Labor Day

Today there was yard work to do, some window trim to be painted, and a general clean-up needed around the house. Well, we did most of the clean-up, but it was warm today. So....we left things, hopped in the Jeep and headed to Hudson to play in the river. We had been there once, last Father's day, and enjoyed the lack of life guards (and therefore lack of dumb rules). The kids loved being able to use their inflatable toys and Andrew made a friend. The water was a bit on the cool side, but the sun and air were warm enough to make it the perfect summer activity. Too bad there was the feeling of impending fall in the air. Andrew starts kindergarten tomorrow and is feeling "unprepared" although up until this weekend he was nothing but excited. I think he will be fine and will love going to school. We have already been to the school library a few times and had a few pre-school activities which have all been great. If I think of it (and have the energy) I will try to post a picture of Andrew on his first day of school some time this week.

Cook-um - A Mealtime Saga

On day I was carrying Nick as I was putting some fish sticks in the toaster oven. Nicholas loves fish sticks and I was trying to explain that they were too cold to eat and that I needed to cook them first.

A couple days later I was making dinner and Tim was holding Nick up so Nick could see what I was doing. He looks at me and asks "Cook-um?". I told him that yes I needed to cook the food (I don't remember exactly what I was making).

Monday, Nick and I were snuggling on the couch near dinnertime. He snuggles with me for a minute, gives me a kiss, and says "Cook-um?". As in "Hey, I'm hungry. Are you going to make some supper?"

It must be Spring

I am pretty sure this is my favorite time of the year. It is finally warm out and I spent pretty much all afternoon and evening out in the yard. Andrew was a great helper this year and pulled out old plants, picked leaves out of a flower bed, identified and pulled some weeds and helped bag up leaves and grass that I raked up so we can take it to the compost center. He also had a chance to do some of his annual worm digging. I cabled Kapik (our dog) to a fence in front so he could hang out with us safely (he is a husky and loves to run and probably wouldn't think twice about running out in front of a car to check it out). I wish I had my camera outside because I looked up once to find Kapik standing on his back legs examining the bird feeder and another time to see him drinking out of the bird bath. Nicholas and I had a talk about staying out of the street and staying on the grass. I mentioned that if he was in the street the cars could go boom and Nick could get ouchies. Amazingly it seemed to work (for today anyway) and I only had to tell him to stay off the stairs instead. He is getting pretty good at going up, it is going down that is still pretty tricky since he insists on walking down. He had a blast zooming around on the boulevard. He is getting very close to running.

I went back outside after the kids went to bed and continued cleaning up the front yard. I was out until almost 10pm, but most of the front is cleaned up and weeded now. I have a single light out front, but it is enough to rake by and pick dead leaves out of the flower beds. It was so nice to get thing cleaned up and to not be freezing or being eaten alive by the bugs. It feels like I am very behind with yard clean up this year. I know I'm not really because there isn't much growing yet. Winter lasted much too long this year. The iris leaves are only a couple inches tall and the hostas haven't even sprouted their leaves yet. I have mostly perennials in the front beds and I love seeing the plants come back to life in the spring. There is always more work to do when winter is over with all the yard and outside maintenance, but somehow life in general just seems more manageable when it isn't cold.

I love Thursdays

Because on Thursday, I spend the evening with other knitters.

Last Thursday evening was spent here



Stephanie is so funny and so nice. I made scones that morning so I brought her one in case she had yet another early flight and no time for breakfast. They had chocolate chips in them, good ghirardelli bittersweet chocolate chips. Mmmmm

with pizza afterward here

Most other Thursday are spent with Jessica and Kathy at Black Sheep Coffee Shop. We even had a new knitter join us tonight. Knitting with others is very good. Especially since it means time out of the house, without the kids. It is amazing how much difference it makes to have a scheduled time every week to spend doing something fun and talking with other adults. Come join us if you are near South St. Paul on Thursday evenings. We meet from 6:30 pm until they close at 9pm.

