Something Other Than Running...

because I still have not digested Surf the Murph 50K enough to write a race report.

In brief, for those who may want to know: I finished; I ran a race Sunday; Monday I was exhausted (combination of lack of sleep over the weekend, running and work); Tuesday I engaged in alternative activities (see below); Wednesday I ran a hilly 45 minutes on the SHT from my back door west and then home again; and then today, being a Thursday and "Thursdays are for running to work" after all, I ran a nice mellow 2.5 miles.

But I have been busy with a few other things:

• Planting Garlic: I needed to get this in before the ground froze and we are running out of time up north. Tuesday morning was sunny and warm - relatively speaking - and I did not have to be in to work until noon so off to the garden I went.
  

preparing the bed

using an antique potato planter to make the holes for the garlic

planting the garlic (harvested from my garden earlier this fall)

Due to lack of time I did not expand the garlic bed this year. But I did plant the largest of the bulbs so am hoping for a bigger harvest next year. It will be a sacrifice, but I am sure we will manage to eat the remaining garlic in the next month or two ;->

• Knitting:

This is a baby blanket for a niece who is expecting her first child. Those are size 5 needles - large for me (I normally work on 0's and 1's) and the yarn is an acrylic/wool blend (Plymouth Encore worsted weight) for easy care. The pattern is called Heart Blanket (Fiber Trends CH-24) and is a favorite of mine. Nice lace pattern but not too complicated... well I guess that depends on your perspective. Embiggen the first photo and tell me what you think. The original pattern came with both written and charted directions. In this case I transferred the written directions to card stock - one row per card - which makes the project more portable and easier to follow, especially later at night when my eyes are tired and do not want to focus on tiny symbols in a chart.

Never let anyone tell you knitting is not a blood sport! Last night while knitting away on this blanket I managed to poke a hole in my right index finger with the tip of the above pictured needles. Ouch!!! Drew blood - and a laugh from my daughter S who was sitting across from me. I think this is the first time I have impaled myself on such large needles. If I am careful I can still knit and avoid hitting that spot. There are few things worse than re-impaling yourself on a knitting needle - and the tips always seem to find that weak spot.

Plans for the weekend include getting straw for the garlic and strawberry beds; finishing up the weeding and rearranging of the strawberry bed (whose idea was it to put in a bed large enough for 78 plants anyway?); spreading straw on the above mentioned beds; attending eldest daughter G's UMAC (college) championship playoff soccer game; running some unknown distance on a trail somewhere in the vicinity; and making some serious progress on this blanket as the shower is in a few weeks.

Not too ambitious am I?