No Tiny Needle Tuesday today. I did start a new (small) project, but it’s a secret for the moment so you’ll have to wait.

Instead, I have something just as exciting.

Sunday, while Dave was putting up all the trim in my office, I was puttering about in the garden. It feels like it’s been ages since I’d been able to get out there. I did a lot of tidying and was out there for most of the day.

As I was cleaning up the veg beds, something caught my eye on one of the pea towers.

Can you see it?

Look closer…

Yup. Another Monarch Chrysalis! And unlike the one I found the other week, this one looks viable! I will be keeping a very close eye on it, so I can (hopefully be there when it opens).

The clock is ticking though… this little one is cutting it close to begin it’s journey back to Mexico.

Not long after discovering that chrysalis, I also found this…

This one was hanging from the netting on the squash tunnel, and clearly, it’s occupant is long gone. No telling how old it is – could be days, or weeks.

But it still thrills me to know that some monarchs start their amazing journey in my garden. That’s a tiny treasure indeed.

Or at least, it was supposed to be. After I got my office painted, Dave and I went back and forth on what to do with the closet. We went back and forth on whether to re-wallpaper it or paint it. In the end, the budget decided – it was way cheaper to paint it.

Dave got to that right away at the start of the week

He took the doors off, gave them a nice coat of white, and then tackled the inside. It’s so bright and clean now.

Then on Thursday, he got started on the floor. It’s something we were supposed to be doing together. We’ve got a good system where I stay down and lay the floor, and he stays up and does all the cutting – that way we don’t get too sore going up and down. But… while I was working at the day job… he just did it all.

It’s not a huge room, so he was done by early afternoon.

Friday, we picked up our ordered trim, and Dave spent a rainy Saturday painting it all while I suffered with a migraine on the livingroom couch.

And then Sunday morning, he was right back up there putting it all up. By noon…

… he was done! And oh my what a difference it makes to the room!

When they redid this house in the ’60s, they stripped out all of the turn of the century character this house would have had. We tried to put some back in…. as much as our budget would allow.

We got colonial style baseboards and casings. I found these fantastic handles at a thrift store – they were originally brass so Dave sprayed them with a hammered silver paint for me.

We spent a little extra to add the rosettes to the corners around the windows and doors. I’m so glad we did – they look amazing.

We had a little troubleshooting to do where we took out the hallway wall. We can no longer get the ceiling tiles used… and we didn’t want to replace the whole ceiling. So Dave ran some plain pine up the walls and across the ceiling… much like a beam would run

We painted it white, and Dave trimmed it out with this pretty little embossed vine trim on each side. When I have some time (hahahahaha) I plan to paint some pretty green vines up the centre.

The only thing we have left to do (and when I say we, I mean Dave) is the cove trim between the ceiling and the wall. We ordered it at the same time as the rest of the trim but it’s taking a little longer to arrive. I’m hoping it comes in today… and as you’re reading this, I might even be moving things back into my office!!!!

With September half over, there are defintiely signs of the gardens winding down – especially in the veg beds.

I decided it was time to pull up all of the remaining carrots…

What in the name of Cthulu?????

Ok… in truth – I do understand what happened here. These were those carrots I got as starts from the garden centre. And… well I think you can see why the experts suggest sowing direct instead of transplanting starts. In truth, it’s probably because the starts were so far along… if they were younger, tinier roots, it might have worked. Oh well – live and learn

I did get several other “normal” looking carrots, so it wasn’t a total loss. The ones on the right are nice and big and long – a perfect carrot harvest. The ones on the left are shorter, but will be delicious all the same.

In addition to pulling the carrots, it was also time to dig up that last surprise potato.

Not a huge harvest… but enough for a meal or two. I haven’t quite cracked the potato-growing code yet, but I’m learning lots as I give it a go!

The earlier pepper are turning red (Dave had this one in his spaghetti the other night) and there are quite a few small green ones still coming on the plants. They probably won’t get very big, or have time to turn red, but they will get eaten none-the-less.

My cabbages are still going….

But the heads are still quite small as you can see. This is actually the largest one. This is my first year growing cabbage so it appears I have a lot to learn still! I think the small size is mostly due to inconsistent watering and not enough fertilizer. Will definitely try again next year.

Raspberry production is really ramping up, and I’m happy to say it looks like I will definitely get enough yellow ones for a batch of golden raspberry jam!

But the real excitement…

I actually got a passionfruit on the Maypop! Now…. this most likely will not get enough time/heat to ripen before the frost (it needs at least 70 days) but the fact that I got one the very first year I planted it kind of amazing!

Last… my pumpkins might not have made it this year…

But the local nursery came through with some beautiful varieties to decorate the front porch with (along with some pink and white mums!)

Yup.. Little Miss Marshmallow is back in the house! (And you can see, Lemmy was not too thrilled… after a day he got over it and they are best buds now.)

Her Dad and his girlfriend are back on the road, headed to BC (and back) so she’ll be with us until October 5.

She arrived on Thursday and, naturally, has already taken over the house.

She’s clearly the Queen.

And she’s not going to let us forget it!

It’s going to be a fun couple of weeks!

Rupert is King of Quilt Mountain!

(At least until Burton shows up…)

I have done a little knitting….

I’ve got the cuff done on the second stormy sock, and I’m about to start the solid black heel.

But the real excitement comes in the form of new yarn. Or at least new to me!

