Saturday, June 30, 2007

CONTEST!!!!!! BIRDIES AND YARN HEAVEN

Hey do you remeber this contest?????? Well I don't have many entrys. Come on peeps!!! Give me some ideas......you don't have to be married neessarily. Just give me some cool ideas!! I am going to come up with the winners on July 16th. There will be 2 winners, 1 for the one I will most likely use and 1 for a random draw. Come on come on!!! Please post your entry to that blog post to make it easier to find you all!!!!



Here they are today....like minutes ago. They are getting soooooo big! It looks like only 2 out of 3 are going to hatch.

Can you spot mom and dad in this pic? Click on the picture to make it bigger.....they are both there!! And then the next picture is to give you a perspective of how close they stay , the bush beside the house is where the nest is, mom and dad are in the tree further out but th first oe on the right. They sit there and tweet thier scolding at us while we sneak pics of thier babes!


Last but not least is this awesome yarn! I can not put into words how awesome this yarn feels. It is 100% Merino Lambs wool, cottage spun locally here in Maine. Best of all it is SUPERWASH! I mean to tell you guys this stuff is awesome, it feels like flannel, your favorite 100 year old soft t-shirt and high pile fleece all in one.......I am not kidding you, If I could make a bed out of tis stuff I would!!! I plan to create a pair of socks out of these and see how superwash they are. OH thank god for a discount!!

Proud Mama

Mrs. Robin is being a good mama.
She now has 2 babies I just have not gotten a picture lately.

This has been a really neat thing for me to watch unfold! I have never seen anything like this so closely! The kids are enjoying it too....although Miss S says this thing doesn't look like a robin.....LOL

Thursday, June 28, 2007

Bad Bad Blogger

I am still kicking....these are pics of the wee ones birthday party!! Hmmm just a day under a week ago andI am just posting pics.
He was so clean eating his cake....the other 2 literally dove in face first which is why they get thier own mini cake........the photos of this guy aren't quite as entertaining, nor are will they have the blackmailing strength as Miss S and Big B's

He was really into sharing with Grammie. Great big fist fuls for her, in the end I think she got more of his cake than he did. He was very insistent!!
Grandma and grandpa bought him his very own cement truck....he was thrilled. Grmmie gave him 2 really cute summer outfits, and a tow bihind caterpille with these nifty spinny balls...too cute. Mommy and Daddy got him a musical bus, he got a book and $5, from hus other grammie, and $5 from his aunt and uncle. He had a great day and baskd in all the attention.




This is the book from our adopted grammie.....he really stopped to look at it too, it has animals in it and he loves anything farm animal!












Here we are playing peek a boo with my package!!! He knew exactly what he was doing.

Where is Little B??????


Here I am Hehehehehehehehehe!!!




There are more pics to come......I have some extras this time around woohooo!!!! And I will update my knitting in the next one!

Saturday, June 23, 2007

Proud/Sad/Bittersweet Parenting Moments


Disclaimer: This post lacks knitting content so if you are here for yarny stuff, today you are outta luck (sorry!!)
Ok so fot those of you with kids, you know that you get to a certain point and you realize that they are growing up right before your eyes..........and you choose to ignore it, pretned it isn't happening and certainly you don't admit toanyone else that they are doing such horrid things.
Then it slaps you in the face that the cat is outta the bag........................................................................heres my weekend in a nut shell, Little B turned 1 yesterday, and he is already to walk......he stands up from the the middle of the floor now without help and then can gently lower himself to a kneeling or squatting position, he just hasn't figured out how to move his feet yet. Sad, bittersweet parenting moment.
Big B is really seriously into the potty training thing, he even told us today on the mainland when he had to go....before he went in his pants. Wooohoooo that is an awesome happy positive proud thing.
The last item I will leave to your savvy interpretation. Miss S had to have certain items added to her wardrobe. We had "the" discussion and she was fine with it. Oh my god was this a slap me in the face wholly CRUD what the heck is going on, where the heck did my baby girl go!!!!!!!!!!!! UGH............what next..........don't even go there I don't want to talk about it, on that note I will be in denial for at least another 5 years (HOPEFULLY!!)
So thats it a weekend full of memories of time slipping by and memories being made. For mom and dad, mostly mom it was a weekend of high emotions!!!

Friday, June 22, 2007

Happy Birthday little guy!!

happy birthday wee one!!!!!! time really does go fast. Little B is 1 today, in about another hour he had joined our family a year ago. He was a surprise baby, and I am so happy he surprised us, he is a very happy go lucky kinda kid, and now you can tell he tries to make us laugh. Happy Birthday Little Man, glad you joined our zoo/family!


These socks are now off the needles but took this picture early in the day to show you all that I really do knit 2 socks at once oncircular needles. I
really sweat by this method. There is never any second sock syndrom, and the socks are always the same. I tend to tweak patterns as I go in my head and then when I go to knit the 2nd I have forgotten exactly what I do. These socks were done in peace fleece, and I really like them. There is no pattern, it all just went from my head to the needles.



So I have caught the stitch marker
bug too. They are so fun,nd quick to mke and I love the fact that they
are inexpensive. The only problem I have is that Wal-mart here doesn't have much of a selection and when you buy on line wih beads you really don't know what you are getting. I do't know what size 6mm is.....I mean I suppose I could break outa ruler, but that would be too smart!




Finished Peace Fleece Socks WOOHOO.

And here is my new project! It is the Lily of the Valley Smoke Ring. It is very enjoyable. I love it!