Laceweight

I bought some merino roving from Amy at Spunky Eclectic last fall and have been spinning the same four ounces off and on all winter. I made lace weight yarn for the first time. It is maybe a little over plyed, but since it will be lace and will be blocked it should all be ok. The yarn is beautiful shades of blue and purple blending from one shade and color into the next. I can't wait to see what it looks like knit up. Although, I'm pretty happy just admiring it right now.




Singles on the bobbin
Singles on the ball winder

Her Majesty Merino Roving from Spunky Eclectic
over 900 yards / 4 ounces

The Moon

Nick discovered the moon today. He has been interested in vehicles (cars, trains -choo choos, and airplanes) and making noises and telling me when he sees them. This afternoon we were in the backyard and he looks up and tells me there is an airplane. Then he sees the moon and points and says "ball". After a couple tries he says the word moon and turns my head in the right direction when I talk to him about it. We were sitting on the ground and he literally takes his hands and puts them on my head and turns my head so I am looking at the moon instead of him. He has to make sure I know where it is, of course.

Public Service Announcement

I know it has been quiet around here for a while. There has been much knitting and many house projects going on. The blog will likely be quiet for a while since we hope to move in the spring or early summer and if that is going to happen many more projects need to get done. The upstairs bedroom that I had drywall pictures of earlier is being painted now with floor sanding to commence this weekend. Then all that is left for that room is some trim and painting the closet. Next up, our room since we had some plaster fall off the ceiling earlier this year and have plastic wrap taped around the hole to prevent more plaster from falling on our bed. After that we will have to see if the bathroom, hall, or back bedroom get done next. Plus there is still the ceiling in the living room. I think you get the picture. Speaking of pictures, our camera died earlier this month but we should be getting a new one in the next few days. Hopefully I can post a few pictures of the house progress, but I'm not promising anything. There has also been knitting after working on the house and taking care of the kids. I have been trying to keep ravelry mostly updated if you are there. One last bit of news before I wake Nick up and go pick Andrew up from preschool. Andrew should be done with speech preschool at the end of this month!

Happy Birthday Nicholas

Happy Birthday Nicholas

This year went so fast. Before you were born I was expecting your first year to be something I just needed to get through. I have truly enjoyed the past year. It helped that you slept when you needed to and that Andrew was here to keep us company during the day. Now that you are crawling and thinking about walking, we don't snuggle as much, but you still fall asleep in my arms sometimes and I think about how lucky I am to be your mother. You are such as sweet little one, freely giving your smiles and hugs to me. I am looking forward to your next year.

Busy = Bullet Point Post

There has been a lot going on this weekend. I have more to do tonight, so here is a quick bullet point post so I don't get behind on the blogging.

- We still haven't found out if the Jeep is totaled or not.
- We did buy a new vehicle
- It is a '80 Jeep CJ7



- It is kind of like a Wrangler (it has a hard top that can be removed)
- Tim plans to drive the car to work for 6-12 months if possible
- The CJ7 was purchased using insurance funds from the front end collision last July. - This means we can put away some of the money from the rear end collision (when we get it) and start saving for a future car.
- We hope to keep the "new" Jeep and fix it up and be able to pull it out on nice days to ride around with the top off.
- Worst case, we have to sell it - the guy we bought it from was getting tons of calls so it probably won't be too tough.
- Both children will be in car seats (not a car seat and a booster) when riding with the top off. Tim is also thinking about installing 5-point harnesses in the back seat.
- I spend most of the weekend working on drywall in Nick's bedroom.

The room after plaster was removed. We have had drywall and a single coat of joint compound up for awhile.

This is what it looks like now.

- Yes, Tim installed the pocket door.



- My arms are really sore (I think most of it is from mudding the ceiling).
- I need to sand and touch up a few places, but most of the mudding is done.
- Andrew spent Saturday night and much of Sunday at Grandma Kathy's.
- That greatly increased the amount of work accomplished.
- Andrew now has a mattress for the top bunk. (We didn't buy one before because he doesn't need one - it is mostly to make the room look nicer - the bunk beds were cheaper than the single we liked and Andrew thought bunk beds would be fun and maybe he can share with Nicholas some day.)
- Andrew's room is looking really nice.
- I still need to make pillow shams and curtains for the french doors and we need to sand the floor.
- Then Andrew's room is done.
- I think he has the nicest room in the house right now.
- I will post pictures when I finish sewing stuff for the room.
- Nicholas figured out when to wave and is waving good bye to anything, especially cute was when he waved to Tim this morning when Tim left for work.
- I found a great deal on Plan toys so we will be set for Christmas and birthday gifts with nice wooden toys.
- I love finding good deals on stuff.
- I keep messing up the Mystery Socks cause I keep trying to knit a few stitches and then set it down again and I forget which row I'm on.



