It’s a bit disorienting to be in February and have only been through an extended mud season – mud from rain, not snow (except for a tiny bit). I don’t mind a mild winter per se, but the ticks haven’t died (have I already bitched about the ticks still hanging on – on the dog – this winter?) and I’m sure the garden’s not-frozen foes are planning their evil attacks…
But there is still ample time for a blizzard or two, so I’ll shut the hell up.
Thanks to N with his speedy PVC erection skills, we’re good to go with seed starting this year – just need the electrician to add a plug, and a few more supplies.
The signs of spring are urging us to eat up last summer’s bounty – we’ve barely touched the frozen veg, but we’re down to just one butternut, and the last of the juicy peak of season blueberries made their way into a pie.
None of my current knitting projects wrapped up by the end of January, so they’ll be finished when they are – soon, likely, for the socks, and I have to really force myself on the sweater – I need the needles from it though (to start another likely long-suffering, but less painful to knit sweater) so that might be the needed kick to the finish line.
I put the hand crank on the Singer red eye.
And it will hopefully be awesome – now, not so much – the machine is far more gummed up than I thought and the movement is sluggish (I think I last used it in 1999? and it’s been in and out of basements and storage units) – and I have to learn a bit more about disassembling parts and well-greasing and whatnot. “Fixing” old sewing machines for me has just been a good wipe down, oiling, and replacing a missing part or two, so it’s time I get a few more mechanical skills on that front – and at some point, I’d like to be able to restore the finish and whatnot, but maybe not – I want to use these machines, not look at them being pretty.
*as in Punxsutawney.
ASTITCHMATISM 
That pie has a mischievous face.
Are those regular fluorescent bulbs in your growing set-up?
Yes, they’re the cheaper daylight bulbs – we’re going to see how it goes before buying the better/brighter (T5?) ones – the room does get some decent natural light (go figure they made the bright part of the basement the mechanical room instead of the living one) and I’m planning to buy most of the tomato plants again to aim for the sturdiest stock, so it will mostly be green stuff and lots of basil which inexplicably struggles here if direct sewn…
(I like to make vampire pies too – so the juice that bubbles out looks like bloody fangs.)