Amethyst Square

I have been working on a blanket for one of my daughters for the last few weeks. I had found a blog (though  written a few years ago) that had a crochet-a-long.  A granny square a day for a month.  Let me tell you it's been rather difficult to keep up with the square a day with everything else being accomplished.  I have changed a few of the squares.  I hope she likes it.  I'll be making another one though in a different color scheme for my other daughter.

The first square is called Amethyst Square. You can find the free pattern here. *Edited to add: This is a downloaded pattern through Ravelry, so you will have to join in order to download it.  It is free to join and there are tons of free patterns.*

I used Caron's One Pound in Lilac for the middle and Red Heart Super Size in Aran (gifted to me from my MIL).  The Aran is slightly lighter in weight than the Lilac and in most of them (so far) it hasn't made too much of a difference.  I still need to block them.


I hope you have a fantastic day!

Mrs. Bissinger

Garden - Spring 2014 (3)

SQUEE!!!! I have broccoli sprouts popping out of the soil already!!!

This one is a bit of a mystery, though I am pretty sure it is broccoli as well, as I forgot to write what it was on the side of the container! DOH!

I also found the marigolds staring to sprout as well! (there's a wee little green sprout smack dab in the middle of the pic)

Working steadily on the garden today.  I'm currently cleaning up the planting area next to the back porch.  The mint we planted last spring has gone a wee bit crazy and as much as we like mint, we don't need quite that much.  I've decided to plant some sweat peas along that back wall. I love sweet peas. When my maternal grandparents lived in the back house (its like what is called a mother-in-law house), my grandmother had some along the back fence. The scent was as strong as the day is long, but it just wasn't spring without that scent wafting through the air.

Our Aloe Vera plants are flowering as well.  We have a few resident hummingbirds that love to feed on the flowers.  They should be south at the moment but they will be back in a few weeks when its consistently warmer to build their nests.

We get a ton of butterflies as well, monarchs, swallowtails and a bunch of others  that I only know by color.  They should be headed back up here soon as well, as our clover is flowering like crazy.  I love it when our front yard is covered in a sea of green with the bright little yellow flowers dotting the landscape.

Speaking of flowers, somewhere on the property we have a bee hive.  We are pretty sure its in the oleanders behind one of the sheds.  Thankfully they don't seem to be Africanized bees as Mr B has mowed back there several times. If they were, we would have had to take him to the hospital. I'm tempted to get a box for the hive and start collecting honey, but I'll have to do some research first.   It would have to be something that I handled completely as Mr B is allergic to bee stings.  We want to avoid that potential issue.  I remember when my eldest was about 5 and we had a bunch of clover growing around the front porch.  She was watching the bees busily flying from one flower to the next and said, "Look, Mommy! Happy Bees!" From that point forward, they weren't just bees, they were "happy bees."

I hope you have a fantastic day!

Mrs. Bissinger

Garden Spring 2014 (2)

I've been plugging away at the "farm" so to speak.  My poor friends back east (well, anywhere east of here) have expressed some disbelief at our harvesting tomatoes this time of year.

Pay no attention to the little knobby on the top.....

Anywho, Yesterday I finished getting the planters ready and amending the soil.  Today I was able to plant:

Corn
Sunflowers
Spinach
Iceburg lettuce
"Garden Blend" Lettuces
Radishes
Garlic
Kaleidoscope Carrots (multi colored)

In the little plastic containers on the porch I have:
Broccoli
Brussel Sprouts
Chives
Cucumber
Fennel
Green onion
Marigold
Marjoram
Mixed Flowers
Onions
Pumpkins
Tarragon
Thyme and a few others I am sure I missed

Hopefully a few will survive :-D

We have a few fruits trees on the property, oranges, tangerines, grapefruit (bleh) and figs. Plus somehow there is a grape vine that has been around for years.  It doesn't produce much and the birds get to the fruit long before I remember to go look.  The fruit vines/bushes should be in the stores relatively soon (if I remember correctly) so I am planning on not only getting another grape vine but at least one other type of fruit vine/bush and hopefully couple of fruit trees, even if it means the miniature type.  I would love a couple of lemon trees and lime trees.  We also have 7 pecan trees.  As kids (we lived a couple of miles away), my brothers and I would come over and rake leaves.  Plus, while we were raking, we had to get every last pecan unless it was obviously bad.  Some of my fondest memories were sitting at the kitchen table during the holidays cracking pecans for pies. I suppose there could have been a few that didn't make it in to the pies. *whistles innocently* The whacking sound was music to my ears.  While this is not the exact same nutcracker we used, its pretty much the same design (the whackin' starts approx 1:07):

*reminds self to find an inertia nutcracker online. We have a bucket full of nuts waiting on me and momma ain't opening all of those with a hand held type. No way, no how.

I hope you have a fantastic day!

