is a poly voile in a softly coordinating floral that’s probably been around since the 1980’s judging by the colours. So nice to use this stuff up finally! The bodice fits better on this one than my first attempt last year but for such a simple shape it seams hard to get right. At least it’s mostly pretty bra-friendly so I can wear it without a t-shirt underneath.

I like that there’s pockets on both layers, though I did increase the size of the outer patch pockets because they seemed a little too tiny. I’ve actually worn it with the floral side out most often even though I don’t think of myself as a flower print person.

So that’s the last of the brick red projects. Next up there’s a grey shirt. And then I’ll have to start cutting out more garments. No shortage of patterns and fabrics around here!

Looking A Little Brighter

May 27, 2019 damselflysdelights2 Comments

I was going to wait until I’d finished the second project with this snow-dyed cotton knit fabric but what the heck! This one is done and I might as well get on with blogging about it, right?

The pattern is Love Notions La Bella Donna. This was actually a test sew for my fitting changes and I’m not totally pleased with how loose the sleeves are. I didn’t do my usual adjustment of raising the underarm and I think this needs at least an inch plus the sleeve bands adjusted to match. Otherwise grading from a size M at the top through to an XL below the bust worked okay. The neckline is a bit wide for me however, especially if I didn’t have the hood to fill in the extra space. I would bring it in if I was making a plain neck top.

The fabric is kind of fun and I had a good time cutting the garment pieces to take advantage of the dye patterning. I also had enough to cut another Lane Raglan T-shirt too which is my next project. I did have trouble sewing this tunic neatly for some reason. The stitching lines which are in white thread show every wobble and there are a lot of them including top-stitching the single-layer pocket bags onto the front. These sit nicer than regular in-seam pockets but they aren’t invisible. I somehow managed the twin-needle stitching better. Besides the hem I went around the neckline to hold the hood’s seam down and also around the sleeves to match.

Wonky stitching aside, I quite like the results and will be using this pattern again for more versions. I’m already wearing my new hoodie a lot. There are some things I love about Love Notions patterns. Tami has made the PDFs layered so you can choose your size/sizes to print and there’s also no need to trim. That makes them especially easy to assemble. This pattern also has the front and back pieces, which are the same except for the neckline, combined into one pattern which saves paper and ink. (Although it does make it a little more difficult to arrange pattern pieces on your fabric.) There is a cool way to keep them connected but still make it easy to cut out which I should show you in another post.

What I’m not so enamoured of with Love Notions patterns (and this could just be me) is that the instructions are meant for digital use on a phone or tablet rather than printed. They flip around with hyperlinks to hop from one section to another and aren’t presented in a linear fashion. Not super-critical since the designs are pretty simple to sew but I don’t like to have to turn on my iPad every time I want to check something. I printed the instructions out for myself with Adobe Reader in booklet format and it’s okay but not wonderful. It also seems as if some information is missing that I would like to have. Like finished measurements. Illustrations are pretty basic. And even though it’s included on nearly every page it took me awhile to find out how much seam allowance has been allowed for! It’s in a tiny shaded box which is hard to read on the printout. On the other hand, there’s lots of info on printing and preparing the pattern, an “inspiration” section and a glossary. If you need all that.

In gardening news, I’m really very disappointed this year. The bug and slug damage is the worst I’ve seen in forever. Somebody keeps ringing the stems of my plants, including the Japanese indigo, and I find them one at a time with the tops severed and wilted. There are holes in absolutely every leaf. And I can’t seem to catch the culprits at work. Probably because they’re out there in the dark doing their dastardly deeds when I’m sleeping! The usual remedies aren’t working either. I’m really trying to be philosophical about it. After all, we aren’t dependant on my produce to live. There are perfectly good vegetables in the market, right? And they probably cost less if you include all the work I put into my garden.

A least the weather has improved finally. We’ve had some cool nights and quite a lot of rain this month which slowed things down and probably contributed to the happy bugs and slugs. Of course along with sunshine and more warmth comes the fact that all my early greens are immediately starting to bolt! At least the ones that survived. I could plant more but they don’t usually do very well until fall. And the lettuce should be edible for awhile longer. Meanwhile there’s quite enough to eat saved in the fridge. The peas are just starting to flower and the beans are coming up. It’s starting to feel almost like summer. The hammock stand is out and just waiting for one of us to take advantage!

Garden vs Studio

May 8, 2019May 8, 2019 damselflysdelights2 Comments

Hope you’re having a lovely May wherever you are! Yes, I realise our Southern Hemisphere folks are heading for colder weather. But they were complaining of the heat when we were freezing up here so it’s only fair to turn the tables, right? Heh. Anyway, I’ve written a dozen delightful posts in the last few weeks – but unfortunately they were only in my head! My hands were very busy.

I’ve been trying to get the garden, especially the vegetable garden, into some kind of shape now that the weather has actually warmed up enough. I’m forced to dig the beds deeply twice in order to eliminate as many of the walnut roots as possible. English (aka Persian) walnut trees don’t produce as much juglone, a toxin that inhibits nearby competition, as black walnut does but I do see a difference in some plants not being as vigorous near our monster tree.

Walnut tree just getting its baby leaves. It’s always this late!

