Tense Times

It's that time of year when everything is a little bit tense and everyone's a little bit grumpy.

Our Combine is out of the barn, but not going anywhere.  Sightings of Combines working in neighbouring fields are not discussed.  Everyone is poised and ready: the drier has been cleaned and checked to be in working order.  So we just wait....

The last few days the weather has been really sunny, if a bit windy, so the farmboy was set to work creosoting the boarding, which kept him busy for a bit:

I have been doing a lot of work in the garden, and everything is looking quite pretty

 

The baby swallows are getting used to flying; they go out swooping and diving and then back to the nest for a rest

 

and we were hoping to have started harvest by the end of this week.

But then we woke up this morning to rain, and it hasn't stopped since.  So, in between looking at Facebook pictures of all the blue skies and azure swimming pools other people have been enjoying, I've been working on my Debbie Bliss lace scarf:

Mine is probably a bit 'lacier' than the pattern dictates, but I have persevered. 

As I painstakingly knit, I have a chorus of voices in my head - Ros: "Follow the pattern stitch by stitch", Sandra: "Cover the rows of the pattern except the row you are working on so you don't lose your place",  Betty: If you drop a stitch you can always add one on", and, finally, Lynda: "you haven't got very far with that, have you?