Berries and Needles

My mind runs seriously at 100 mph all day long.  While tis very hard for me to get bored, its soo not a good thing for me to be bored.  I get reckless or fall into depression.  So busy is always the word of the day.  Now your definition of the word busy and mine are most likely miles apart.  As long as my brain has enough input flowing in to keep it happy, to me that is being busy.  My body can be busy, but if my brain finds the activity boring, good things never happen.

As ya all know I'm not a huge tv watcher.  However there are shows I adore.  River Monsters, and yeah I have a wee "thing" for Jeremy Wade.  Not sure what's that all about, but something about him lights me up.  Besides the whole "damn I could tap that" with Jeremy going on, the show interests me.  I love to fish, and would happily travel the world until the day I crumble into dust.  Bizarre Foods is also a fav of mine.  And except for the bugs, I would like to think I would try most of what he eats.  Most other shows I sit and watch with TH (the husband) kinda bore me, but he wants me to sit and be with him.  We really dont get to spend a great deal of time together. 

To keep me from driving TH nuts while he watches tv "with" me, I knit.  Now most shows I can knit and watch and totally keep up with both.  The knitting bleeds off the boredom and keeps TH from throttling me.  Since I'm no longer knitting for the grandbaby, I needed to find something else to knit.  While I'm happiest dressing in black, I do enjoy brightly colored socks.  I found a cool pattern that knits the socks from the toe to the cuff!  Oh, I had to give those a try.  I had a bit of an issue with the use of two pairs of circular needles at first, but then changed those stupid things out for my trusty double pointed needles and life was good again.

This first picture is the start of the heel.  If ya count closely?  I have 5, yeah count 'em 5 needles in this one wee sock!  However, one of the needles is lazy and is only holding stitches until I need 'em later.  The lazy needle is the metal cord you can see peeking out on the top right of the pic.

The finished socks.  Not perfect by any means, but for a first pair, I'm happy.

 I used to love jam, but since the world has gone to adding other sugars than just plain granulated sugar to jam, it's all to sweet and sticky for me.  While ya can buy the made with sugar jam, the price is thru the roof.  The idea of paying $8.00 or more for a wee jar of jam is just out and out painful to me.  The last time I buzzed the grocery, I picked up the supplies to make the stuff myself.  I used to can a great deal.  I used to go and help my Grandma "put up" as she termed it, jams, ketchup, tomato sauce and applesauce.  We also blanched and froze a ton of veggies each summer.  After marrying TH, I started my own garden and began to "put up" stuff for the long cold winters. 

Just a bit more than an hour and my strawberry jam was finished and sitting on my cutting board.

If your wondering how much each jar cost?  I figured around $4.50 a jar.  These jars hold 16 oz.  While there is cheaper jam out there, it tastes cheap and to me is unappetizing.  I'm thinking about making apple jelly next.  I love that on biscuits.  If I can find a good apple juice it's a go!