Life in the little homestead is treating us well. Besides the garden we’re definitely in that full-time job mode where most things only get done on the weekends. I’ve been doing a lot of reading, some to prepare for my first class visit to the library. The perception of a librarian getting to read all the time at work is definitely only that, a perception. Last week, we had eighty third graders visit the library, where I told them a story, book talked four books and then they received a tour of our new library.

The garden has been feeding us quiet well. Just over a month ago the cherry tomatoes started to ripen. I had no idea how many cherry tomatoes we would receive from five plants. In all I think we’ve picked over 9.5 pounds (4.3 kg) of cherry tomatoes. A pound of cherry tomatoes is a lot since they are so small. At one point we made pasta sauce, kept a container for ourselves, gave a container to my parents and donated over a pound of tomatoes to the local food bank through their Plant an Extra Row program.

With so many tomatoes we had to use them. We set out to find a good pasta sauce recipe for cherry tomatoes, which we found. Through combining and borrowing different ingredients from several different recipes, we had our own pasta sauce. It was extra gourmet. It was better than any pasta sauce I’ve had in a fancy restaurant. It was bursting with flavor and we made a special meal out of it.

The cherry tomatoes are winding down and have fallen victim to what I think is the tomato worm along with with some other little flying bugs. We’ve managed to rescue about another half pound of cherry tomatoes from doom.

In August, there was talk around our area about the great Midwest Tomato “Famine” of 2009. Everyone had a gazillion green tomatoes for weeks and no red ones. As an experiment, we brought a few green ones inside to see if we could get them to ripen.

About three days later as the ones inside were starting to ripen the ones outside started to ripen too. So we’ve been inundated with brandywine and moonglow (orange tomato – back row, center) tomatoes. We can’t use them fast enough so we’ve been sharing those too.

Then to add to the harvest, the peppers became extremely generous about the same time the tomatoes did. At one time there were over 30 jalapeño peppers on one plant.

Needless to say, the first year garden has been a huge success and we’ve been spoiled. Over Labor Day weekend, I planted several fall crops – lettuce, peas, carrots and beets. We’re also planning the flower gardens for the front yard for the spring. Who says fall isn’t a gardening season? What with bulbs for next spring and planning for next summer! :)

There are a few things I’ve learned from my garden this year:

1. Don’t plant cherry tomatoes next to the entrance of the garden. When they really get going in the middle of the summer, it’s like walking through a tomato jungle.

2. Good soil, sun and water will make the garden grow bigger than I ever expected.

3. Don’t fret about the plants that don’t make it because there’s a reason they didn’t live. There wouldn’t be any room in the garden if they had survived.

4. Give butternut squash a bed all its own.

5. Always be amazed how much the garden changes over a few days, especially when new flowers and peppers appear.

6. Eleven basil plants is plenty but we’ll have pesto for the next year.

7. Cage all of the tomatoes not just some.

8. If making beds in the garden instead of rows, make the walkways larger than two feet wide as the tomato plants will grow so large that they will practically intertwine themselves over those two foot walkways.

9. Never underestimate the power of the flower to invite bees. They love our tomato plants this year.

10. When you move into a new house some of the plants you want to buy may suddenly appear in your yard because they were planted by the previous owner.

I haven’t blogged in just over a month because I honestly have only knit about 10 rows since moving to Kansas. Considering this is a knitting blog I tend to not think about blogging. Life in the new homestead is great. It’s definitely beginning to feel like home. My new job as a youth/teen librarian is wonderful. This week we’re moving from our old library building to a brand new one that’s four times the size of the old one. A couple of my library school friends and I recently started a librarian blog of our own to write about our experiences as new librarians.

(phone camera not so great)
Kansas City is treating us well. We see my parents at least once a week. A couple of weeks ago we both had a weekend off and were able to get out and see a bit of the city. Being librarians we headed to the Kansas City (Missouri) Library’s Central Library. It was amazing and so much fun to explore.

One of the major advantages to living in a house that’s been in our family is the massive yard. The house has a yard that’s half an acre which is great for a garden. (All of the houses in our neighborhood have huge yards.)

Our 30 foot by 10 foot garden looked like a postage stamp in the backyard when we were preparing the garden for planting but now that it’s growing it looks a bit larger.
We’ve decided that we’re going to expand the garden next year and also put in more flower gardens in the front and the back. Bryan and I are all for more gardens because it’s less to mow.

Speaking of mowing, we bought ourselves a great new mower that we couldn’t be more pleased with. We had read about how polluting a gas mower is and that to run the mower for an hour is as polluting as driving your car a hundred miles. So we set out to find a good electric mower and my dad just happened to stumble on an ad for the Neuton. It’s so cool, electric and cordless. We just drop in the battery, plug in the key, flip the switch and off we go. It’s so light I’ve been able to mow the lawn and it’s not even self-propelled. Mowing our lawn has also become a form of exercise for me so I’m working it into my workout schedule.

It’s been a crazy few weeks but things are starting to settle.

A week and a half ago, I received my MSLIS (Master in Library and Information Science). Graduation was an exciting day but also a day of saying goodbye to some very good friends. I miss them all so much but I know we’ll see them again.

