New Finished object (not knitting)

Hi everybody. Well it's been crazy around here, especially the weather, and I haven't really been in the mood to knit. For some reason I had an itch to sew something. So I went to Joann's Fabric, which is just across the street (danger) and picked out some cute material to make a couple of project bags. One for me and one for my sister. I started last night after dinner and was done before bedtime. Talk about instant gratification :) one sock in progress. Two socks in progress. Perfect fit.

I started the other one today but haven't finished because we had to go and pick up the other car at the Port of Tacoma today. I also bought a really cute pattern for a sundress for my niece Sadie and my baby Cierra. We are going to California this summer and I want them to both have something handmade with love and I figured that a knit dress might be to hot in July. I am a self taught sewer and the only things I have sewn are quilts, aprons, oven mitts and now these "Punky Pouches" I have never sewn a dress or any other garment for that matter, so if anyone has any tips I would really appreciate it. Here is a picture of Cierra eating her Easter hippo. She is so silly.That's all for now. Thanks for reading and happy crafting

Happy Easter!

Well I just wanted to stop by and say Happy Easter to everybody and if you don't Celebrate Easter then Happy Spring! Last week, while the weather was nice, Travis and I took the kids to the park for a little photo shoot. I needed pictures to send to the family in their Easter cards. Here a just a couple of my favorites.


The kids got their stuffed toys for Easter. They all loved them. I will take pictures of them with the kids when I get a chance. Here is Kizaiahs Blue Bunny Suffie.
I had been telling the kids that we were going to take them to the zoo for Easter. Well Travis had to work that morning and when he came home that afternoon it was sprinkling. I figured we live in Washington, it rains a lot here and I'm sure that there will be crazy people out and about in the rain right? Well when we got there it started to rain buckets :) There were about 20 people total there but we still had fun. We will definitely be taking them back when the weather is nice.

Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium

My 3 boys waking in the rain back to the car.
My silly husband saying hello to the Walrus :) I love this picture.

The boys "Ninja Turtle"
Cool aquarium. It's hard to take pictures in an aquarium when there is "no flash photography" allowed. This one came out good. Well even though it was raining we enjoyed ourselves in the Aquarium. Next post will have more knitting content. Thanks for reading and happy knitting.

Two down One to go :)

WARNING LOTS OF PICTURES :)

Well Tums is done. This is Cierra's Easter Hippo. Super fast knit, Super Fun to knit, Super Pattern and SUPER CUTE Don't you think?I added little details to his butt, a little heart and on the bottom CPG for Cierra's initials. Love it to cute. I got this done in One day I love fast knits!Gizmo and Rockie love Him too.When I finished Tums I cast on for Pepto. This one took me a little longer about 4 days but I think it's cause I got a little distracted with new yarn. I made my first trade with Yarnbeans. I traded Vesper sock yarn(I have a skein of LoveSticks in a similar color) for some Posh yarn Lucia in "Pantomime" love this yarn can't wait to find the right pattern for this colorway.Here is Pepto. Another fun, fast and cute knit. I knit this for D'Andre. He wanted a Pink Elephant so how could I resist this cute guy. D'Andre can't wait til Easter He wants him now. I embroidered a star on his butt and DCG on the bottom for Dre's initials. Here they are together.

Two kids down one to go, now to cast on for Kizaiahs Blue Bunny. Too bad mochimochiland doesn't have a bunny pattern. I love her toy designs
Thanks for reading and Happy knitting.

Happy Easter Hippo

Hi Everybody. I'm still knitting my Oblique Sweater but I have given myself permission to take a detour for some cute little toy knitting. I decided that I don't knit enough stuff for my kids and since the things that I have knit for them they have grown out of so fast, I decided to knit each of them some toys for their Easter baskets. First up Cierra. Since she can't choose what one that she wants I chose "Tums the Hippo" by Mochimochiland.com. I started yesterday afternoon and I am almost done. I just have 2 little legs left to finish and the teeth. Along with the stuffing and sewing closed, I should be done soon.

D'Andre wanted "Pepto the Elephant" by Mochimochiland.com He even wants it in Pink. Haha funny kid. And then there is Kizaiah he wants Stuffies by Ysolda Teague. He wants the rabbit and he wants it in blue. I will post pictures of those once I start them in the next couple of days. Lets hope that I finish these before Easter. Wish me luck, gotta go and finish "Tums"

Happy Knitting!

