Friday, October 31, 2008

Halloween

We made crafts.



(Hubby gets the credit for the great faces on the ornaments).

We ate monster food.


We Trick-or-Treated.


We had a great time.

Thursday, October 30, 2008

Mail Call!

Last week, I received some goodies in the mail!

The first was a dishcloth from dishrag tag. The race is over, and our team came in fifth.

Huh, not sure why it's sidewise.

The second is this book:

I won a blog contest on Andrea's blog. I have to say, I've been pretty discouraged as a parent lately, but this book and some good Bible reading and prayer time has been helping. Thank you Andrea!


On the knitting front, I'm still slogging away on the February Lady Sweater. I finished something for the Misery Knits Swap I'm taking part in, and today I brought a baby sweater to the doctor's office. I'm still not sure how all the Christmas knitting I want to get done will get done, but we'll see.

Happy knitting!

Friday, October 17, 2008

Little Girl's Second Hat

Last year, I made little girl Ela's Favorite Hat from the original One Skein Wonders book. This year, she got her purple spiral hat. But, three days later we bought her snowsuit (at a GREAT price at Sears), and it happens to be pink and brown. And I happened to have this pink and brown wool in my stash. And I needed an easy project to take to see the Yarn Harlot. Thus, here is little girl's second winter hat, once again modeled by Annabelle. (Where is Ruggles?????)


Last night, I actually worked on the February Lady Sweater. It's so slow, it's unbelievable.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

My Knitting Mojo is Back!

At last, I'm back in the knitting groove!

I spent last week with my parents. I love Western New York. If any of you are thinking about moving, I promise, it's a great place. On Thursday, I went to my mom's knitting class at Have Ewe Any Wool, and I worked on little girl's winter hat (she wanted a purple hat.) (BTW, the Thursday group at the shop is full of the nicest, most encouraging fellow knitters you will ever meet.) The hat pattern is from 101 Designer One Skein Wonders, and it worked up super quickly. Sadly, right at the last minute, just when I was sewing up the top, I dropped a bunch of a stitches. A BUNCH. Thankfully, my mom fixed it for me. (Aren't moms great?)

(Ruggles seems to be missing, so little girl's pal Annabelle is modeling hats today.)

The following day I started little boy's winter hat. No published pattern here (that I know of) - just your basic hat. I love the colors, and it looks fabulous on him! I think I will make matching mittens, and if there is enough yarn leftover, add a pompom on top. (Oh, btw, both hats were made with Plymouth Encore.)


I also brought the February Lady Sweater. Sadly, I had to rip back 8 rows or so because of a mistake. I'm now one row ahead of where I was when I got to my parents, but now I have a load of stitch markers to help me keep my place.

I also bought some yarn for a baby sweater and some LOVELY alpaca to make a tam for my sister-in-law. Remember my short list of Christmas knitting? The one I made so I wouldn't stress myself out? Yeah, that's out the window. I'm back to wanting to knit for all the babies, and make two tams, plus the Oriel Lace Scarf I want to do. And finishing my sweater sometime this year would be nice too.

I pretty much plan on knitting whenever humanly possible - but I feel great about it!!!!

Lucky me, I got back to town just in time to go see the Yarn Harlot in Cambridge. How convenient that she was speaking just 10 minutes from my house! I love hanging out with knitters! Within seconds of sitting down, we were showing each other our knitting, pictures of our kids, and comparing LYSs. I don't know if you know, but in general, strangers sitting next to each other do NOT speak to each other in New England. It's been a hard lesson for me to learn, and one that I love does not apply to other knitters.

(Sorry about the picture quality - I should have replaced the batteries in the camera before I left.)

Anyway, back to Ms. Pearl-McPhee. If you haven't read of her books, read them! She's funny. She's smart. She's an amazing knitter. (Best advice so far - It's only yarn.) If she is coming to a place near you, go see her! She's just as funny in person, and you feel like she's a really approachable person.

While there, I worked on a second hat for little girl. Not that she needs one, but her new snowsuit perfectly matches a half-ball of yarn I've had sitting in my stash, and knitting a hat didn't require too much attention. I hope to finish that today, and work on my sweater. I will have to decide what the rest of the week's playground knitting will be - but rest assured, there will be knitting!

P.S. Did you notice the counter up top? I'm in my 20th week. Halfway there! Last night, Daddy was able to feel a couple of kicks!

Monday, October 6, 2008

Linda's Hat

My friend Jeff's mom has cancer. She had been in remission, but recently, it came back. Her husband died of cancer a few months ago. It's all very sad.

Cancer.

I can't even imagine....

Anyway, our bible study is sending her a care package, and so I knit up this chemo hat.


The pattern is called Lace-Edged Women's Hat, and it is a free Ravelry download. Little girl particularly liked the hat, so I might make one for her (for snow time, as she said.) The hat was REALLY easy, and the lace pattern, which isn't showing up so well on my picture, is really pretty.

The kids and I are leaving tomorrow morning for Western New York, to spend time with my family. Things have been a little stressful here at casa de Mommy Knitter, so I'm glad to run away from home for a while and relax. And obviously, I'm psyched to be around another knitter or two!

Hopefully, the February Lady Sweater will be complete (or close to it) by the time I get home next week!

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

I have an announcement...

Blogger Graphics


It's a GIRL Baby!!!


(I found some really Cute Blogger Layouts at Doobix.com)

Little girl is VERY excited, as up until a few days ago, she didn't want another baby ("I don't need another baby. I already have little boy") However, then she decided that though she didn't want a boy baby, she would like a girl baby ("Because I'm a girl.")

She has gotten her wish! We are all very excited!

Ribbed Cap

I've spent a lot of time this week at the playground. It's been nice out (until this afternoon when it poured cats and dogs), and the kids have been having so much fun playing Fireman together. I LOVE that they are playing little games together now. Anyway, since I'm not going to bring the Celtic Knot Stole or the February Lady Sweater to the playground, I needed a take-a-long project.

I shopped in my stash and found a skein of wool that I had bought to make a hat to match a mistake rib scarf I made in the spring. The set is meant to be a Christmas gift. I chose a pattern from One Skein Wonders (I STILL love that book!), and it knit up super quickly and easily.

The Ribbed Cap took no time at all, and since it required hardly any attention, it was a great knit while watching the kids kind of project.


Although Ruggles doesn't do a great job showing it off, I really like it. And, I think it's perfect for a guy. (BTW - Ruggles got a big kick out of modeling.)

My new take-a-long project - a Chemo cap for a friend's mom.