mrs. tomato’s babies
Sunday was a very exciting day around our house, we picked the first baby tomato from Mrs. Tomato. Last night, we picked the second tomato. All of her babies are coming along quite well. I can’t believe how many baby tomatoes she has on her right now. 
In all, she has 10 babies, two of which have been picked. Now we have two of the babies ripening on the kitchen window sill. The first one will be ripe enough to eat tomorrow. I can’t believe that with some watering and love, I can grow tomatoes. A few weeks ago, the wind knocked over the tomato pot and I was heartbroken when I noticed that the oldest tomato’s branch was broken, but not completely broken off. I took some rags and made a sling for the branch hoping that it wouldn’t hurt the tomato and I was so proud to see the tomato survive and be the first one to turn red. A few weeks ago when a few of the leaves at the bottom started to turn yellowish-brown, I was worried but was reassured by several people that their tomato plants do that, too. 
(The bottom photo was taken just before the first tomato was picked. This was the first baby tomato that appeared on the vine in mid-June.)
update July 27, 2006 - We ate the first baby tomato last night on our pizza and it was scrumptious. I see tomato, red pepper and basil sandwiches in our future today to eat the second and third (I picked it this morning) tomatoes.
The log cabin blanket is nearly finished. On Sunday, I finished the last stripe and started on the border. By Sunday night, I had finished the first edge of the border and had started the second edge of the border. I’m knitting the border as they describe it in Mason-Dixon Knitting, where you pick up one edge of stitches and knit them increasing on the right-side rows to make a “picture frame” effect. The first border edge looks really great and I know that the rest of it will look great too. I’m waiting until it’s all finished before I take another photo.
This past weekend was a quiet one, I got a lot of knitting done and some reading. Yesterday, I finished yet another book called The Minister’s Daughter by Julie Hearn. This book is another Young Adult novel and is about two girls in England in the mid-1600s, one who is a “healer” and the other is a minister’s daughter who accuses the “healer” girl of being a witch. It was a really fascinating book and I had a hard time putting it down when I first started reading it on Thursday. It also sparked my interest once again about the Salem Witch Trials, I was so fascinated by them when I was in junior high and high school. Several years ago, I saw a program called Secrets of the Dead II — Witches Curse on PBS about how a lot of the hallucinations of the people who accused others of being witches were actually caused by eating fungus-infested rye. One thing that the author of The Minister’s Daughter observed is that a lot of the women who accused others of being witches were minister’s daughters themselves. Very interesting.
update July 27, 2006 - I most likely won’t hear about the job until at the earliest tomorrow.
Erin said,
July 26, 2006 @ 3:10 pm
Congratulations to Mrs. Tomato, her babies look beautiful. Have you heard anything about the job yet? I’m dying to know if you got it!
Leslie said,
July 26, 2006 @ 3:53 pm
I’m keeping my fingers crossed about the library position. Since you didn’t hear I’m assuming no news is good news. BTW - your gas burners may well light without power if you use one of those long fireplace matches. The oven won’t work but the burners will. It’s one reason why I got a gas oven when my old one died about 5 years ago.
Lacey said,
August 1, 2006 @ 4:31 pm
Oh, another YAL book that deals with the Witch Trials is Ann Rinaldi’s “A Break With Charity.” If you like historical fiction in the Ual area, Fever 1776, is also a good one. I can’t remember who wrote that right off the top of my head. Those are both fairly interesting books. I wasn’t really into historical fic. up until then. I plan to teach high school English, that’s the reason I’m into YAL books. Plus I heart Scholastic books.
~Lacey