Just in the Nick of Time

Finished, just in time for Christmas, the baby "Converse" booties and balaclava mentioned in the previous post! Both projects were full of "firsts" for me on the knitting front but I'm beyond tickled at how they turned out.

We had an excellent visit with my folks. My brother and sister-in-law were there through Christmas as well so we had MUCH fun playing family games, visiting and, of course, eating way too much of Mom's good cookin'. As an extra Christmas present, we got to leave the kiddos with Nanny & Granddad for a few extra days! 2008 is now here and we are neck deep in a ton of new projects to get the new year started including doing a mini makeover on the second bath that wasn't functional and was a nasty black hole and also refinishing a dresser.

Sewing projects and more knitting are soon to begin as well...just after this weekend which is DS's 2nd bday/party.

Happy New Year!

Holiday Knitting and Knitting and Knitting

HOPEFULLY, by Christmas Day my holiday knitting will be complete and I can add pix of some of the other items I've got OTN. In the meantime, all I've gotten completed is a batch of various washcloths which are being paired with homemade Rose & Thyme soap (with roses and thyme from my garden) for my "girl" gifts for the family holiday gift exchanges. My favorite, but by far most time consuming and brain focus required, was the Elfish Leaves Washcloth. I also like the nubby cloth a lot. The smoother texture on one side combined with the bumpy alternate side makes for a washcloth that I'll definitely knit again.

For our Garden Hoes holiday party, we had to do a garden themed gift. I made a Flower-Power Washcloth and paired it with another one of my Rose & Thyme soaps. That was my first endeavor in knitting in the round on two circulars.






Additionally, basically because I couldn't wait until it is done, I've got an "in-process" pix of My So-Called Scarf that I'm knitting for mom. This scarf SHOULD be finished but kept getting set aside while I knit on other projects.

The last of my holiday knitting includes a pair of baby converse booties for my soon-to-be nephew and a balaclava for my dad. Here's crossing my fingers that they get done in time!

Merry Christmas!

Her Royal Highness' 3rd Birthday

This past Saturday friends and family joined us for a royal celebaration in honor of my DD's 3rd birthday. She wanted a princess party so that is what we did. It was a wonderful party. We served punch in my silver punch bowl (FINALLY, an excuse to use this thing!), covered chairs in pink satins and chifons (so guests could enjoy "royal" seating as well), and hung pink tulle and organza from the ceiling as a backdrop for the cake table and the birthday girl. My pride and joy, besides my DD of course, was the castle cake mom helped me make. We were up until 2am the night before trying to finish this bad boy (thanks to Mom for making sure we finished it that night so the morning of the party we'd not be rushing as much). Anyway, here are a couple pix of our little princess on her birthday...

Giving Thanks

We spend Thanksgiving each year with my DH side of the family and this year, as always, we had a hoot of a time. With 13 adults and 5 kids running around there was much laughter and thanksgiving this year. The turkey was beautiful to gaze at and even yummier to eat. ALL the fixins were scrumptious.

Again this year, I escaped having to cook anything. I don't know who is more thankful for that...me or those who would have had to eat what I made. Instead, I took on, for the third year, the task of setting/decorating the table. Following are a few pix of this year's Thanksgiving dinner table.

Winter Wonderland Swap '07

Apparently, my swap partner didn't have access to Santa's "naughty/nice" list as she thought I'd been very, very good as evidenced by the absolutely WONDERFUL package she put together for me.

This was my first swap as a hostess. The matching of partners was a bit daunting but overall the swap has been a huge success, which makes me very happy.

Anyway, back to my package I received. My swap partner, Jeanie, sent me the following wonderful items: two sets of beautiful stitch markers for different sized needles, some wonderful hot teas and cocoa mixes that were packed in the precious holiday tin. The teas had the cutest names like "Nutcracker Sweet", "Sugar Cookie Sleigh Ride" and "Sugar Plum Spice". I'd noted on my questionnaire that one of my most favorite things about the holidays was the smell of Mom & Dad's house when we go home for Christmas. Every time I open the tin, the smell of those teas transport me there immediately. It is SO heavenly a smell. Mmmm. The creme de la creme of the package, however, was the two balls of HAND-DYED yarn! The colorway is one she named "Sea" and it is beyond scrumptious! It is a wool, alpaca, silk blend and I THINK I've decided to take my first venture into the world of knitting socks using this yarn. My swap partner sent me a whole group of patterns to select from and I'm wavering between a cloche type hat and the "Rainy Day Socks" pattern from MagKnits. Hmmm.... Decisions, decisions.

Before I ripped into the package...

The goodies my Secret Santa sent!

It's Gonna Be a BOY!

Got the call from my brother and sister-in-law today... they are having a baby BOY!!! I'm so excited I can barely contain myself! I've already decided what I'm going to knit for my little nephew first! Oh I can't wait to meet him!

More Time, More Money....More Headaches!

So we thought we'd done everything right when we were preparing to paint the exterior of our home (see earlier posts as to reason we decided to paint). We looked at a million color cards and selected the "finalists". We spent the money and bought a quart of the finalists to put up so we could determine the "winner". The "winner" actually ended up being one that was between the "Rattan Palm" and "Sweet Annie" colors that are visable in the pix posted earlier. It was a slate green color. What we didn't pay attention to was that the slate green color was an interior paint so when we went to get the exterior paint in this color the store ended up having to do a "custom" mix of it. Whatever... didn't think it would be a HUGE deal. Boy, were we wrong. Got home and painted the front of the house. It was evening when we finished and it finally dried and, to be honest, ANYTHING was better than the white. HOWEVER, the next day, when we could really see it..... tears came to my eyes as it was the WRONG color. In fact, it wasn't anywhere near ANY of the colors we'd selected as our finalists. It was a blue spruce! (Not that there is anything wrong with that color but it wasn't what we wanted!) Unfortunately, due to the HUGE headache and multiple screw-ups the day it was purchased, we failed to triple check the swatch to the paint and being custom, it wasn't returnable. URG.

Forget custom colors! We opted to get the color that matched it most closely in a "standard" color and after MUCH searching found it! Our home was going to be "Homestead Resort Olive". It was lighter than the "Rattan Palm" but still retained some of that slate coloring which was EXACTLY what we wanted and it was less yellow than "Sweet Annie" and a little darker. We were so very excited to have found the right color!

This morning, after we'd painted part of the front again with the new "correct" (or so we thought) color yesterday evening....did I mention that in my excitement the other evening before realizing the initial color was WAY wrong, I'd already pulled all the tape off the front of the house so I could begin taping for trim so I had to RE-TAPE everything again for the "right" color??....we were a bit shocked to learn that the paint didn't dry as dark as it should have. It looks like we have "Sweet Annie" on the house instead of the "Homestead Resort Olive". It is SO much better than the blue spruce color but is significantly more "yellow" than what we'd selected. What will we do? Go back to the paint store and demand they fix it...at THEIR cost this time since it wasn't a custom mix color or will we just go with it as we are SO SICK of this whole experience?

I guess you'll have to tune back soon to find out as even I don't know how this story will end.