Composting

I have officially given up on composting. I tried, I really did, for more than a year, but the environment of all things, got the best of me.
I live in an area of NY that, between June and September is either humid and hot, or raining and hot. The rest of the year it usually freezes over, so I was constantly struggling with compost that was frozen, or too wet, or infested with fungus gnats. There was never a good time for my compost bins, no matter how much brown I added to cover it up. Sure, it broke down, but what use do I have for it, if it is swarming with gnats. I am a container gardener, and while the compost would probably work in someones veggie garden in their backyard, it simply didn't work when all I had was potted herbs and some flowers.
So, I dug a hole in a corner of the backyard (I rent, and live on the second floor of a house split into 4 apartments) and dumped the compost in there, and covered it up with the dirt I had dug up. The compost that went in smelled and was buggy. Ugh! It was too hard to do it, what with living in an apartment and having very little access to workable browns (ie, grass clippings, dead leaves, hay).
Vermicomposting, while very interesting, isn't an option in this household. My fiance is openly hateful towards worms, and avoids them on sidewalks. Don't ask me why, I have no idea there. It also seemed quite difficult, to me. I was unsure where exactly I was going to be able to sort the compost without terrifying the man, and what if I missed the tiny eggs while I was sorting? Is it ok to have worms in my tiny containers? Nothing I read on the subject really shed any light on that, and I figure they're writing more towards people who have room to garden.
On that note, the worms in the bins do reproduce and grow in numbers, and what was I going to do with the excess? Give it to bait shops? Save it for the day the man pisses me off enough that I resort to covering his side of the bed with worms? I figure that would be more than I really wanted from compost.
I hope I didn't scare anyone away from composting because it really is a great way to reduce the amount of garbage that leaves your household, but in my case, it just didn't work.

No photos this time around.

Spring 09

           

The tomato I first planted in late January has been coming along, albeit not without some struggle. It's been transplanted into a bigger container and already has quite a few leaves, as you can see in the first photo. However, I might have been a little heavy handed with the fertilizer I added and might have burned the early leaves a little bit (photo 3).

The violet blooms are my biggest surprise of the season. When we bought the plant about a year ago it bloomed for a few weeks, then went dormat for a while, with nice dark green leaves. When it started blooming a few weeks ago, I was super surprised. It's been a very low maintenance plant, thus far.


Next Update: Chamomile Seedling & My Compost

Fighting the Winter Blues

This is an experiment in winter gardening. I'm so exasperated by all the cold around here that I just had to do it, to hell with conventional seed starting dates. In my defense, though, it's highly probable that none of these plants will ever live full time outside. Except for maybe the tomatoes. (Yes, I planted tomatoes mid-January, sue me, it's boring here.)

There's basil, oregano, chamomile, tomatoes, and catnip. In retrospect I probably should have labeled the containers, but for a few of them its too late, and their seeds were too microscopic too identify now. The tomatoes are in the toilet paper roll though.

Everything, as you can see, is edible. Except for the catnip, which is going to be harvested and dried and stuffed into hand-made cat toys. If I could have a cat I would do it in a second, but Richard's allergic. The joke's on him, though, I'm allergic to dogs.

If this winter garden fails, I lost out on a few seeds, but I'll just toss the stuff into my compost pile. Otherwise, I'm going to eat like a queen, and the next door neighbor's cats are going to be the happiest fatties around.

Checkerboard Dishcloth

This cloth was was designed using alternating squares of stockinette stitch and seed stitch, to make a nice checkerboard pattern. I use my dishcloths in the kitchen, in the bathroom, and everywhere else in my home. Old cloths get used to clean the bathroom fixtures or for the rare times when I get down on my hands and knees and scrub down my kitchen floor.

I used 100% cotton yarn in worsted weight. Sugar 'n' Cream is my brand of choice, but any other comparable yarn will work as well.

A 120 yd. ball of Sugar 'n' Cream has knit up 3 full sized dishcloths, with enough left over to make one small


Pattern:

Cast on 31 stitches, & knit 3 rows.

Knit Repeat A 4 times.
Knit Repeat B 4 times.
Knit Repeat A 4 times.
Knit Repeat B 4 times.

Knit 3 rows, bind off.

*You can omit the last repeat if you want a smaller dishcloth, or you can keep adding on repeats as you see fit

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Repeat A:
Row 1 - k3, p1, k1, p1, k1, p1, k5, p1, k1, p1, k1, p1, k5, p1, k1, p1, k1, p1, k3
Row 2 - k3, p1, k1, p1, k1, p7, k1, p1, k1, p7, k1, p1, k1, p1, k3

Repeat B:
Row 1 - k8, p1, k1, p1, k1, p1, k5, p1, k1, p1, k1, p1, k8
Row 2 - k3, p6, k1, p1, k1, p7, k1, p1, k1, p6, k3

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This pattern is to be knit for personal use only, not to be knit for resale, blah blah blah, its my copyright, y'all know the drill. Be good and awesome!