Quick knit FO

I have another finished item to report! Wow I know, I can hardly believe it myself.

A little while back I bough myself a birthday present. Two tickets to the Paw Sox annual Stitch and Pitch (Rav group here). It's the weekend before my birthday and Hubster and I love baseball, especially the (Boston) Red Sox. It's the kind of thing we would go to before we had kids. Not that we wouldn't go now, but the kidsters make it logistically harder to say "Hey, let's go to a ball game!", if you know what I mean.

So I find myself with just enough time to make up a few charity items to bring to the game. And I have all this unknown, unlabeled, inherited acrylic just waiting to be made into cute kidster things.

The first is a girl's bucket hat. I did it in two days! Hey, that's a whirlwind for me. It's the first girly thing I've made and I kind of like it. I cast on with a pattern in mind, then changed it the very next round. Then I thought I'd do the Scrap Hat like I made before, but then changed my mind again. This is what I came up with:
I wonder if I can keep up this pace?

Renee Award

Darcy is at it again, giving me this most cherished (my first!) blog award. Yay!

A little bit about it, from Darcy's blog:

This Award was created by Bella and Ces in honour of their friend Renee, an incredible lady who in the face of a frightening life battle is tackling each day with great spirit and courage.

Here is what Bella says of this award: “this is a brand new award and I have the pleasure and honor of spreading the seed, watching it grow. I hope it finds it’s way to those who are like Renee: the acorn, becoming a tall and sturdy oak, giving acorns…”

Growing tall and sturdy hmm? Well, at 5'10" I'm just tall enough, but I would love to grow "sturdier" and feel like I have something important to pass along, my acorns, so to speak. I love this metaphor. Plus the button is cool, and goes with my outdoorsy theme, no?

I'm going to also pass it on.

1. c'est Moi! the tink-n-frog I think we have the same sense of humor!

2. knitspun daily stitches My newest fiber friend, on a sock adventure.

It's finished!

Finally I can report an FO! Oh, I am so excited!
With about 20 feet of yarn remaining, I finished the sage cable handled tote bag this weekend. I did remember to take a picture prior to felting, which is unlike me since I usually get too excited and run to the washing machine as soon as the yarn needle finishes it's weaving job.
Before:
After:
In the words of Hubster, "Wow, that came out really nice. It was just a big blob before." Thanks honey, that was the plan.


I took lots of notes, so yes, there will be a pattern coming soon! And I'm on a kick to get more of my stuff "faved" over in Ravelry. So if you like it, let me know!

Thursday Thirteen

My fiber friend Darcy tagged me to dish a little about myself, so here are 13 "interesting" things about me:

1. I have a freckle constellation of the little dipper on my arm. Or maybe it's the big dipper. Astronomy was a long time ago. Can you see it there?

2. I hate soft/crunchy foods like deli salads (tuna, egg, chicken, etc.) because of the celery. Yuck. Or onions in meatloaf. Yuck. And don't go sprinkling any granola in my yogurt either!

3. I do not wear light pink. Maybe a fuschia, once or twice.

4. I do not exercise on purpose. All that sweat. Besides, think of the computer time I would be wasting!

5. Swimming is one of my favorite summer pastimes but I do not like to swim in the ocean past waist-deep. It's the little fish/big fish paranoia.

6. I love it when it rains or is windy because I can wear a hat without feeling guilty that I was too lazy to do my hair. Yes, it rained today (I wrote this post on Weds).
7. I cry when my in-laws go on vacation and leave me to fend for myself.

8. I put my 4 yo to bed in school clothes so we don't fight in the morning about getting dressed, and I am proud of that.

9. I consider myself a creative person but cannot even draw a stick figure:(

10. I have known hubster for half of my life and he is my best friend (and he doesn't read this blog so I'm not just trying to win points or anything!).

11. I have never paid for a babysitter. I don't stiff them, just have never hired a babysitter that wasn't Grandma or Auntie.

12. When I am sick, I never, ever sniffle. I think there is something gross about sniffing back in what your body is trying to get out. I go through boxes of tissues! It takes everything I have to deal with kidsters' sniffling (which about this time of year is constantly).