Actual Finished Object

Hi everybody....I actually have knitting content for you and an actual finished object see.This is my contribution to Project Spectrum "Fire" element. Waving Lace socks from Interweaves Favorite Socks. ShibuiKnits sock yarn in "Pagoda" I love love love these socks. Yarn and pattern combo is now one of my favorites. Next to my Pirate Penllyn socks.

I now have 2 more projects on the needles. I cast on for Oblique on the 25th of February. I cast off the back today. So far I love how it is knitting up but I think that it might be longer then I want. Guess that's what I get for being short. :) Pattern is a fun knit I might actually finish my first sweater...well let's not get ahead of myself right?!

I am using Cascade220 in Doeskin Heather and a size 6 circular needle. I don't have a size 7 and when I swatched (yeah I know what you're thinking...she swatched?) I didn't like the way that the size 8 made the fabric look.

The rest of our stuff FINALLY came this week. Oh how I missed my bed, couch and stash :) Speaking of stash I looked at what I had in my knitting basket when we unpacked and realized that I should use some of the yarn that I had for a while. So I cast on some plain ol' socks.

Duet sock yarn in "Exclamation" It's DK weight and is knitting up really fast. Love them so far. I don't have any set timeline to finish these. It's just mindless knitting when I get tired or bored of lace.

I also added some lovely yarn to my stash. These came the day before we got our stuff back.

I got these from the Loopy Ewe. I joined the Dream in Color KAL. Here is Dream in Color Classy in "Deep Seaflower"

Also Dream in Color Smooshy in "Happy Forest" I love this yarn color and have been wanting it for a while now. I also ordered my first Sundara Sock yarn in "Grap over GreyViolet" and "Graphite" I wanted the Graphite for Project Spectrum "Earth" element. I will knit this or my Dream in Color "Happy Forest" Stay tuned for that.
Thank you all for checking in. Hope that you are all doing well. Check back in a couple days to see if I finish another section of my Oblique. Thanks for reading and Happy Knitting!

Tooth Fairy came to visit

Hi all. I hope that everybody had a great week. We had a very cool event happen this week. My son finally lost his first tooth. He was so excited. That darn tooth was loose for so long, seriously so long. The new tooth was even coming in behind the baby tooth. I thought that it would never come out! The other night we were eating pot roast and it finally came out. When it came out we told him about the tooth fairy and how she would come and give him money and he said, "is she going to give me $1000. Will I have enough to buy a power ranger?" I told him if that was the case then I would be knocking out all my teeth just for the extra money...haha. We put the tooth in a plastic ziplock bag (we are still sleeping on the floor and I didn't want the tooth fairy to have a problem finding it in the middle of the night.) The next morning there was a dollar in the plastic bag and Dre came running in my room saying "Was my tooth a Transformer cause it transformed into a dollar?" I couldn't help but think, sure son whatever you want to believe, it was a transformer. :) It was cute.
How much does the tooth fairy give in your house? Here is a couple pictures.
On the knitting front I am almost done with my Waving Lace socks. I love them. I finished the heel and one repeat on the foot. If I don't finish them today they will be done tomorrow. I will post pictures when they are done. I also ordered some more yarn. Sheri at the Loopy Ewe is having a Dream in Color KAL and is offering a discount on Dream in Color Classy. I ordered 4 skeins of Dream in Color in "Deep Sea Flower". She only had 4 left I hope that it's enough for a "Wicked" Sweater. We'll see. I will post picture of that when it comes. Until then happy knitting and I will blog again soon. Thanks for reading.

Something to blog about :)

All I have to say is I love my husband. For more reason then one but here is the latest reason. On Thursday I was reading yarn harlots blog and saw that she was in Tacoma. I thought hmm....I wonder what she will be doing here. (I only live about 30 min away from Tacoma) So I did a little investigating and found out that she was going to be at the Madrona Fiber Arts Retreat. I obviously couldn't go to the retreat because sign-ups were months ago when I lived in Germany. I went to Madrona's website and found out that there was going to be a Market Place open to the public. So the next day I was talking to my husband and mentioned that I had seen the Market Place being open to the public and how cool it would be to go. This would be my first Fiber Fest experience. He laughed and said haha fly your sister out here (from Florida) and go with her. He was obviously not impressed. I know he knows that I love knitting and yarn but I don't think that he realizes how much. Anyway, I thought to myself "Oh well there will be more fest while I am her in Washington, I will just take myself to the next one." Oh yeah I forgot to tell you I couldn't just take myself to the Market Place because my stateside drivers licence expired while we were in Germany so I can't legally drive.