The ancient beast is over 50 feet tall and wide and the roots extend even farther out than the canopy does! The greenhouse is now partially under said canopy and this year the root situation is ridiculous. I needed Thom’s help to dig the tomato beds in there and after only clearing half of it we dumped five (5!) buckets of roots into the city’s green bin.

I think those walnut roots were way too happy to grow in the dry and slightly warmer (at least in the daytime) soil in there all winter. Yeesh. I managed to only (only!) get less than two buckets of roots from what will be the squash and bean bed, even after going over it twice. But then it’s a little farther away from the walnut tree too.

After we finish the greenhouse there’s only a bit of tidying to do around the edges and I can call the veggie garden prep done. Still have to plant the beans and cucumbers and transplant tomato and squash seedlings yet though. Gardening is kind of like housework. It’s never really done! Although this is definitely the busiest time of the whole year out there. Once everything is planted it’s down to watering and weeding. And harvesting.

When I got too tired to mess about in the garden I switched to my studio. I’ve mostly been working on my patterns, assembling PDF printouts and doing fit adjustments. Once they’re all ready to be used I can just grab whichever one I need to cut out without having to stop and prep the next pattern. I’ve also cut out a total of 8 projects already (all knits) but haven’t started sewing them together yet.
What can I say? I was on a roll! I’m going to have to sew them soon though because at least 3 of these are test garments, aka “wearable muslins” (or toiles, depending on your country of origin). I need to see how they work out before cutting any more using those patterns. Just in case any adjustments need to be made.

In other crafty news, my hands are too tired to do anything else! I did finish my Blue Dragon socks (pattern is “Shur’tugal” from Alice Yu’s book Socktopus) if you missed it on Insta.

The yarn is from Black Cat Custom Yarn, colourway “In the Navy” and for once I pretty much followed the pattern except that I made the leg longer so the socks come up above the top of my Blundstones. Other than this though, I have barely touched needles or spinning wheel for ages. I did do a wee bit of dyeing however, but I’ll save that for another post.

Oh, you might be interested in this last tidbit: I finally got three separate offers for my bead de-stash, all within 24 hours of each other! Talk about synchronicity, eh? A whole month after I put them up for sale. Unfortunately I had to tell everyone that they were already gone home with my sister. You snooze, you lose. Might have actually made a few bucks (sigh) but at least my sis is happy!

Can’t you just smell them? I sure can. **Atchoo!!**

April Showers

April 5, 2019 damselflysdelights4 Comments

We’ve had such lovely weather in March but now it seems that the old April showers trope is true. Luckily I got quite a lot of the garden dug and ready before the rains hit. The peas and spinach are coming up now and I’ve been harvesting kale buds, corn salad (mache) and chives. In the greenhouse the baby seedlings are waiting until they are a little bigger before being transplanted into the garden. The tiny Japanese indigo plants are still being brought in every night since it’s warmer under the grow lights.

They won’t be going out into their bed for awhile yet. Neither will the coreopsis, marigolds or sulphur cosmos.

The cosmos (the very similar looking plants in the back) are new for me this year. I’m testing to see how well they do in my garden and also how well they do in the dyepot. A yellow to orange dye, depending on pH., similar to the dyer’s coreopsis. They can grow quite large and need sun so it remains to be seen if I can give them what they need. Nowhere in my yard gets full sun all day anymore thanks to all the big trees but most things do OK with less. We shall see, won’t we? At least they don’t need a lot of water or fertilizer.

The rest of the biannual and perennial dyeplants are already perking up in the garden. The madder seems to have survived being dug up, root-pruned and divided into a different part of the dye garden. So did the rhubarb. I keep digging out part of the clump of dyer’s chamomile but it keeps looking just as large. I have a couple of volunteer weld plants which I’ll probably allow to go to seed this year just to freshen up my seed supply. Though I don’t need more than one or two plants a year anyway for the small amount of dyeing I do with weld. It’s a large plant! And very easy to grow just about anywhere.

It’s kind of nice to have a bit of a break from the digging. Though I’m especially happy to be finished with days and weeks of sorting out all the stuff for the craft supplies sale tomorrow. I have books, magazines, a bit of yarn, some sewing patterns (uncut), and beads-beads-beads. I only packaged up about 2/3 of the bead stash and there’s still lots left. For this go-round I concentrated on the beading, doll-making, paper arts, and embellishment stuff. I didn’t even go through the fabrics or fibres at all. Plus there’s still plenty of sewing, knitting, spinning, dyeing, crochet, weaving and braiding books and mags left! So I think I’m all ready now. Maybe. I have way too much stuff for a single table (18 boxes full!) but that’s all the sale space I’ve got to work with. And this was just the first pass through the stash too. Yikes. I’m certainly going to be very aware of anything new that comes into this house in future. Remind me of this when I get antsy to buy any new stuff, won’t you?

Uh-oh. Glad we already loaded up the van in the garage with the sale boxes during an earlier dry period because now it’s raining quite hard! If this continues tomorrow it’s going to be equally exciting unloading without getting vulnerable books wet. I am so not looking forward to this. Wish me luck finding new homes for it all! Or at least some of it.