Mrs, Bissinger

Gardening Spring 2014

Even though it is (still) January, in my neck of the woods, it is perfect weather to start planting.  We have had some hold overs from our spring 2013 plantings.  Some plants were just planted in the wrong season for this area and are now going bonkers with growth.  I learned a lot of lessons last year and hopefully we will be a bit more successful this coming season.

We primarily use what we have available on the property.  Like I said prior, it is family property that was a dairy over 50 years ago.  It belonged to my father's parents who eventually sold off most of the land to the size it is today.  We have one major issue that we have had to contend with, gophers.  It is because of them, for the most part, we can't plant in ground.  Well that and the soil here is primarily clay and not fun to work with.  So we have built several raised beds, have multiple old water barrels cut in half being used as planters and a couple more unusual raised beds.

This is a little planting bed beside our back porch.  Front, from left to right, aloe vera, container of carrots, jalapenos (blue pot #1 - trying again as I killed off the last plant), cilantro (blue pot #2 - one lone little seed sprouted a few weeks ago which was left over from the prior year), random basil growth. The brown pots in the back under the window are currently empty awaiting a new planting.  We are going to attempt to move the lantana bush to another location.  It is great at attracting bees, but I'm planning on putting some other flowers in to do the same job.

Behind the Aloe vera is the main basil planting (that stuff will take over every thing if you let it), then some rosemary and mint (in ground) the little white pot behind the carrots has sage.

In the black container on the left are tomatillos.  I'm really surprised they survived but it is producing like crazy. The black container on the right are tomatoes. I thought for sure it was going to die off during the winter, but it is just as happy as a lark.

Then we have our newest soon to be plants (hopefully).  I'll list out the various seeds we are starting later and yes those are various dairy containers that we are using. while I am sure that someone might argue with that usage, my environmentally conscience hubby says its ok and the seedlings will only be in there long enough to be replanted elsewhere.  Reduce and Reuse :-D

I hope you are having a fantastic day!

Mrs Bissinger

*edited the title

Welcome!

Carrot of love, pulled from planter just a few days ago. All I did was clean it up a bit to slice it for a salad and this is what I found - lol!

Welcome! Pull up a chair or a couch and get comfy.  There is freshly brewed coffee in the kitchen or a tea kettle on the stove.  There are so many things to talk about!

First, a little about me.  I am currently a stay at home mom with my youngest in kindergarten and two step kids for half of the month.  I was born and raised in lovely Arizona and currently live on family land which was a dairy many moons ago.  I am spoiled rotten when it comes to space as we have our own little oasis in the city. When we ever move, it will have to be to a horse property or outside the city as it would be so claustrophobic to be in most of the homes being built currently. There are nothing wrong with the homes, necessarily, but when you have been looking out your window for the past 10 years and the first thing you see is an expanse of green instead of your next door neighbor, like I said, one tends to get spoiled.

I have my degree in Secondary Education with emphasis on History and a minor in Political Science. While I am not currently teaching at a school (long story - which I will talk about another time), I do get my teaching fix by teaching a Sunday school class a couple times a month at our church. I also sing in our little choir. Prior to getting my degree, I did back office accounting for a major travel company for 10 years.  I am looking to work, either substituting or accounting until I am ready to go full force into my passion of teaching (again part of that long story).

I have a myriad of interests that include gardening, crocheting, knitting, cooking (including canning), various do-it-yourself projects, and sewing.  It was only with in this past year that I have really gotten into crocheting. My grandmother had taught me how to knit eons ago, though I put it down for years.  My MIL and SIL got me back into knitting (including learning to crochet) and have supported my current yarn obsession.  My mom had taught me how to sew, also eons ago.  Other than various projects around the house, it was only this past year I started creating clothing.  I'll post some of the projects later.  The good ones of course, because the not so good ones are, well, not so good.  They are functional, but not so pretty. :-)  Meh, one can not learn, if they don't fail along the way.

Gardening is another story entirely, I've grown some things with great success, but others have been dismal failures.  Mr Bissinger has a wonderfully green thumb, whereas mine is an odd shade of olive and khaki, think camouflage.  Last spring we built raised beds and found some things to use as raised bed (I'll show those in another post *giggle*) We got off track on the feeding and watering schedule (I thought Mr B had taken care of it and vice versus). So some things flourished and others not so much.

Part of the reasoning for the blog if to keep track of these things and hold myself accountable, not only for the gardening but other projects as well.  The other part is that it may lead to a business. If it does GREAT! If not, no biggie.  On that note, if I endorse any product or service, I do so on my own accord and my opinions expressed are my own. Should I happen to get paid endorsements later on, I will most certainly make that clearly known. However I will not endorse anything that I have not personally tried and are satisfied with said product or service.

I hope you stay around a while and have a cup of coffee or tea (we also have juice or water) with me.

Mrs. Bissinger