Well that night we were laying in bed talking about what we were going to do the next day, Saturday. We had already talked about going to Ikea to buy the kids dresser drawers for their rooms. While we were talking about that he asked how far the fest was from Ikea...Me being me, and just in case he changed his mind,I had already investigated that too and found out that it was only about 30 mins or so away from Ikea. He said lets go. I thought that he was just going to drop me off and find something for him and the boys to do while I fondeled all the lovely yarn that was there. But I was wrong, he took me and even walked around with me. Mind you he didn't look as excited as I was...in fact not excited at all. But I had so much fun. I kept the trip short only about an hour or so, trust me I could have been there much longer, but while I was there I did get some lovely things. Here are the pictures of the loot that I brought home. I didn't take my camera inside for fear that my husband might feel uncomfortable with me taking pictures of the beautiful knit wear and all the wonderful knitters and spinners that were inside the Pavillion.

Socks that Rock in "Lodestone" and "Aquaboy" I plan on knitting Bird In Hand mittens with these. I ripped out the other ones that I had started the other day. I am just waiting on my ball winder and printer so that I can knit these. That is if I can wait that long, I might just go to Kinko's and print out the pattern and wind both these skeins by hand. Maybe after I finish these...

ShibuiKnits in "Pagoda"

I know what you are thinking, another project on the needles. But I just couldn't resist. Plus this needed to be started so that I had something to take pictures of for Project Spectrum. This is the Waving Lace socks from Favorite Socks book that I bought the other day from Jo-Ann Fabric Store. I love this pattern and this yarn. Shibuiknits sock yarn is so soft and squishy. This is a great way to spend the day. Watching Dallas and knitting some lovely socks...who knows I might even finish this sock today. (Notice I said "this sock" I'm trying not to get ahead of myself by saying pair of socks :) )

I know many of you have husbands and boyfriend that enjoy knitting as much as you do, or at least understand your love of all things knitty. But this is a totally new experience for my husband. I have only been knitting for about 2 years and my husband was gone for most of that time. While he was gone my obsession has grown dramatically. He knew that I was knitting everyday while he was gone but I don't think he understood how much of the day I have needles in my hands. Eventhough he knew that he wouldn't enjoy the Market Place he took me anyway. Now that's love. Doing something you don't want to do just to make your spouse happy. That is just one of the reasons I love my man :)Now maybe I can get him to love(or even like) it just a little bit so that we can do more things yarny.

Happy knitting and thanks for reading.

I'm Back....Thank goodness!!!

Hi all I'm back in action. We finally have got internet and now I am connected to the world again. Oh how I missed my knitting community. I felt so out of the loop and disconnected with you all. Hope that everybody is doing well. I think I have caught up on most of your blogs. There was alot going on while I was away, so many beautiful projects like these, these and this. Glad to be back!!!

As for the move well it's still a work in progress. The movers come today, in fact they are on the way now, to deliver our clothes that we packed way back in December. It seems so long ago! We are living n Puyallup Wa. about 30min from post. Oh the movers are here gotta go and start to unpack.

I'm back...it's 3:30pm and we are not finished with unpacking but I'm tired of it and needed a little brake.

Well not much on the knitting front for the past 2 months or so. I know I suck! I wish that I could be more like my sister and Tiennie and just crank out projects left and right but for some reason I wasn't really in the mood...I must have been sick. Well I will show you what I did knit all works in progress, of course.

1st up my lovely Woolmeise yarn kniting up into kneehighs. I decided I needed kneehighs because I wear uggs A LOT and I hate when my socks (not hand knit socks) roll down into the boot. So I figured that this should solve the problem right? That is if I ever get them done. I don't know what I did, I always knit short row heels but for some reason i have holes in the heel. That never happens, I guess I wasn't paying attention while knitting the heel. I guess I will be ripping this back because the holes really bug me.

