Twinkling Snowman is now basted together so that I can spent bits of time here and there sewing it down. I am pleased to get this far.
And this is the total amount of raisins from a 4 gallon bucket of grapes
They are horrible to pick off the screen, so I’m hoping not to do any more of these this year or else find a better way to do them.
Today was more food prep for winter and for the weekend. So the applesauce was canned, rice cooked, greens cooked, and split pea soup made. Laundry was washed and that’s about as domestic as I could handle today after the gym.
sheep decided to form one group in the pasture without a fence between them. Fortunately there is only one mature ram here so they are just getting the chance to breed a bit earlier than had been planned. It could have been a disaster if we had had more than one mature ram. I will mark my calendar for 150 days from today though I don’t think any of the ladies were ready. There is always some type of excitement and that doesn’t even include having a dog that got out and was checking out the neighborhood.
It is so dry after 2 months of no rain, that if it has even a hint of green one knows from a long distance that it is nettles growing. So the dozing begins. They have taken down all the blackberries in the top pasture and tomorrow will finish removing the nettles in this pasture. Then they will plant what they estimate to be about 3 acres. The weather forecast is for rain and in the 60s all but one day next week. Absolutely perfect weather for pasture growing. I am getting excited about this as I’ve waited a long time to get this done. The sheep will be excited in the spring.
After gym today, we worked on sheep care. They are nearly all wormed now. We looked them over to decide potential breedings and did some pen maintenance. We worked some on a fleece we are soaking and before we knew it, the day was gone
Garden update for 9/11/17 begins with these grapes. They are the beginning of the harvest. This was a 4 gallon bucket. I will be making some juice, some raisins, and some frozen grapes. If the birds stay out of them, there may be about 5 times this many.
We have eaten a number of small personal sized cantaloupes. This one is a larger one that isn’t yet ripe.
I’m not sure what happened to the watermelon. Lots of leaves, but no fruit – it really fizzled.
I’m tired of cherry tomatoes and cucumbers and they are dying back, so we have started pulling them and putting in the winter vegetables. We still have a very few squash ripening as well. The weather man says cooler weather for the rest of the year. That is good. When the harvest comes, it doesn’t give you much rest. But it is so very welcome.
Pumpkin head #2 is now ready to be embroidered and quilted. I think I should find a little black cat and a embroider a spider to finish them off. But finishing them may not happen this year. I may pin one of them on the wall just for decoration just like he is this year.
When putting together the applique pieces, I laid an applique pressing sheet over the pattern. It is a white “Teflon” type of plastic through which one can see the pattern. I press Steam-a-Seam on the back of the fabric I will be cutting out and after removing the paper, press it over the pattern picture. I assemble the entire block on the pressing sheet and press. I then carefully lift it off and over to the backing I have previously prepared. In this way, I can see the image on the pattern for placement and if I put something down incorrectly, it is easy to move on this sheet. Hope this explanation helps those of you who aren’t confident in placement.
Pumpkin Head is now all put together. He still needs to be stitched down, but he is in one piece. This pattern is called “Pumpkin Head” and was designed by Rachel Pellman. It finishes at 13 x 15.
Then there was this Fall pattern with pattern pieces pinned to it and not put back together very carefully. So I will try to figure out what was going on here and possibly finish it. The pattern is dated 2001, so I know that it is not older than that and might be 2-3 years younger.
I did make a trip to the grocery as it has been so very dry that we are having to supplement this for nectar from flowers so the bees don’t starve this winter. 
Then I went to the bee supply store. The item on the left is a “J” hook to use when looking inside the hive and the thing on the right is a “bee protein patty” which I’m guessing has peanut butter in it. The screen is for making the entry hole smaller to keep the yellow jackets from storming into the hive and stealing.
We froze a few more bananas for “nice cream” which we enjoy on hot days.
And, because you asked, this is what the cucumber chips look like when they are ready to eat.