I’ve said before, I don’t normally come across much sock yarn when we are thrifting – but every so often it pops up. Usually in the form of part balls.

Happily, I like ankle socks, and I’m pretty good at eyeballing and deciding if the leftovers will enough for a pair for me. At least three of these should be fine – that one on the top left may be cutting it close. I’ll probably use something on heel and toes with that one. But… at just $1 each it’s worth the risk.

So imagine my delight when just a week later, I came across more. This time part balls of Kroy. And not just single part balls – four to six part balls in each colourway.

I’d have to weight them to be sure – but once they were all wound together, it looks like I’ve got enough for full-size socks in each colour! And at just $3 for each set of part balls… that’s one heck of a deal!

Now I really got to get those stormy socks done.

It’s Wednesday so I figure you’re expecting another butterfly post…

But I don’t like to be predictable. So… how do you feel about grasshoppers????

It’s grasshopper city in the garden right now. They are EVERYWHERE!

I know in large numbers, they can be very destructive, but that’s never been a problem in any of my gardens.

The cats find them endlessly entertaining.

Especially Furby. I saved this one from him a couple weeks ago – but not before he managed to chew one of the hopping legs off.

A few days later, he brought one inside the house and dropped it off at my feet as a gift. Both hopping legs gone this time – but yes, otherwise alive.

Happily, that’s the only one that made it into the house.

Though I did spend about 20 minutes thinking my fridge was on the fritz because of a high-pitched noise coming from the kitchen. Eventually I found the source..

If there’s one thing we have more of than grasshoppers… it’s crickets! But I don’t need them in the house.

While working on my office was all consuming…

I did manage to find some time to give my fairy her wee little foot.

And with that…

My little Woodland Fairy is done (13-year-old me is jumping up and down with joy). As I mentioned, I’ve had this pattern since 1993 (when I was 13) but didn’t managed to start it until April of this year. So, about six months to complete (working on it only on weekend evenings). Obviously, it still needs to be soaked, ironed and framed – but I’m happy to call it an FO at this point.

You can’t see it well, but the aida is a mottled blue/green. Dave and I picked up a beautiful frame on clearance at Michaels, as well as a pink mat. (The pink matches the pink in her dress bustle). As soon as we’re done messing about with my office, I’ll get him to frame it so I can really show her off!

I told you I hoped to be painting by the Saturday…. and technically… yes… I was. Just not quite painting the beautiful green walls that I wanted.

First I had some priming to finish… including some of the wood work that replaced what was left of the wall we took out.

It goes across the ceiling and down each wall. It will be painted white and I plan to do some fancy hand painting on it (vines or something like that).

Then I had to paint that darn ceiling.

Let me say. I love painting walls. There’s something very satisfying about seeing the colour change and transform the room. Painting ceilings… not so much.

I got it done…

But I think in the end the paint won.

I also had a couple small spots of my poor drywall taping to repair. So I had to wait overnight for it to dry.

And that ceiling needed a second coat Sunday morning.

In the end… I didn’t get to the fun stuff until Sunday afternoon.

When we went to the paint store on Friday to buy the paint, I ended up changing my colour. The “Mother Nature” green I had picked out online was much darker in person. Now… I’m not opposed to a very dark green… but it is a very small room. While it gets lots of light in winter, in summer, the tree blocks most of the natural light from the window. I didn’t want it to feel like a dingy cave. So… I opted for Green Knoll instead.

When I got it home, I was a little worried I’d actually gone too light…

With just the corners done, it seemed a little brighter than I planned. But… I’ve done this enough times to know… you’ve got to get it all on and let it dry completely.

With the first coat done… I was feeling a little better, but it was still on the green crayon side.

When the second one went on

My heart was at ease. It was perfect.

Now… that wood work still needs to be painted…

as does the closet door (word is, Dave may do that for me this week). And of course, it needs a floor and a lot of trim so we are nowhere near finished… But it’s starting to finally feel like it’s coming together.

I hadn’t gotten out to the garden to pick things. I brought a small bowl out to hold the beans

I clearly should have gotten a bigger one. I prefer my beans a little skinnier than this – but as I said, I’d let them go for a bit. We will eat them all the same.

I also picked a yellow squash

And fall raspberry season is ramping up…

It doesn’t look like much yet – but I’ve actually already got half a bag of the yellow ones in the freezer from the last two weeks. I’m hoping to get enough for a jam. The reds will most likely be eaten on the spot as I already did a batch of red raspberry jam with the berries I froze from last year.

Tomatoes are finally coming in.

They won’t overwhelm us this year, but there are lots for snacking

We’ve got exciting news in melonland….

I picked two Mini Mike melons. You can see there nice little size here, with a cantaloupe from my neighbour’s garden for scale. I’m saving these to open for when Mom comes for a visit in a couple weeks. If they are good, I will definitely get more seed for next year – they are the perfect size.

And I was excited to get another mini Mike, and a yellow-fleshed watermelon appear a few weeks back. Hopefully they will get enough time to ripen.

I still have three HUGE birdhouse guords on the vine – and I thought I was going to get at least one more…

But it went a little funny as you can see.

I was planning on planted some late season lettuce in the empty pea beds…

But then I noticed this little pea sprout coming up there. Not sure if it will get any peas, but it will be fun to watch.

This weekend I’m hoping to get some time to harvest the carrots and the last surprise potatoes, but there’s one thing that’s very clear about the winner of this year in the veg beds…

…are the marigolds! They have absolutely taken over the beds!