Next on the WIP list is my own design, these will be knee highs too, not because of the ugg boots but because I want to see how much I can knit with shibui yarn and not have any left over. I really love this yarn I must buy some more, it is so squishy.Then I cast on for these before I left Germany. I went to the local grocery store and bought some regia yarn and cast on some primavera socks with a little mod of a p1 k2 p1 rib for the plane ride just incase i got bored knitting plain st st. Well you can see the trend in my knitting lately and guess what I haven't picked these up since the day we left Germany.

And last but probably not least I had to cast on for some "Bird in Hand" mittens. I love that pattern. So I went to Jo-Ann Fabrics and got some Lion Brand Wool-Ease that was on sale. They didn't have very many colors to choose from but I did manage to find some Heather gray and Heather Pink. So far I love this knit. It isn't easy to knit worsted weight on size one needles but it will be all worth it when I am done. Lord knows I need something for my hands when I go out in this chilly Washington weather to walk the dogs. Another thing that makes it a little hard is the fact that I don't have a printer, so I have to push my laptop screen down flat and turn my computer so that I can read the chart. Damn I wish I had my printer.

Well that's about it, I hope that everybody is doing well. I will update the blog as regularly as possible, assuming that I have something to blog about. I guess I need to be like my sister and stick to one (or maybe two) project(s) at a time. Wish me luck!

Glad to be back....Happy Knitting! and thanks for reading.

part 2

Hi all I'm back into the swing of things. Thank you all for your well wishes! I feel much better. I am making sure that I take all my antibiotics(if I forget then I get a little scolding from my husband) As for the rest of the story, Well Moving day went alright. The only problem was the language barrier. The movers were of course German. We pointed out what to pack and what not to pack and long story short the guy who was packing the kitchen didn't quit understand. He ended up packing ALL the food in the cupboard. All Cierra's baby food, and the dog food. Remember we are still here for a month. And because I wasn't up to par on moving day I couldn't be there to supervise. I was in one of the rooms with Cierra curled in a ball because I was so cold. All is well though. We went to the commissary the next day I was just irritated that I had to buy formula again. That stuff is not cheap!!

We are sitting on the floor right now. Leave it to my husband to forget to schedule the government furniture. Oh well we will have some on Thursday. Thank goodness we have friends who own blowup mattress's and mats so that we don't have to lay on the hardwood floor for a week.

Here are the pictures that I promised.

"Wollmeise""Deepest Purple"

"Sultan""Suzanne""Krauterbeet"

and last but not least Yarn Pirate Booty Club December shipment "Icicle"

I am in love with my new stash enhancements! To bad I can't wind them up anytime soon, the movers took my ball winder too. Damn it!

edit: I tried to post this entry days ago but blogger wouldn't let me download my pictures. Since this post we have received government furniture and I hope that it's more comfortable then it looks :) Happy New Year everybody may your new year be filled with love and all things Knitty! I probably wont be posting again until we get to Washington and set up house. I will be reading all your blogs though! Take care and talk to you all again in about a month.

Christmas, Wollmeise, ER Visit & moving part 1 (WARNING ITS LONG AND NO PICTURES!...yet)

Christmas in our house starts Christmas Eve. We lay around and watch Christmas movies and open up gifts from the relatives after dinner. Just a totally chill day. This is normally how it goes and it went this way except the fact that I had a fever from 101.2 to 103.3 during most of the day. I had started not feeling good on Thursday. My throat was starting to feel scratchy but I didn't think anything of it until Sunday when it was getting really hard to swallow and I started to get a fever that night, nothing major just a low grade fever. I thought oh well I will have a little cold during Christmas nothing major.....Right? Well Like I said Christmas Eve was chill but then Christmas Morning came. Oh my gosh I felt horrible. I pushed through breakfast and Christmas Morning present opening like a champ, if I do say so myself. At 9:30 ish we got a knock on the door. I was some beautiful Wollmeise yarn that I had order just days before. (More about these later)Around 10am that same morning our friends came over and we exchanged gifts with them. I say friends but they are more like family to us. They could tell that I wasn't feeling up to par (I wonder what gave it away, the fact that I was sprawled out on the living room couch with my sons Spongebob square pants blanket with a cold rag on my head, or the other fact that I really couldn't look at them when they came in the door.) We did our gift giving talked for a little bit and then parted ways so that we could get ready for Christmas Lunch/Dinner at 1pm. NO I DID NOT COOK, thank goodness I live on a Military Base. We went to the Dinning Facility aka Chow-Hall and ate lobster, crab legs, shrimp, turkey, mac n cheese, greens, salads and desert. They had way more there then I could remember. I forced myself to eat something, like I said I couldn't swallow. Everybody enjoyed their meals. I was glad that I didn't have to cook and clean up. All though it was a struggle getting ready and getting me out the house on time I didn't feel as bad as I had earlier that morning. My fever went down the only thing was I had a really bad headache.