13. I love everything orange. Orange juice is my coffee. I love oranges, orange smelling stuff like lotions & perfumes, even the color orange. I HATE warm orange like General Tso's chicken and Duck a la...whatever.

14. I am intensely, insanely, (and probably clinically) fearful of spiders.

Ok, I know that was 14, but I thought you should really know about the last one. See, fiber friend Leeanne has one of the blogs I check in on, and for some reason I always seem to hit it when there's a spider thing going on. So be nice and give me a little warning, now that you know!

Here are the blogs I'm tagging:
craftsandstuff

tink-n-frog

Shortly Stitches

Wool & Cotton

Come on ladies, I want to hear about you!

Knitting in childrens' stories, part 2

Continuing with the subject, here are two that are quite humorous. Without a lot of words, the hilarious pictures get the point across. They are by Nancy Shaw. My favorite is this one.
The story is not about knitting at all, but as you can imagine with sheep as the main characters there is one lovely lady that is knitting at every turn, even when they get themselves into sticky situations! To top it all off, the story has such a funny punchline at the end.

The other one in the series that we did read was this one. Also quite funny.
There are three more that we don't have at our library, but I'll be ordering them through the inter-library loan soon!

Sheep in a Shop
Sheep in a Ship
Sheep out to Eat

Sheep Blast Off!

Sheep Trick or Treat

I can only wonder (and hope) what kind of shop they are in? I'll let you know when we've read it!
ETA the last two titles, found when I was reserving some of these other sheep books from the library! Looks like we've got more reading to do.

Hell week(s) again

I am sorry there haven't been any pictures of the sage cabled purse lately, but I'm trying to get it finished and don't really want to spoil the surprise! I've made it to the second side and am knitting the last two straps at the same time. Soon it will be a few Kitchener stitches and felting time!!!

It's school vacation week once again, and in case you didn't know, this actually means less knitting time. (Sigh.) And next week my in-laws are leaving me, um... I mean leaving on a two-plus week vacation. (Double sigh.) I will have to take a lesson from my childhood friend Tom, of Tom and Jerry, and prop my eyelids open with toothpicks in order to get anything done after the kidsters are in bed.

I won, again!

I think I'm on a roll or something. I found out that I won an awesome sterling silver butterfly cable needle necklace from my fiber friend Darcy! She was giving away a bunch of stuff on her blog for her 'versary and I was one of the winners. I am still in shock. I saw this necklace on my first visit to her blog and have wanted one ever since. I even showed it to hubster! And my birthday is coming soon. How did she know?

Becoming British

Last weekend I had cast off the top of the sage cabled purse, put the handles on holders, and proceeded to work the two front handles at the same time. I was even enjoying a rare episode of knitting while the children played in the same room! All was going along so well (which should have been a sign, sigh) when I discovered that I had made a cable error at some point before the cast off.

I suddenly became British. It's probably because The Masters was on and there was a lot of listening to Nick Faldo and David Feherety (he's Irish, I know), but "Blimey!" and "Bloody he--" (stopping because kidsters are in the room) was all I could come up with. I wanted something a little stronger to represent the emotion I was feeling, but we have always made it a point (ok, tried very hard) not to swear in front of the kidsters. Maybe a few have slipped out during extreme duress and this would have qualified for sure, in my book anyway.

Feeling completely aggravated I put it aside for a few days. That and I didn't have any time to sit and un-knit. I'm happy to report that the unknitting went as well as could be expected, and I am back to where I was a week ago. Well, not happy that a week went by without progress but happy that I don't have to do any more unknitting!

Knitting in childrens' stories, part 1

We're big into books around here. My kidsters love to go to the library. Which is great for me since we can borrow the books for a while and the ones that they fall in love with get put on the wish list for some holiday, birthday, or otherwise special event in the future (and we don't end up buying books that they aren't too fond of after the first or second reading).

