Fruitarama!

This was the weekend of the Fruit.  Friday was planned to be our annual blueberry pickathon, but a steady downpour (all.day.long) bumped it to Saturday morning.  Marianne couldn't join us, so Melanie and I drove off at the crap of dawn on the hour-long drive up to the blueberry farm.  It was a perfect day for blueberry picking - clear skies, gentle breeze, low humidity. 

I managed to break my all-time record in 2011 of 12 lbs of berries.  I picked 15.2# of blueberries off of five bushes!  We then drove down to Marianne's to relieve her poor, over-burdened plum tree of plums - another 8# joined the blues.  Then there were the pears.  Another 8#.  Then there were the three 5-gallon buckets of apple falls from my neighbor, Nancy's tree.

I suppose it's rather obvious what I did all weekend, right?  I managed to freeze all the blueberries and dry a good portion of the plums.  I also discovered zucchini fritters, which had me in the kitchen most of the weekend.  Poor me.  :)

I am in the process of going through the apple falls.  The gnarly ones are going to the sheep, llama, goats and chickens.  Norman is afraid of apples so far.

And speaking of the lad, we (I) had a regular sheep rodeo yesterday.  Normie's coat was chafing - they outgrow them as their fleece grows in volume - so it was time to put him in a larger size.  It wasn't pretty.  I thought that getting the old one off would be more difficult than putting the new one on.  Not so.  It also was very clear that Norman is no Icelandic sheep, those nice, short, 'fluffy' sheep.  No, Norman is all legs and bucking bronco.  Thank god for tree cover so that no one was subjected to the spectacle we created.  I did, however, prevail in both cases and he is sporting a new, clean, sage-green coat with ample growth room.  His previous owner has entered his fleece in the county fair, so I am excited to see how it does.  It looks wonderful!

In the process of cleaning, freezing and packaging all those blueberries, a few broke free of their bonds and ended up on the kitchen floor.  Where I stepped on them and dragged them around.  All over my nice, clean kitchen rug.  Sigh.  BUT WAIT!!!  I had forgotten about UFO #46 -- yes, it's still an UFO, but it's finished state is now within view. 

It works out to 3 squares down, by 5 squares across

Should be colorful! (And easier to hide
smooshed blueberries...)

I had forgotten all about #46 until I stumbled across the squares I had finished.  I decided to finish one a night until I had enough (15) and then Melanie came over on a Sunday night and we worked out the pattern.  Now all I have left to do is to steam each square and lash them together.  Piece of cake.  It should only take me until 2015...