When we got home I took something for my headache and went to the couch to lay down a bit. 7pm-ish that night it started to really kick in again, the fever that is. And around 10pm my husband decided that 3 days of a fever higher then 103.0 can't be a good thing so he took me to the German Hospital. All well in good, I thought okay they will check me out give me something and send me home. Boy was I WRONG. I forgot what Country I was in. Germany is infamous for keeping Americans in their hospitals because they know that they will be paid,if you have lived in Germany as a military member you know what I mean. The nurse in the ER was nice enough that wasn't the problem, the ER was packed with sick elderly people, drunk people and who knows what other kind of problem people. The nurse took me to a room that I shared with a Homeless drunk guy. My husband stayed to only until they took my blood and did an EKG because German hospitals are strict about "visitors" After he left I laid in the bed in all my clothes and shoes and waited to fall asleep. This of course didn't happen. I wont get into all the nasty details lets just say that they halls were filled with SICK patients, one patient cussing and yelling at the nurses the whole night and my roommate was SICK too and attached to an IV so every time he had to go use the restroom to well you know he had to walk right past my head and bed. I thought that I was one tough cookie until that night. I wanted to get up out of that bed and walk my sick ass home. At around 1am the nurses came into the room and said that they were going to take me to a different floor, "thank you, there is a God" is what I though "finally some rest." They wheeled my bed into a room that I was going to be staying in. There was an elderly lady there asleep in her bed already. All I cared about is that I wasn't in that DAMN ER anymore!!!


After I got to the other room thhe night went pretty smoothly I did get some sleep. They gave me something for my fever to go down, the only down part was my roommate would wake me up with a loud grown in her sleep every once in a while but nothing like the hell that was going on around me earlier that night. The next morning I felt much better, my fever was gone and I was eating a little better. It still was hard to swallow but I could deal with it. I wanted the Dr. to check me and give me some meds so that I could get the HELL out of there. I had to go home regardless of what had happened the night before, the movers were coming to get our furniture and stuff to send back to the States. The Dr. came in after breakfast and took more blood and told me that I need to stay in the hospital at least one more day. I couldn't believe it. She claimed that they didn't know why my fever was so high and that they wanted to start me on Antibiotic injections. I argued with here and said that I couldn't stay that I was going to have to check myself out so that I could pack clothes and other necessities like yarn (I didn't tell her the yarn part...I don't think she would've understood the need for that) before the movers came the next morning. Well she was trying to convince me to stay I just laid there looking at her like "this can't possibly be happening","what a day for this crap to happen" She told me to think about it and that she would be back in a few minutes. In those few minutes the nurse came in because my roommate who was bedridden rang the nurse bell to go to the restroom. Well like I said she was bedridden. The nurse got the big Silver bed pans, more like big salad bowls, and placed them under her bottom and left the room. She did her business and let me tell you I started crying. Everything hit me all at once, I flashed back to the night before in the ER and now this lady is doing her business in the bed and it's not going quickly either and its cold outside you don't want to open the window and well you get the picture. Then in the midst of my tears my husband and baby girl come in. I really start to loose and I tell him " I'm going home, I don't give a shit what that doctor says, I am not staying here!!!" He asked "What's wrong." I said "she's taking a shit in her bed and they say I can't leave this place." He went and talk to the DR. and told her that I was going to check out. About an hour later they had discharge papers in hand and a Dr.s note saying that I had "Tonsillitis" (remember earlier they didn't know what was wrong with me)so that I could get a prescription from the American clinic.

"DUH" I could have told them that. I used to get that all the time when I was little. Like I said before they just wanted to keep me there to make money. They wanted to do Ultrasounds, draw gallons of blood and do EKGs for days. Long story short, haha, I got the hell out of there at around 1:30pm. I took it easy most of the day after I found all our passports and important documents before the movers came in the morning. More of this long drawn-out story and pictures of pretty yarn to come...