sheep in the city

She's here! Yay!

How fun...I have another niece! My sister's little family is growing and I love being a part of it! The baby and my sister are both doing really good...everyone is healthy. She is already sporting her handknit socks that Kim made for her using Red Rocks yarn in the Sheep in the City color-way. I have the best knitting friends! A bunch of the girls are actually helping us knit a blanket for the baby too. Some of you may have seen some of the squares around on some blogs lately. It's going to be all pink, green, and brown. Thanks ladies for helping me knit this afghan!

Finally feeling a little better...

...thanks to the miracle of modern medicine! I went to an Ear, Nose, and Throat doctor yesterday because I woke up intending to go back to work, and my ear was in intense pain. It seemed like I had been getting worse over the weekend and not better. That was a sign to me that it was time to go to the doctor. It turns out that I had a pretty bad sinus infection that ended up making my ear "very angry" in her words. People...they gave me a steroid shot to take the swelling down! I was a little freaked when she said that I needed a shot, not because I'm afraid of needles, but because I thought she was going to put it in my ear! Thank goodness she's the doctor and knows what she's doing...into the hip it went. I went home for the rest of the afternoon and rested. I made a little nest in the living room that became my "resting zone". Of course I had my constant companion Jesse with me. He would only get annoyed with me when I decided to leave the nest. He'd give me this look, it's like he's trying to tell me, "Hey! I'm trying to sleep here!"

Because I felt so rotten, RayLynn and I stayed close to home and just knit and talked and played around on the computer. I didn't get ANY of the knitting finished that I thought I would. But I made some progress on the baby surprise jacket and the Koolhass hat that I am knitting for a class sample. (you can see this pattern here on Ravelry Seriously, if you haven't signed up yet...go...it's the coolest thing to come along since the ball winder people! Hop to it!) I would knit for about 20 minutes and then need to rest. I'll try to take some good pictures of both of these projects soon. The baby surprise is SO close! Today I am back at work and swamped with things to catch up on, but it feels good to be back in a normal routine!

I've got the crud.

I've been sick and at home for the past 2 days. Bleck. I hate being sick, but at least I've been able to knit a little and clean up around my house. This guy has been my constant companion. What a sweetie!

I've got big plans this weekend. RayLynn is coming into town! Yay! Then I have Monday off from work for MLK Day. Double Yay! I'm planning on getting some serious knitting done on Sunday and Monday. Expect to hear about some finished projects very soon!

Before I go to take a nap, let me tell you a funny story. I'm sitting up in my loft, knitting, looking through Ravelry, writing this blog post when all of a sudden I hear this strange plopping noise followed by a sizzling bubble sound. What in the world? Good grief. My cell phone fell off the side of the couch and into my glass of Cherry Coke. Crap. I rush to dry it off and get every little bit of liquid off the thing and it still works. That was a close one. What are the odds of my phone falling directly into my full glass of cherry coke?! Okay, must go take a rest now.

Baby, oh baby!

I went to the doctor with my sister last week and she was told that the baby could come at any time...even though she's not due until Feb. 5th. What does that mean for me? I'm cranking out the baby knits. I cast on for a baby surprise jacket over the weekend. It's going to be flying off the needles any day now. I think that I'm finally getting this pattern this time. I cast on for one a few months ago and I promptly ripped it out in frustration. Not sure why it's going better this time, but it is. Oh, maybe it's because I borrowed the DVD of Meg Swanson knitting up the sweater. It sure helps to have someone telling me exactly what to do. Sometimes figuring out Elizabeth Zimmerman's "pithy" instructions, as she calls them, is hard to do on your own. I'm knitting it with Dream in Color "Classy". It's a superwash wool that knits up like a dream. I'm using the sweetest little baby girl color called Petal Pink. I got it from my local shop, Colorful Yarns. I am loving knitting with this yarn. I need to make something for myself out of it. Maybe a sweater like this one, the Vino Cardigan, that I stumbled across last night. I also am in "full-swing knitting of afghan squares for the new baby mode". Since Liam had a hand-knit blankie, Amelia is going to need one too! I'll take pictures of all my teeny-tiny miters later this week. Her blanket is going to be so cute. It's all pink and green and brown.

I'm headed to the dentist, my favorite thing to do. I've got my knitting all packed with me...just in case I get left in the chair for long amounts of time. As long as I'm knitting, maybe I won't have any dental chair freak-outs today?! Maybe that is just wishful thinking.