I've come across a few in the last few months that have some knitting in them, in some way or another, and I thought it would be fun to post them here. This is our most recent find, which I myself am totally in love with and am putting on my wish list!
By Keith Faulkner, it's a cute story about how Spider knits for her friend Bee. The things she comes up with are a hoot (with so many legs she is a fast knitter, I'm jealous!) and the colors are so vivid. And the knitting is textured on the pages. It's really amazing. And as a plus for parents, it is a pretty short story without seeming short since there is so much to look at. We've had this book since Thursday and have read it every day both at nap time and bedtime, and it doesn't look like it is going to be getting any breaks anytime soon!

Opening Day

Spring has finally sprung. And I can prove it.

My DFIL gave us our annual Easter Lily this week. Unfortunately the only place we can put her so the cats don't get her is on the downstairs mantle. So we don't see her too often, but as soon as you go down there it smells great!

The Red Sox managed to win their opening day game! Yes, they did have to postpone it by a day due to torrential downpours, but they did it. I hope postponing opening day doesn't bring in some bad mojo or anything. At least now I can look forward to some good knitting TV.

Kidster #1 started T-ball practices. His first organized sport. He looks so cute with his little glove. They get their shirts next week so then he'll be just adorable. (As a little aside, I've never been a really girly-girl. Having boys is fun and I think I am pretty happy doing the whole baseball-dirt thing as opposed to pink doll house stuff. No offense intended to my fair readers of the pink preference!) Hubster is the coach. He's so good with kids and he's loving it too. I'm pretty proud of the both of them. They have their opening day next weekend.

I had visions of sitting on the sidelines knitting while watching Little League games and practices. Unfortunately that will have to wait a few years. See, the playground is right next to the T-ball field, and in order to keep kidster #2 from wanting to run with the other kids, well, you know where I'll be. I guess in a few years when (if) they are both playing then I might be able to do it. Heck, I might have to since I will be shuffling them both around so much it might be my only time to knit!

This blog itches

Yes, this is my made-over blog, with the header I wanted, that I had formatted with what I wanted, and that I finally got released not even a whole month ago. But it seems too busy. Like wearing a striped sweater with polka dot pants. I'm thinking that I want now is a nice white or neutral background. But I already know that once I do that I'll want some color and texture back. Alas...maybe I'm just making this up as an excuse to spend more time at the computer?

It's ironic because my first pattern project was pink, and now my second pattern project is green, and they seem to just blend in with the blog instead of stand out. Even my latest yarn purchases were pink and green. Does she have any other colors, you ask? Yes! I have a six foot tall by four foot wide stash of plactic bins (and yarn!) just waiting for me. I think I'll do turquiose next. Should clash nicely with the blog colors:(

I made it into KPC!

So I'm having a great day even though is it the second day of flat-out rain. I don't even care that the kidsters are climbing the walls and each other (and occasionally me). My Around About made it into the Knitting Pattern Central free patterns list for bags & purses! I feel like I have "arrived"! Oh, and have I mentioned that it's on Ravelry and I'm considered a designer now? Oh yeah, you say, about ten times already. Sorry.

But I shall not be a one hit wonder! I am feverishly working on the next item and pattern, the sage cabled purse. Well, as feverishly as possible for me anyway. I think I only did two rounds last night, which is two more than I would have expected on "Survivor" night. Usually the knitting just sits in my lap and keeps me warm. But the challenges were long and I wasn't on a cable crossing row, so I squeaked it out. Tonight there will be zero knitting. And I'm ok with that, since it's Ladies Night! Woo Hoo!

Yarn Score

I was looking around in a discount store today for some summer things for the kidsters and I came across this: and this:

Yes, of course I bought them! After searching Ravelry, I am completely satisfied with the price I paid. I am also glad that I didn't buy more of the green. Even though it speaks to me, in volumes!! And I thought about it, since there was certainly sweater quantity available. I love everything about the colors in the hank, but when I searched projects I was not thrilled about how the colors looked when actually knit. But I'm not worried about that since I plan on felting it anyway, which should look pretty good! So for now I'm going to enjoy (read: fondle) my new yarn and enjoy (read: drool over) the beautiful colors just they way they are!