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Knitting and newness

So I discovered this nest perched rather low in a lilac bush. It is right outside of the front door to a house my husband caretakes for. It is quite a deep nest. Little Miss S actually saw it first but decided there were no eggs....I believed her and bypassed it for a few days, and then I took a peek in it. Now I don't know i the eggs were there to begi with or if they were laid after S. peeked. but anyway there are













3 Beautiful bright blue, robins eggs in that nest. and since spying them we have seen momma bird sitting on the nest and gathering food for herself. I am anxiously awaiting the baby birds, I have never been able to peek in on a nest like this before. The kids have been told to stay away and that if they touch the nest or the eggs that momma bird won't take care of her babies, and that if we are creful we just may be able to watch them as they grow and get ready to learn to fly.











I think it is awesomely amazing. The olor of the eggs is incredible!












So I did my first day in the yarn/gift shop here on island, and it really is not conducive to the wallet.









This is one of the first sweaters I ever attempted and I love it. It came out beutfuly, not to toot my own horn.










Look at all that yany goodness it takes a great bit of restraint to cntrol oneself when under extreme circumstances such as these!








If you look really closely in this picture you will see my new spinning wheel.....I am not sure which one, was hoping to get some advice n it, but she has 3 in stock 2 are ashford travellers, one of which is a double treadly with scotch tension, (it may sound like I know what I am talking about..but I really don't I just read the box ) the other is single treadl and the 3rd is a really beautiful looking traditional.........Now if I didn't have kids that were really young and I could display it I would definitely get the traditional because it embodies all you dream of when you think about spinning wheels.




See them in the box at the bottom of the picture, under the table to the left of the empty baskets???? YUMMY!






The smell is delish when you walk in, it smells like balsam fir pillows and candles, and yarn!

Can you see the wheels inthis one too?????? :)

I know I am severly redundant.



Thank you to my mom and others who commented on the blog and privately about my last post. Life certainly has been a lesson these las few years. Lessons that I have learned are:
Not to wait till tomorrow to say things you can say today, because sometimes tomorrow doesn't come. Live life to th fullest, every day, but also take time to indulge yourself with lifes smallest pleasures, as sometimes the simplest things are the most special. Don't wait until someone is gone to remember them, remember and celebrate those you love evertime you see them. It is sort of like if I were rich, which I am not, I would begin giving freely now so I can watch those around me enjoy it, rather than will it to them upon my death....what good does that do??? Gve of yourself now amoung the living and do what makes you hapy, life is to darn short to work hard at something you hate! I know even though things seem tough right now there are many out there who have it worse. I have a beautiful family, 3 healthy kids, my mom is responding wel to her regime thus far, and my dad has a date for his surgery, and so far as we know know it is going to be a fairly simple surgery with no chemo to follow. Itcertaily could be much worse. I am healthy and can hlp out where I am needed, and was able to help a grieving family have a safe place without constant reminders of thier lost loved one. Aaaaah I do have a good life. May yours be peacful and calm!

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Fragility.......


I am not even sure that is a real word, but man oh man, am I feeling fragile.
Let me preface this with the fact that I know this all goes on everywhere but, I live on a tiny island and these things just aren't supposed to effect us here!
In the past few days apparently I have had a sign on me that says "tell me what I don't want to know" I have heard things ranging from, people cheating on others, to someone in the school working with our kids is doing coke, to having a friend die of, as of yet unknown causes, to adults seeing pictures of community members in various stages of undress. I feel like I am on overload. You know how when the washing machine is overloaded or unbalanced it makes tha banging noise and walks across the floor? That is what all this stuff is oing in my head! Add 3 young kids and parents with the C word and it really is almost too much! Yikes! I am ready to dig a hole and livein it. This is nuts!
I have been knitting for sanity, although it isn't working very well. I have no pics as of right now maybe tonight!

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

This is the scarf that never ends!!!

WOOHOOO for me. I have figured out how to resize my pictures, (psssst, do thy seem to take less time to load now???) so now they are tiny files but are still beutiful crystal clear.

I have 2 skeins of this cashmerino yarn from Bartlet Yarns (the color outside on the porch is fairly true) it is yummy, I have knit this scarf up (well half of it anyhow) twice now.....I first knit it up with the middle hearty cable the other way, and from the bottom edge, it also had 2 more k stitch cables as well as 2 more moss edge stitches AND 2 more purls between each adge of the middle cable. Why do I bore you with all the details, well because it was too wide, nd was not even going to be 4 feet long total. I ripped it all out.......then I decided on some decreases in number of stitches, knit about half way through my yarn and decided with all the cables it was going to be quite bulky and inflexable around the neck.....soo.............you guessed it ripppppppppp, sooooooo now I fairly happy with what I have created. Can I call it my own pattern? I borrowed the middle cable from a sweater pattern I love but tweaked it here and
and then used some of the elements from the ARAN hat and threw them in a blender and played till I got a good result. I don't know, at this point I feel like it has probably all been done before, so to post it as my patter or not?????? I dunno!
I love the yarn, I love the look, I get lots of compliments when I work on it. It is beautiful.

So here is a first, a post withnothing other than knitting news. I didn't know I was capable of it!

I have cast on a pair of socks, I am doing them for sale at the LYS here on island. I have also started making stitch markers to sell there as well.

I will do a roll call. Currntly on the needles, this lushous scarf, a pair of cuff down socks easy cheesy pattern but wool........hey I live in Maine and it even is cold in the summer for summer people!!!
And I just cast off 2 of my mini angels
and they are patiently awaiting finishing off which is a messy time consuming project!

That is it for now.