Crochet Success!!

Hello Knitters,

I mentioned in my last post that I was learning to crochet. Well on Thursday night I wanted to start a baby blanket but I just kept having my crocheted fabric look nothing like the picture in the book I was following so I asked my Mom to help me out since she knows how to do some crochet. We sat together and worked away for a while but things still weren't working so I asked her to actually watch me do mine and guess what? I wasn't double crocheting properly! She showed me how to do it right, and things just took off from there. She then taught me how to make a granny square. Here's a picture of my swatch:



I'm going to call it a wash cloth and do a decorative edge on it then give it to her as a thank you gift for teaching me.

I honestly feel like a whole new world has opened up to me!! Yesterday while sitting in the car when we were in the city, I started the baby blanket. Here's a close-up of the fabric - you can see the ball of yarn in the background through the holes.

The yarn is Bernat Chunky and the colour is Chocolate Cherry. I'm really liking how it's working up and it's so much fun to do!!

Yesterday we went across the river to Joanns. I picked up two small crocheting pattern books and a laminated instruction booklet of stitches to keep with me in my bag if I ever need help with a stitch. The books I got are Vanna's Choice Easy Crochet Critters and Celebrity Slouchy Crochet Beanies for the Family. I also got the knitting version of the slouchy beanies. Both books have such cute patterns for hats that I really want to make myself for fall, and the critters book is just adorable! Anyways, needless to say, I'm very excited about learning this new craft!

I also got to do some shopping for my swap partner - it was so much fun!! So dear swap partner, your package should be in the mail on Monday if all goes as planned :-)

Well, that's all for today. I'm going to get back to work the blanket! Have a lovely weekend everyone!

Happy Knitting and Crocheting!

Bullet Tuesday

Hello Knitters,

Since I'm not up to writing a full post I thought I'd do something a little different today. A while back I seen a post on Anna Maria Horner's blog where she just did bullet points and thought that would be the perfect thing. So here we go!!

• I got baptized on Sunday and it was wonderful!
• I've begun to work on my Christmas gift making list.
• Susan B Anderson is having a sweater knit-along over at Spud Says! that I wanted to join didn't because I have too many projects on the go right now. (But if you're able to, you should join!)
• After a lot of praying, I learned to crochet the other night when I couldn't sleep. (I'm left handed so it was making it a challenge to figure out.)
• Now I want to crochet more!
• Looked in an instruction book and found out I was actually doing the stitches wrong, or as the book called it, "the lazy way."
• Will now be working on correcting my lazy crocheting....
• My wrists are hurting, so it's taking time away from my knitting and crocheting :-(
• Trying to figure out if there is some way to wrap my wrists so that I can at least do some small amounts of knitting....
• Found out that typing doesn't really help the whole pain thing!
• Need to find a project for a special someone that I can get done in a jiffy.
• I'm searching Ravelry at the moment....hopefully something will pop up.
• I like the new Ravelry search, but find it can be super slow to load sometimes.
• Sorry if things seem a little random....I'm just writing what comes into my head.
• I finished 5 preemie baby hats!!
• Maybe that's why my wrists hurt?
• Found out there are an abundance of babies coming to knit for!!
• Is there anything more fun than new babies and new knitting opportunities? I think not.
• Our dogs have mange....that they caught from a fox....didn't even know that was possible....yes, they've been treated.
• Am now wishing I hadn't made jokes about the "mangy fox"....
• Didn't know there was such thing as a "Speed Hook", I think I need to check that out!
• I think I could use to some tea, maybe it will help my wrists....I can hope can't I?
• Going to make tea for me and Mom - I'm going to surprise her with it since she is outside watering flowers....Have a great evening everyone!!

Happy Knitting!!

Bear-y Exciting!!

Hi Knitters,

I hope you are all having a lovely weekend :-) I just wanted to let you all know that I'm trying to do my best to keep blogging and checking in on the Ravelry groups, but as you know I haven't been feeling well at all for the last while and it seems like there isn't any quick-fixes to make me better yet. I did get some testing done, but it won't be back for a week or two. In the meantime, my Doctor has given me some medication I can take to help dull the pain. We're not sure if it's an ulcer or something like that, but until we find out, there's not a whole lot they can do for me. Some days are better than others, so it's good that I'm not sick all the time. I'm really thankful for that!

I'm slowly working away on projects for my swap partner's next package. I'm really enjoying working with the yarn I chose, and find it such a treat to be working on this project! It's fun to watch the colours and pattern come together :-) When I'm not feeling well enough to work on these things, I've started knitting preemie hats for my local hospital if they'll take them. I find it very soothing to work on them since there isn't much thinking involved. It amazes me how much knitting helps me in so many different ways. I'm so thankful the Lord gave me the ability to do it and find comfort through it.

