Last weekend we whipped the garden into shape enough to get the soaker hose out and plant the poor seedlings that have been languishing in their starter pots. Of course, I did have to pick the hottest weekend that we've had since last August to insist on all this hard work!
The previous beds just needed weeding and the soil turned but we (Jonathan) also needed to dig up a new potato bed since they are supposed to be rotated in order to keep down disease and pests. A new sunflower area was also required since we are trying out the truly mammoth sunflowers this year and had to figure out a place to grow them where they wouldn't shade another sun-loving plant.
We had also neglected to bring in the soaker hose at the end of last year so we had to extract it from its cozy little nest of grass that had grown up around it. Some grumbling on both sides cemented the conviction that this travesty of yard keeping shall not recur. In the end, however, it was laid out with careful attention to the mathematical relations of the hose wetting area to the bed space and the strain rate of the hose bends.
I had intended to plant the seedlings on Saturday but we needed to take our red faces inside to cool off. They were finally planted in the cool of the evening on Sunday. And then it rained--hooray!
The strawberry plant design was modified from an out of print botanical drawing. It turned out to be more intricate than it needed to be for the application but someone is going to get a beautifully embroidered knitting bag.
The lines were done in stem or split stitch with either 1 or 2-ply thread. The flowers are mostly nested detached chain with french knot centers. The strawberries presented a particular challenge. Initially, I liked the idea of doing a lattice in yellow over a red background or even simply a red lattice with yellow stitches over the crossing points. However, a couple of attempts showed that the stretch in the underlying material would not allow for this. The solution proved to be a Pekingese stitch with the back stitch portion done in the goldy yellow and the lacing in the red. The rows of stitching overlapped a bit, creating a more 3-D look.
The real thing setting flowers in the garden!
