Two baby hats delivered to the lovely person who ordered them for some lovely babies, one just is one to be.
Then the third pair of short-summer-socks. Nothing special to say about them....the first ball of dark noro into the second ball of colorful nor then a wee bit of the second ball of dark nor. Thrilling I know.
Naturally one must make blueberry muffins. Blueberry Oatmeal muffins to be exact.
Three and a half jars of blueberry preserves. I don't seal the half jars and one of the full jars didn't seal so only two jars are getting put up. They thickened up amazingly! I don't use pectin, really I'm just down to the fruit and lemon juice. So usually my preserves are very runny. Raspberries slightly less but blueberry wow perfection!
And the special treat; blueberry cheesecake bars. This recipe calls for 12 oz of cream cheese. I happened to have one brick and some goat cheese. Just a touch more goaty tangy deliciousness!
And this is just one corner of the things we are doing. I could make a list....but I think that would stress me out. Starting next week Mr. Gnome is off contract for two weeks. Usually this means lots of doing stuff and little blogging. HOPEFULLY lots of pictures....maybe. So.....we'll see what happens.
So I Bugged the colors. Orange; her usual favorite, a brighter green to go with the orange and kept the stems the same color as the grass just to make things easier. And since I was making an orange dress I figured it would be nice to make yellow flowers; her second favorite color.
Naturally yellow flowers are Black Eyed Susan's. 
Also some pictures of this years garden.
Do you see some gnomes?
I happened to have this frog bead left over from a project. He's hoping along the bottom shaded nicely by those lovely big flowers.
There is also a cute little inch worm made from some scrap sock yarn.
We went raspberry picking this morning. Yum!
So far there are 4 jars of raspberry jam, like the strawberries I didn't add sugar this year. I had thought I wanted to make a raspberry pie but that thing takes 5 cups of raspberries! So I made Raspberry Crumb Top Muffins instead. So yum! There are some in the freezer and there will be raspberry pancakes; probably tomorrow. And lots and lots in a certain little Bug's belly.
Yesterday I finished the second pair of short socks for summer use. Starting with the hand dye originally used in Mythos then used to finish the first pair of short socks. I then went to the colorful noro from the Noro stripey knee socks followed by the dark Noro from the same socks. I still have another color ball and another darker ball.
It's shocking I know. Socks. Really who would have guessed.
So these are Argus Panoptes, the sixth round socks of Sock Madness. The yarn is Mackintosh Yarns, the rest of the ball that was barely started to finish Damson.
They the eyes of the peacock feather. A fun stitch pattern; doing the long stitches was fun in its differentness and a wee bit difficult in its fidilyness. 
These socks are everything I love about Cookie A. socks.
The twisted stitches, the traveling itty bitty cables, the 20 some page instructions with half a dozen charts. Seriously A-E charts for each sock. That's more than half a dozen. Love it! 
It even cables down to the tippy tip of the toe. The yarn is Lorna's Laces new line that has some NASA fiber that is supposed to keep you cool when you are warm and warm when you are cool. So far me feet are hot. So......not sure about that. I'm not the biggest fan of Lorna's Laces anyway, I prefer and more saturated color, but that's just me. Some people commented that the Outlast (the funky regulating fiber) wasn't at all stretchy making this kind of pattern super hard. And that is mostly true, it is only 55% wool so not as stretchy as some might prefer especially when doing itty bitty twisted stitch cables. 
Luckily it's June, which means June's Cookie A. Sock Club! First off we've gotten the cookie recipes. Despite 90+ degree weather I made these bad boys. Orange cookies with vanilla cream cheese frosting. Oh yeay! The other cookies is Orange Madeleines not having a pan I will probably skip those.
Last night's dinner was Bulgur, Arugula, and Cannellini Salad from Veganomicon, one of my favorite recipes for arugula. Except I used fava beans instead of cannellini beans; because that's what I had, and the first orange tomatoes from the farmer's market instead of mushrooms; because that's what I had.
Then for an after dinner and Bug Bed Time Tread Mr. Gnome made this lovely concoction: coffee leftover from the morning, soy yogurt, chocolate sauce made for the waffle sundays, a fresh banana, a frozen banana, and a bit of peanut butter; because that's what we had.
I got this shiny stiff paper at the St Louis Teacher's Recycle Center (still reaping the crafty goodies). I thought The Bug would cut out shapes and use it in collages or something. I never thought to paint right on it. She used some foam stamps for the squares and circles. She also mixed the red and the yellow to make orange and some sparkly paint in with the yellow for added sparkle. There can never be too much sparkle if you are a six-year old girl. Now I haven't gone out and taught any color theory. I want her to feel more free from all that. When she asks what happens when one mixes two colors together I tell her to do it. She is currently out of orange paint; it is her favorite color. 
I think it is pretty darn cool and more importantly so does she.