This afternoon my Mom and I had a little excitement. We decided to go for a walk to the end of the road and back, and on our way home a bear crossed in front of us! I didn't see it, I must have been looking down at the time, but we turned right around and started walking back to a neighbour's house to ask for a ride home. Lucky for us, another neighbour driving home stopped and picked us up. She said that they had seen the bear around their place (about the same spot where we seen it) this morning eating the berries! We have bears around here often, but I've never had one be so close before!! It was a bit of a scary thing to say the least. We've heard different reports lately of black bears actually killing people, so I was very glad we got that ride home!

Tomorrow I am getting baptized along with my sister and her fiance Jake. I'm excited and scared at the same time!! I am happy to being doing this though, and I really think this is the perfect time.

Well, I think I'll try to get to bed early tonight, so I should start getting ready. Have a great rest of the weekend everyone!!

Happy Knitting!!

A Little Lesson I Learned

Hello Knitters,

I don't think I mentioned this on the blog, but the other night I was feeling like I needed something easy and mindless to work on since I wasn't feeling very well and thought a hat would fit the bill. I had been looking through 101 Luxury Yarn One-Skein Wonders earlier in the day and had liked the Lacy Leaf Alpaca-Angora Hat. I went into the stash and came up with a couple balls of Patons Angora Bamboo in Indigo. I didn't check my gauge (yes, I know....) and cast on with dreams of sporting this around town when the weather turns cooler looking all hip and happenin'. Well....I'm sure you can guess where this is going. When I was about three repeats of the lace pattern into the thing I thought to myself, and even mentioned to Mom, that it looked a tad small. But I thought, maybe it will stretch once I get it on my head. I kept on knitting and finished off about an hour ago. It still looked small, but I thought it would fit since my head isn't all that big. I tried it on and....nope, not even a chance. It wasn't even close to being a beanie (you know, the kind with the little wind blowy thing on top). I showed Mom, we had a little laugh about it, and I've decided to add it to the flower girl's gift bag. Here's a picture:



I actually don't feel as bad about it as I thought I would. I'm happy that it's something someone else can enjoy. I can't be selfish and knit only for me all the time :-) Next time however, I won't choose something that clearly states in the name that it has lace in it and therefore requires concentration. I was picking this project up for mindless knitting, but that wasn't what it ended up being. Now I'm thinking about trying the whole two-at-a-time sock thing again....this time with just plain socks, not cables. Kelly Petkin always talks about how those are her go-to knitting projects for taking around in her bag to knit at restaurants and when she needs something simple, so I thought I'd at least give it another try. I'll keep you all updated on how it goes....

Happy Knitting!!

Note: to anyone who owns this book, there are a lot of pattern mistakes so I strongly suggest you check out the errata here.

P.S. Thank you everyone for your kind words and thoughts for both my Mom and me!! You are too kind!! :-) She is doing very well and is getting better all the time. I still don't feel 100% but the medication I got should start working within the next week or two. Again, thank you for thinking of us, we appreciate it so much!!

Baby Bear Progress Report

Hello Knitters,

Well, I was hoping to have a better progress picture of my Baby Bear, but this is all I've got!




This is the reason why:

My Mom and I have begun cleaning the house. We'll call it Fall/Before-the-Wedding-Guests-Get-Here Cleaning. I've been working on my room and happened to have a very tall stack of Vogue and Harper's Bazaar magazines that I need to go through and cut out inspiration pictures. These are from my sister. I have a matching pile under my bed, however, I'm "collecting" them and don't want to cut them up. She didn't want hers anymore, so I thought I'd put them to good use. So far I've only made a small dent in the pile, but I'm working away at it. Tomorrow I have to run into the city, but maybe I'll get back to it when we get home. It's a fun thing to work on in the evening. I've always been a fan of fashion, so I find it very interesting.

Well, I just wanted to post my progress report and check in. I hope you all are having a wonderful week!

Happy Knitting!

Sprinkles Yarn

Hello Knitters,

I hope everyone is having a lovely weekend! It's been very hot and humid here today so I've spent my day indoors doing some baking and knitting. We recently ran out of bread, so I baked some up this afternoon. I ended up making a white and whole wheat blend since I didn't have quite enough white flour, it worked out well and made a nice grainy bread. My Dad is coming home tonight, so I also baked up a blueberry pie using some of the blueberries Mom recently froze. She is sampling it right now; I hope it turned out well!

I have some knitting to share!! First off, as you can see from the picture above, I finally got a picture of the yarn I dyed from my swap partner. I'm really happy with how it turned out!! The green in it showed up more like yellow in the photo, but in real life it's more of a light lime green. I've already cast on for the Baby Bear :-) If I can keep at it, I should have some progress pictures by Monday for you all.