- I started some Thujas to work on instead.



- I don't like fickr - I have had a free account for almost a month and already have my limit of pictures.
- I love my Picasa account. I have had their free account for a year and still have lots of room and can organize pictures into more than just 2 folders and upload lots of pictures.
- Unfortunately, Ravelry is linked to flickr.
- I want to add more pictures, but I don't want give flickr money when I like my Picasa account and Ravelry will be allowing photos from other sources eventually.
- My projects and stash on Ravelry might be pretty boring for a while.

All Done

I have good news and bad news today.

First the bad news - I think the Jeep might be all done. Tim was rear-ended in the Jeep on his way to work this morning. It isn't too bad since he wasn't hurt, it wasn't his fault, he has a loaner Mustang to drive for 10 days courtesy of the other driver's insurance. Tim said the Jeep didn't look too bad, but it wouldn't start again. I'm glad we didn't bother to get the front end fixed. I don't know if it will be totaled or not (the adjuster will look at it tomorrow) but we were really thinking of replacing the Jeep with something smaller for Tim to drive to work now that we have the wagon. We just didn't really want to try to sell the Jeep. So, I spent pretty all of preschool driving and then picked Tim up in Minnetonka this evening. Also, this weekend was supposed to be spent working on Nick's room and will probably be spent looking at cars again. Uck.

Good news - Andrew's Tiger hat is all done. He thinks it is pretty cool. The hat is very soft and should be pretty warm since it is stranded. I used this pattern and a size six needle for a 20 inch diameter. I do still need to wash it before the weather gets too cold.

Grrrrr

I finally got around to taking pictures of the Nick Socks. Today was a good day for wool socks (I wore a pair of mine too).


They look kind of funny when they aren't being worn, but they stay on.

I don't think Nicholas is a baby anymore

Nicholas is increasingly mobile. First it was crawling. He got good at that quickly and loved being able to get toys, bug his big brother, etc. Then it was standing. If there was something a bit off the ground, he uses it to get onto his feet. He doesn't usually know how to get back down, but that doesn't stop him from trying. Today it was the walker. We tried this once before, but it keep rolling away from him. Today he could do it. He walked back and forth along the length of our house. I helped him if he got stuck on something, but by the end of the day, he was managing that if he wasn't too stuck. I don't think it will be long until he is walking by himself. He can already walk pretty well just holding on to one of our hands. He is also getting better at communicating. He can say his version of "all done" and also sign it and "meh" for more and he has a sign for that too. He wanted a drink tonight so he pointed at me while I was drinking and complained. He smacks his lips when he wants to eat or nurse. He also understands a lot of what we say. I was cleaning out the coat closet last week and putting shoes back in. I was sitting by the closet, Nick was sitting next to me, and on the other side of him was Andrew's sandal. I said, "Nick could you give me Andrew's sandal" and pointed to it. He saw where I was pointing and went and picked up the sandal and brought it most of the way to me. I was pretty shocked by that. I didn't actually expect him to understand, mostly I was just talking to him. It is amazing how fast kids learn and change.

Time flies when you're having fun

The kids got to bed a little earlier tonight so I sat down with my Malabrigo and the Tiger Hat pattern and the next thing I knew it was already 10pm. I'm about a third of the way done. Andrew is going to love this hat.



I finished seaming the last clog and felted them all this morning. I tossed all eight clogs into a zippered pillowcase and put the pillowcase in the wash on hot with a couple towels. I only had to restart the washer once (the time near the washer was spent wisely folding clothes) and once all the clothes were folded I checked the clogs to find that they were already felted.

