**Update**

The first strawberry didn't survive to the end of yesterday - I suspect a squirrel.

Ripening

The first strawberry has turned a lovely shade of red.  It's not quite ready yet, but it will be soon.  The next two days are suppose to be fairly hot and sunny, which should do the trick nicely.

I'll let you know if I manage to harvest this wee lovely before the squirrels do.

Newly discovered (for me), yesterday, is the site Map My Walk.  It lets you plan a walk or bike ride in your local area (assuming your area has been added to goggle maps), and calculates how far you will (or have) traveled.  Clever.  Using this site I was able to see that when I walk Gus, I normally only travel 0.8 miles - shameful - no wonder I'm so fat!  I increased our walk today to a shade over two miles.  Less shameful.  The site also lets you integrate a blackberry, android, or iPhone to allow you to keep track of miles logged, as well as an option to log in through facebook so you can brag to your friends about how far you walked on a given day - I've opted to just blog about it.

Prediction:  Nigel will comment saying, either, "Bah - I walk Gus farther than that!", or "I've planned a new route", because he won't stand for my walks with Gus to be further than his.

I listened to this album while I walked:

 

Good Mud

Check out my new Cube after puddle jumping.  Doesn't he make the most adorable mud splatter patterns?    Too cute!

The late spring garden is well into blooming.  This lavender is a very large Spanish Lavender purchased at least four or five years ago at Sage Garden Herbs.  It's not perennial to our region, but Sage Garden offers an overwintering at the greenhouse for a small fee (I've been sending a rosemary there too). 

When I sent the plants in last autumn, I was sure the lavender had met it's end and it wasn't going to survive, but it's come back better than ever this year.  The blooms on this type of lavender are beautiful, it's also called "butterfly lavender" because it looks like pink butterflies are resting on the top of each bloom.  Here's a link of images to enjoy.

The peonies are also happy (though nearing the end of their bloom cycle).

A view of the side garden - click on the photo to open it and you'll see Gus on the far left, inspecting...

New this year, a set of sun and moon solar lights from Canadian Tire.  I admired them for a few weeks, waiting patiently for them to go on sale, which they did.  Hooray for me!

I've also been admiring these solar firefly lights, also at Canadian Tire.  They may not look like much in that photo, but they're awfully sweet in person.  I'm trying to be patient and wait for those to go on sale too. You see Nigel, I'm not as impulsive a shopper as I sometimes appear.

New to the garden this year, are a few ever-bearing strawberry plants, which are showing great promise.  I planted them in one of these, seeing as strawberries can sometimes get a tad aggressive.

Here's some more sweetness...

New, New, New

Check out what's new in my life. 

That's right, my brand new Cube.  Isn't it adorable?

I ordered it at the beginning of May, and it finally arrived a week and a half ago - I would have shown it off earlier, but it was too, too rainy.

I special ordered the fancy custom grille option for the front - checkers!  And I love that instead of a trunk it has a cupboard.  How adorable is that?

Absolutely adorable.  I'm enjoying my new toy very much, I haven't named him yet, but names like Quebert have been tossed around, as well as Herman (as in Munster - because of the shape of his brow).  I'm open to suggestions.

On, off and around the needles of late:

a scarf called Slanted and Enchanted, named for an album by Pavement, one of Nigel's favourite bands (not one of mine - but I do allow Nigel to inspire me from time to time).  I chose leftover bits of reds and oranges, with a dash of black and white thrown in - like the album cover.

I started this one back at the beginning of May, but the weather turned very (very, very) warm shortly afterwards and the colours looked too hot to handle, so it's been left to languish.

To remedy this I started a shawlette called Wingspan (that's a Ravelry link).  It's quite a clever pattern, working in short rows, eight wedges are made in a semi-circular fashion.  The yarn is Jawoll Magic 6-ply, a superwash sport weight sock yarn.  It took almost exactly one skein, I only had two or three meters left over. 

I loved the yarn when I saw it in the shop, it reminded me of something from my childhood - possibly colours of ice creams, or sweeties - I'm not sure, but it was terribly appealing when I first saw it.
Oddly, after finishing the piece, I decided it was truly hideous - too many colours combined with too many wedge points.  This yarn may need a different destiny at some time in the future.

My most recent project started was the Beekeeper's Quilt.  This is an utterly addictive pattern - just tiny little knitted "hexi-puffs" - that are later (much later) tufted together.

This projected has taken off in the Ravelry world, there are more than 3800 knitters (just through Ravelry) that are currently working on this pattern, and another nearly 5000 that have it in their "queue".  So far, I've been using up scraps of yarn in pinks and greens and have made about 40 or so.  I estimate that to make a bed sized quilt I'm going to need between 400 and 500.  Does that sound like a lot?