Solo Rides

I've taken some solo bike rides lately.  I enjoy them much better than I thought I would.  The only drawback is that I have no judge about how fast or slow I am going.  Wait a minute, is that actually a drawback??

Summer Knitting Obsession

Queensland Pima Lino

More Pima Lino, in a different colorway

The Mackinac Tank, from the summer edition of Knit Scene

Layout, just started in the Pima Lino (pattern here)

Plain and Simple pullover, 2/3 done (pattern here)

Usually my knitting tapers off in the summer.  But as our summer road-tripping has increased, as well as my work related travel on long airline rides, I have had a need to knit. But I couldn't knit in wool!  Too hot for car rides!  So my "Plain and Simple Pullover" has been tabled until fall, and I knitted up a sexy-back tank from the summer edition of Knit Scene in Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool.  I think every woman over 30 should have a sexy-back tank of some sort.  In fact, I may knit another in a different pattern (with a lace panel in back).  This is my second Silky Wool project, and I have to say I love the yarn!  Light enough for summer, but warm enough for summer evenings in Idaho.  

The Pimo Lino though--I have to say I am in love. I bought two grab bags of "Lovely Linen" from The Yarn Underground, my LYS, and then immediately had to buy more skeins to get sweater, (or at least tank), quantities.  Well, extra skeins and a third grab bag.  Because that's how obsessed I was.  But it's knitting up quick!  If I hurry, I may be able to wear it on vacation this summer!

In other news, we did about seven loads of laundry today.  After a week with no washing machine, the laundry was starting to get restless.  

Summer Bounty

Last of the raspberries

Overripe currents

Bounty!

  

Love my August sunflowers!

OOC beanstalk

First of the hollyhock

We are decidedly more relaxed around here.  While we are not through major transitions, we are through major decisions.  And that brings its own form of peacefulness.  There's still a bit of anxiety in the air, as the summer has seemed too rushed.  For instance, this summer does not seem to be the summer I get out to pick huckleberries.  Or even pick the currents in the back yard.  But I am content in that the huckleberries and currents will be there next year, as will we.  So I can let that go for now, and just enjoy the bounty from my garden that I have been able to capitalize on this summer.  Like lettuce--for the first time ever we have been able to keep up with production.  And garlic scapes.  I discovered garlic scape pasta (recipe here) and have made three batches, to much success and acclaim.  I've also been knitting...a lot.  The most summer knitting ever.  Hopefully I will have pictures to share soon!

Oh, and we broke down and bought a new-to-us washing machine.  Because laundry is somewhat important in the grand scheme of things!

Summer Rains...

...are weird if you live on the Palouse.  The first few days of August were unseasonably cool and RAINY!  I'm not sure what to make of it--volatile weather patterns to say the least!  But rain when it's been so dry is much appreciated, even as it disturbs you with its unpredictability.

Yesterday I did something that I hope will become a more regular habit--solo bike ride!  So lovely to ride to Troy and smell the ripening wheat and the pine trees!  Even the spring wheat is turning golden, so summer is truly winding down.

Things are still a little unsettled around here, much like the weather.  Hopefully we will have more certainty and "settledness" once I start to feel the chill of fall in the air.  The drama of the day was that our washing machine died--mid load, if you can believe it.  Lovely.  We made ourselves feel better by completely reorganizing our son's room, to much success.  I guess you win some, you lose some!

Garden Beauties

Relic of a railroad age on the Latah Trail

Made it to Troy!

Moscow Mountain

 

These Are the Days

Just some shots from around the house and garden this week.  The weather cooled down to be just about perfect this weekend.  We spent the afternoon hiking at Phillip's Farm Park, followed by ice cream and a ride in a horse drawn carriage at the McConnell Mansion Ice Cream Social downtown.  An old-fashioned Moscow Sunday afternoon.  

I said a while back that May and June are the most beautiful months on the Palouse.  July isn't bad either! 

Happy and Tired

The irony of summer...we wait and wait for it to get here and we fill our days so full of fun and adventure and trips and busyness that we exhaust ourselves.  What a fun filled Independence Day weekend we had!  Parades and bike races and friends and fireworks!  I was so tired last night, and just wanted drift off to sleep and forget that today would be Monday.  Sadly, it was not to be.  The sound of thunder woke up the little one and we all had a sleepless night. 

Even still, I treasured this weekend.  It is so, so achingly lovely on the Palouse right now.  The spring wheat looks like velvet and the winter wheat is fading to pure sunlight.  Hay is being baled and put up for the long, cold winter ahead.  We were so stressed in June, though we tried to hide it with all our trips, as we waited to see if my husband would have a job in the coming months.  Thankfully, he does, and we shall stay here a bit longer, it seems.