This is the other project I've been working on:


They are a pair of fingerless gloves I designed over the last few days. The yarn is a luscious merino/cashmere blend that I got when we were in Traverse City for my sister's dress fitting a few weeks ago. When I seen it, I just knew it had to be made into either a cowl or fingerless gloves. I opted for fingerless gloves since I thought they would be the perfect transition piece to add to my wardrobe to help me ease into fall. I hope to have the pattern available on Ravelry in the next week or two.

Well, I guess that's about it for today. Have a great weekend everyone and remember to squeeze in some knitting time!!

Happy Knitting!!

My First Package Arrived!!

Hello Knitters,

Guess what I got in the mail yesterday???? A wonderful package from my Itty Bitty Teddy Bear Picnic Swap partner!! I took close-up pictures of everything, but for some reason they only upload sideways, so I will try to upload again tomorrow and see if it works. However, I was too excited about my package to wait! I wanted to share it with you all right away :-)

First, there was a lovely note from my dear swap partner, who is keeping herself a secret :-) For my kit, she included some beautiful Workhorse Maritime Wool from Cricket Cove in Creamy so I can dye it myself!! (I've been going over colour combinations in my head all day, I can hardly wait to dye it) And two boxes of food colour - one Primary and one Neon, as well as some black embroidery floss - all for making the Sock Yarn Teddy Bear from Itty Bitty Toys. (This is something I've been wanting to make for a long time, so I'm glad I get the chance to!)

For the goodies she included: a package of adorable Eco Friendly pencils, 5 pretty flower and bead stitch markers, a cute little polka dotted bag I can use for storing my project in and the most beautiful crochet flower pin cushion she made just for me for my sewing!!

I'm so blessed to have such an amazing swap partner!! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!! I LOVE everything and can't wait to get started on my little bear!!

Just to let you all know, I didn't get back to my sister's house yet, I'm still here at home. This morning my Mom was very sick and had to be taken to the hospital by ambulance. She is doing better now and is back home, but we still don't know what really happened to her. We're waiting for her test results to come back and she has to go in for some more testing probably this week. Hopefully we will find out soon what's going on. In the meantime, we are praying for her and I'm doing my best to be all the help I can to her. I feel so very blessed to have such a wonderful aunt who came and took me to the hospital, stayed with us there and drove us back home again!! The ambulance attendants, the hospital staff and doctor were also wonderfully caring!! I thank the Lord for everyone who helped us out today!! Thank you all!!

Well, I'm going to head to bed soon, it's been a long day. I hope you all are doing well, and thank you again swap partner for making me such a fun package!!

Happy Knitting!!

Sick

Hello Knitters,

Sorry I haven't been updating you all like I said I would, but I ended up getting sick half-way through the week and just haven't felt up to doing much at all. Because of this, I didn't get any knitting done....I know I'm sick when I don't even want to knit! I've been doing a lot of sleeping, so hopefully once this is all passed, I'll be well rested and ready to get back to things. I'm sorry this is so short, I just wanted to explain what's been going on.

I hope you are all having a fantastic weekend, and I should be back well and healthy at the beginning of the week!

Take care and happy knitting!!

Beach Vacation

Hello Knitters,

I hope all you Canadians are enjoying this long weekend :-) I'm back from our Traverse City trip. We got back Saturday evening in time for Mom and I to go to Community Night. There really wasn't a lot of people out for it, but it was still nice to go. On Sunday we went to the city for the Finnish church service that was going on and then we did a little shopping afterwards. We ran into my cousin and her husband at Sears as well as another cousin and his girlfriend, which was really nice since I haven't seen either of them in a while. Today I haven't done much other than bake a peach pie and look through recipes. I'm trying to decide on which ones to use for the wedding cupcakes for my sister's wedding.

I'm home this week for a "vacation." It's nice to be here by the water. After being in the city for a while, I feel like I'm at a real cottage. I'd like to do some relaxing at the beach and maybe even go for a swim or two. I'm not a huge fan of swimming in the lake, but the water has been really warm, so I think I'll have to get in at least once. I don't know how often I will get to blog since the Internet is so slow here, but I'll try to keep you all updated as much as I can. That being said, who knows if I'll do anything interesting enough that's worth posting! lol

I did get to work on my clapotis some more and am now on Section 3. I really like working with the yarn, so it's a fun knit. I can't wait to start dropping the stitches!

Well, I guess that's all for today's post. Tomorrow Mom and I have to run into the city, so I should get more knitting done and have something worth posting next time! Have a great rest of the long weekend!!

Happy Knitting!!