*By the way, one of my knitting buddies, Jeni, is having a HUGE stash sale. She's got some great deals and lots of yarn for sweaters...hurry and go check it out! She is even selling an Offhand Design bag for a great price!!*

Itty-bitty and Teeney-tiny!

I started some baby socks when I was at lunch with Kim last week. I have been inspired by the 2 pair of baby socks that she has already knit for my soon-to-be-born niece. Wanna see them? Go look! Here is the first pair...and the second pair! Can you stand how cute and tiny they are?! I can't! I really haven't done much more than the cuff because I've been obsessing over my Juliet. That is one addictive sweater! Back to the socks though, I'm hoping that these little guys will push me over the edge to be a better sock knitter. What am I saying? How about to be a sock knitter at all. Some of you may not know this, but I have massive amounts of sock yarn and I've only knit 2 pairs of socks....ever. That is going to change this year. I want to knit a pair of socks that will go on my feet! All of the socks that I've knit, I've given away...so now it's my turn!

*because I know that one of you will want to know...the little pig bag is a "Piddly" bag from the Piddleloop girls. It's the cutest little fabric cube and perfect to put a little cake of sock yarn in! Jen should have new bags up in her shop sometime in the next week or so*

Juliet

I am loving working on my Juliet sweater. I'm knitting it out of Noro Iro, it's 75% wool and 25% silk. It seems to be a bulky version of Silk Garden. The other good thing about it? It knits up super fast on size 10.5 needles! That is my kind of project.

I had bunches of fun with my knitting friends on Friday night and again when they all came to hang out at the shop on Saturday. Man...I love the girls that I knit with, they just make life more exciting and fun. Sunday came around and I headed up the hill to see if I could help Mary-Kay out with a little organizing of her stash. Michelle came with me and we had a fun filled day of playing with someone else's yarn. It was great. We started at 10:30am and left at 6:30pm. We are planning on finishing up next weekend...so stay tuned. You can see some fun pictures of all of our hard work over on Mary-Kay's blog.

Oh, and the other fun thing that happened over the weekend was that baby Isabelle came for a visit and got to meet Alice and Liam. What a cutie! She even wore the hat that I made her all those months ago!

Everybody's doing it...

It seems like everywhere I turn there are people making long lists of what they've knit up in the past year. For some reason, it just doesn't feel like I've finished that much. Don't get me wrong, I know that I have finished items...but the starting far outweighs the finishing. In the past year there have been lots of outside things influencing my knitting time/knitting mojo. Don't take this as a complaint though. I'm happy with the things that I've accomplished and I do think that there are a few stand-out projects.

Ariann: I started this project, along with my Mom, last February when my Dad started his radiation treatment. I then dragged it to the hospital when my Dad had to have a couple stints put into his heart. (ummm, can you say scary!) Then I've just continued to work on it here and there while he has been in chemotherapy treatment. I'm at the point now where I just need to finish it. I am at the armpits and I need to knit the sleeves and connect it all together. My goal is to finish this before the end of February.

Sienna Cardigan: Finished, at last, in September.

Secret Projects: I had a few projects that I couldn't reveal here on the blog while I was working on them. The biggest being my Dad's afghan that I finished (well almost!) just in time for Christmas. It was made with 11 skeins of different colors of Malabrigo yarn. I'll be honest and admit that I didn't love only working on one project for the majority of 2 months, but the end result was worth it. I love knowing that it's for my Dad and that he loves soft and cuddly things. This definitely ranks as soft and cuddly. Overall, one of my best FO's of the year. The other secret project that I eluded to in November was for my roommate Genia. It was a skully dishcloth. You can get the pattern for free here. Genia flipped when she saw it...so if you have someone in your life that loves everything skully, you have got to knit them one of these!

I also took a couple big trips this past year...Russia in October being the biggest/longest/furthest away. I went to Chicago, Illinois. Kansas City, Missouri and Kansas City, Kansas (at least 3 or 4 times). Arizona with my parents. Overall...a pretty good year for travel. I don't really have any trips firmly planned for this next year. Of course, there will be DisneyWorld sometime this year, maybe late Spring/early Summer. My roommate and I are going to try and go somewhere together this year...we just don't know where yet. We've talked about taking a road trip, so maybe we'll finally do it!

I do have some knitting goals for 2008:

1. Knit more socks. I am determined to knit with some of the luxurious sock yarn that I own and just stash away. I just cast on for a pair of baby socks for the niece that will arrive in 4 weeks! Yay!

2. Knit more projects from the stash. This doesn't mean that I can't add to the stash, it just means that I need to think through projects and what I already own before I buy new yarn.

3. Finish. Finish. Finish. Enough said!