Oh Palouse, when I think it is time to leave you, you find a way to keep me here a bit longer.  How is it that you do this to me, year after year?  Every passing year, I love you more.  You don't have the hardwoods and the wetness of my childhood home, but you have the sweet scent of pine and grass.  You are the place I am raising my baby, his happy home.  My happy home! 

June Love

So happy.

Well, It's Good for the Estate...

Cool and rainy the last few days.  I love it.  As one of my friends says, "it's good for the estate."  She meant her garden, but she's a sociologist so I think it was also a commentary on American suburbia.  You never can tell with those sociologists.  

It is good for the estate, though.  My gardens are soaking it all in, and it postpones the dusty, dry season and prolongs the green, flowery season.  June rains.  We weeded the tiny flower bed around the choke-cherry tree in front, and the peonies rewarded us by blooming this year.  The rain popped them open.  

Last night I fell asleep listening to the rain through my open window.  If my husband would let me, I'd sleep with the windows wide open every night.  Sleeping with the windows open makes me feel closer to nature, just as I do when tent camping.  But then again, sun and birds at 4 am do not wake me up, even though I'm a very light sleeper.  Hubby is also a light sleeper, but sun and birds do wake him up (although, ironically & annoyingly, the sound of a baby crying does not always wake him up).

Window open or not, I'm glad for the rain.  I hope the rest of summer passes much slower than these first few sunny, fun-filled weeks!

Contentment

Summer never seems that lazy to me.  In the winter, we go to bed early and sleep a lot under many blankets.  Not so in the summer.   The days are long and busy, filled with activities and trips and general craziness.  

It's been hot here lately.  Now don't get me wrong, I love summer, but 95 degrees with no air conditioning is hot.  And exhausting.  I keep reminding myself how much I love wearing shorts and skirts and sandals and how that is all going to come to a screeching halt soon with the advent of fall, and therefore I should not complain.  But hot is hot!  Hot makes me switch from dark beers and red wine to the lightest of whites and summer ales.  Hot makes me want to lay around with no part of my body touching any other part of my body.  Hot makes me tired!

I like the turning of the season that late August represents, even though it makes me a little nostalgic.  It's harvest time here on the Palouse.  It's time to celebrate the season and put food by for the winter.  It's time to celebrate new weddings and the anniversaries of old weddings, at least in my book.  It's time to watch "American Graffiti" or some other end of summer movie coming of age movie.  Hot makes sunflowers and tomatoes ripen!  Salsa time!

The late summer heat with earlier, cooler evenings also brings contentment to me.  In that way, maybe contentment is a form of laziness.  I don't worry so much if the house is perfectly neat.  I don't feel guilty if I can sleep in late or have a quiet afternoon.  The seasons are changing, and we're moving from the period of business to the period of dreams...

I've never had so many tomatoes this early!!

Dug the garlic today!

Beany teepee!

My happy sunflowers!

Salsa time!

The onions are lonely in this bed now!

Palouse August

I love sunflowers and harvest...they remind me of my wedding!

Another gratuitous flower farm picture!

August Days

What fun we've been having around here!  My husband is getting excited about the cyclocross season starting soon, my garden is producing a ton of food, and my son is enjoying playing with all his new friends, especially our new neighbors next door.  After a busy start, we are enjoying a few calmer days as we watch the wheat harvest come in.  For some reason, I love the smell of ripe wheat in the fields, even though it makes me sad in some respects because I know the summer is almost over.

We've been biking to the farmer's market almost every Saturday.  It really is the place to see and be seen around Moscow, and oh yeah, there's produce and food and crafts and flowers too.  I think this weekend we definitely need another outing to the flower farm and the pool.  What other summer things can we think of to do???

I love tea roses, especially ones that don't require pampering!

Stawberries, tomatoes, and peppers, oh my!

Purple potatoes!

I "inherited" a lot more linen this summer.  My mother brought me wonderful cutwork from my grandmother's house.  This piece was one of my favorites; I love the colors so much!  It makes me happy to use these pieces in my kitchen, just as it makes me happy to sleep under an old, loved, hand pieced quilt at night.  I like to think about the hands that made each piece, and wonder what the maker was thinking as she cut and sewed and seamed.  But then I wonder, would I want someone knowing what I was thinking one day when they look at something I've made?   Sometimes I stitch when I'm angry, or frustrated, or sad.  I often stitch when I am very happy and content.  A lot of time I stitch to pass time when traveling in a car, chatting away with the driver or occasionally interrupted to take a picture, restart a video, or pass a snack to someone.  And sometimes, I only think of really, really boring things when I stitch, such as "crap, is this row 8 or row 9" or "should I get up and fold laundry, or just sit here"?

Lots of life happens when stitching, gardening, and otherwise passing time in the summer!  Oh, for a few more weeks yet of warm days and pleasantly cool evenings!!