The day after graduation we moved the rest of our stuff from the apartment in Illinois to our house in Kansas. It was probably the least stressful move I’ve ever experienced. (I’ve only moved six times in the last 13 years.) We’ve begun to settle into the house with some boxes still remaining in the downstairs. The upstairs attic (future craft area and spare bedroom) is still full of boxes and needs some serious work. One of the challenges of moving into this house has been going through my aunt’s belongings and making room for our own.

Two days after our move, I started my new job as the Teen/Youth Coordinator at one of the local libraries. I love my new job and it still doesn’t seem real that I’m an honest to goodness librarian. I’ve been planning activities to go along with our summer reading program which has been a lot of fun. Today literally flew by.

Over Memorial Day weekend, I worked a lot in the garden. It’s now 95% planted with peppers, tomatoes, lettuce, peas, butternut squash, onions, herbs and we’ll soon be adding peanuts. We also put in two raspberry bushes in the backyard with one more to add later this week. The gardening has been so fulfilling and I can’t wait to find out how plentiful our harvest will be. I think we’ll probably have lettuce in the next couple of weeks.

Okay, so maybe spring isn’t officially here except the calendar says it’s here. It snowed on Monday and has been chilly the last several days. Will winter ever leave?

(Dahlia seedlings three days after planting)
Spring feels like it’s trying to get here. There may be flowers outside but inside is where the exciting things are happening. Little seedlings are trying to grow big and strong in their little pots in my office. This morning as I was getting ready to water them I noticed three little plants have already pushed through the soil. When I came home from work there was another one starting to come up.

The semester is wrapping up quickly and it’s all making me quite nervous, excited and sad. Nervous and excited because something I’ve wanted for nearly five years is all coming to an end. There were months I hoped to get into library school and in about six weeks I’ll be graduating with my MLS. And also sad to be leaving so many great friends. Some are starting off on their own post-grad school adventures while others will give us a reason to return for visits.

This spring will probably not be remembered as the learning-to-keep-myself-in-check season, but it probably should be. Bryan has always been a good balance for me and when I start to get a bit overstressed or over-analytical, he always seems to remind me of the wonderful things we have. Turning 35 this past December was a real wake-up call for me that I needed to take better care of myself, the number sort of jolted me, especially knowing we would be living apart for five months. I’ve incorporated yoga into my life in a way it’s never been before. And I’ve been learning to just enjoy being quiet, though my mind does get the better of me a lot. Daily journaling continues and is a way for me to purge everything at the end of the day. It’s all been an adjustment and I’ve had my moments where I’m ready to pack up and just move. Bianca has been a huge centering element too. She keeps me in line and gives me a lot of kitty loving exactly when I need it.

Last week, I spent my Spring Break with Bryan and visited my family in Kansas City. Coming back was difficult but it’s made me realize how special my friends here are to me. I know have a very finite time here and I’m also preparing to finish up a library degree that for so long has felt so far away. Now we’re looking forward to living together again and the amazing things that come with having our own house with a huge yard. Last week I plotted out our garden – 10 feet by 30 feet. Bryan came home and immediately said, “That’s it?” The yard of our new house is huge and a 10 x 30 foot garden looks like a very tiny piece of the yard. I have a feeling we’ll be planting lots of flowers and berry bushes so there is less yard for Bryan to mow.

I may be in the middle of a busy semester but that doesn’t stop me from dreaming of sewing. My mother and sister bought me some wonderfully beautiful fabric while my mom was visiting my sister in Singapore this past Thanksgiving. I’m starting to feel the itch to make some cute tops out of the fabric but getting my reading done each week for class doesn’t allow me a lot of time to sew. Even with listening to several as audiobooks. As May approaches and my packing has to increase, I’m hoping that I can squeeze a bit of sewing time in. I have several patterns that will make great little tops and even traced a couple of patterns from a Japanese pattern book that my friend Sarah owns. I’m hoping that this weekend, I can sneak in a bit of sewing time.

In the time warp, otherwise known as May, I knit another little Baby Surprise Jacket for a friend’s daughter. I blocked it last weekend but with all of the rain we’ve been having lately it took forever to dry. Now it’s ready to send off to mom and baby. I was glad to finally have something to use with this Cotton 100 yarn. It’s been languishing in the stash for quite a while and is perfect for kids sweaters. I just needed the perfect sweater that fit the amount of yarn that I had.

pattern: Baby Surprise Jacket by Elizabeth Zimmermann from The Knitting Workshop
yarn: Berocco Cotton 100 in 9208 (Lavender) from stash
needles: size 7 bamboo
started: April 30, 2008
finished: May 9, 2008

This morning, I finally planted a few plants we bought at the farmer’s market last weekend. With the roofers around for several days, I wasn’t about to go out and try to pot anything for fear of being hurt by falling shingles. I fear we may have lost one of our cilantro plants but the gerbera daisies and peppers are still doing well. The lettuce came already potted so it was just a matter of hanging it up in the back. I was excited to see that the mint I planted last year is doing quite well. Ooh, mint tea!