All Done!

So, yesterday I said I would talk about talk about spinning. I purchased a fiber sampler from Hello Yarn this past spring. I finished spinning the superwash merino singles and the plan is to try navajo plying it. I purchased corridale roving in two different colorways at the last Shepherd's Harvest. I spun up the red and yellow dyed roving and plan to navajo ply it after practicing on the merino.

Yep, the bobbin is a bit full.

When we went to the state fair I stopped in the cabin at Heritage Square. I spoke to the woman who was spinning/knitting/doing needlework (not all at the same time). She mentioned that she had been spinning for 20 years. I went away thinking about what and where I might be spinning 18 years from now. Then I went home and tried spinning the denim cotton roving sample from the fiber sampler. At first it didn't go too well. Then I grabbed the carders I bought at the Creative Fibers sale (they are finer ones to go with the ones I got for mother's day). Spinning the cotton I carded was much easier than spinning from the roving. After that bit was spun I tried spinning the cotton from the fold. That went pretty well too. So, after I used the bit I pulled off I tried spinning from the roving again. It actually spun pretty easily. I think that spinning the fluffier preps. first helped with getting used to the short fiber. I thought it was pretty cool that I spun cotton. It was one fiber that I was very apprehensive to try. We will have to see how it goes when I start spinning the rest of the cotton up.

Projects

There are lots of projects going on around here. I'm more excited about some than others, especially some of the house projects. We have done a lot of structural and mechanical things in the last years and visually our house hasn't seemed to change much. Now we are finally getting some of the cosmetic things done and I really enjoy seeing the difference.

Knitting Projects:

First a warning - I am going to be doing a bunch of gift knitting in the next couple months. I will not say who anything is for though. So, if you see something that I make that is a gift, who knows. It might be for you, it might not. I'm not telling. I do however, want to have some blog fodder other than the kids and the house projects.

Mystery Stole 3
-The mystery stole is kind of stalled. I wasn't sure for a while if I was going to knit the asymmetrical design or make the other half and join it in the middle. I have finally decided that I am going to just knit it as written. I like things to be symmetrical, but I'm also pretty picky, so knitting something different for once probably won't kill me.

Mystery Socks
-I have knit both socks at the same time so they are both done to the final clue, the turning of the heel. I partly want to just continue on until where I would usually start the toe, but I have plenty of other projects to keep me busy so I haven't. I am knitting these out of Maisy from Crystal Palace. I found this yarn this summer at Clickety Sticks and hadn't seen it on any blog or heard about it anywhere so I wanted to try it. It is made from corn and has elastic in it. It knits up pretty nice.



It might be a blanket
-I started knitting the Patons Divine that I received at the Knit Out last February. Andrew loves fluffy, fuzzy yarn and I though he might like a knit blanket that isn't a baby blanket. I thought I would knit up three strips from the three colors and seam them together. Just garter stitch since the yarn would hide any stitch pattern and the yarn is a pain to knit, hence the It might be a blanket.



Bauhaus Fair Isle
-I have one pattern repeat knit so far. I like the fabric that is forming and I like colorwork. This is not getting worked on much since I am on a gift knitting kick and this is not a gift. This pattern was shown to Tim quite a few times before actually purchasing the yarn and starting the knitting. When I was going to buy the yarn I looked at Knit Picks to see if they had colors that would be similar enough to use their less expensive yarn. They didn't at the time, but recently came out with a bunch of heathered yarns and now I could easily find all the colors I need for the sweater. Of course, now that I already started it in Heilo. Oh well.




The Mountain of Clogs
-A whole mess of felted clogs for Christmas gifts. I can actually make a pair in 2-3 days (which is mostly knitting after the kids go to bed at night). I have three pairs done and almost have the forth done. I might need to knit another pair, but will have to wait and see. I am very proud of myself for having them almost done and it only being the beginning of September. I love wearing my felted clogs (I'm wearing them right now).

two of the four pairs

I was going to mention my spinning and house projects too, but I think those will just have to wait for later this week. I want to get some other things done tonight and I don't have pictures of the other things anyway.