Why doesn't she have a movie deal yet?

It snowed yesterday.

We had to make cookies because that's the thing to do while the beautiful snow is falling.

My daughter made her gingerbread man into Wonder Woman.  She's awesome like that.

She must have the special extra-long toes that some people have because she can carry her Magic Lasso with her foot.  Sadly, I can only pick up dropped pencils with my toes.  That must be why the Justice League recruiter still hasn't called.

I smell like a princess.

Happy Mother's Day to all the mom's out there.  I hope today you were given the appreciation you deserve.  I've been showered with love and it's truly been a wonderful day.

The kids let me sleep in until 9 am, and then they gave me presents.  Presents!  I love presents.

One of those gifts was a sampler of Vera Wang's Princess perfumes: original, Night Princess, and Preppy Princess.  Delightful!  I love them all.  Plus the kids scored big because there were TWO gift-with-purchase promos going on.  Buy Vera Wang and get a tote bag, plus spend X amount of dollars on fragrance and get a purse.  Woohoo!

This is huge, and will make an excellent pool bag this summer.

The purse is a beautiful shade of teal blue.  I don't have a blue purse so I was excited to get one, but unfortunately it's too large to be used as an official purse.   However, it's just the right size for a crochet project bag!  See...I've already moved in.

A whole afghan project will fit in this thing!

My son wrote a lovely poem for me and framed it.  Here goes:

Makes good food
Our best mom ever
Told many stories
Hugs and kisses for me
Eight years with you
Roses for you

Awww....

My family also took me out for lunch to a fabulous local mexican place.  I snarfed down my enchilada combo before thinking to take a photo.  Splurged on a delicious mango margarita - very similar to the ones we enjoyed in Cancun a few years ago.

In somewhat disappointing news, one of my most favorite yarns ever is being discontinued.  Caron Spa, a lovely soft bamboo yarn, will soon be no more.  Luckily I found out about this before it becomes really scarce, and I ordered myself 6 sweaters' worth.  Yeah, I may have gone an eensy weensy bit overboard there, but I figure I can always resell what I don't end up using myself.

Joy!

 Later this evening I'm going to start a cardigan project with that light stone colored yarn in the lower left corner.  I want something light that will look good with jeans and t-shirts as well as layered over a sundress.

Next post I'll do a show n tell of the Most Versatile Pattern I've Ever Found.  Stay tuned!

Stuff and Things

Roses are Red

Violets are Blue

I can't keep up

How about you?

Life has been crazy busy these past two weeks!  I have things to show you, but I have been unable to get good photos.  Soon, I promise.

What's happening?

1 - Selling lots of furniture, because we're going to do some upgrading over spring break.  New beds for all of us, and a transition from childish room to pre-teen room for my daughter.

2 - My youngest child turned 8 yesterday.  How did that happen? 

3 - Valentine's day came and went.  I managed so snag one of the very last boxes of fancy chocolates on Feb 15. (my annual tradition.  Half-price chocolates taste SO much better than full-price ones)

4 - I found a new knitting/crochet group!  They're wonderful ladies.  Right now I'm the only crocheter in the group, but I intend to convert at least one of them to the dark side.  :-)

5 - The pattern testers finished working on my sweater design.  It went very well!  I have to do some editing of the pattern and take good pictures, and then it will be ready to publish!

6 - Hubby's birthday is Monday.  I'll be baking a scratch cake (chocolate with orange marmalade).  Should be delicious!

7 - My Nook Color bit the dust.  Fortunately I had purchased an extended warranty so it could be replaced for free, but they don't make that model anymore so it took a lot of time to dink around with choosing a new model and getting it set up.  Very happy with my new Nook Tablet.

8 - Germs Germs Germs.  Seems like someone has constantly been sick this winter.  Right now it's me.  :-(

9 - Allergies.  Took my son to the allergist, and he is allergic to Everything on Planet Earth.  The upside is that we don't have to get rid of the cat like I'd feared, because the cat is the least of his worries.  The downside is that he will be miserable for nearly every season of the year.  I'm hoping Zyrtec is a miracle drug.   

Looks like there might be ONE thing he is not allergic to - the spot above letter D didn't swell.
Lucky him.

Today

Today I should have put the laundry away.  It's still sitting in baskets. (But the day isn't over yet!)

Today I should have worked on my son's sweater, since the pattern design is scheduled to be done with testing in 7 days.  I didn't.

Today I should have cleaned the house, or at least made the beds.  Husband did; not me.

What did I do?

I spent 6 hours building a Lego house for my kids.

Welcome!

Front porch with gardens and lighting.

Tennis or skateboarding, anyone?

Back view.

Hinged, so it opens like a dollhouse.

Home office with balcony door; living room below.

Bedroom with table lamp and wall sconces;
kitchen complete with oven and red hot burners.

Outer view when it's opened out.

The kids are still working on the city.  When it's done, it will have a downtown area, the 'burbs, and a super hero HQ where batman and the Justice League help the local police fight crime.  :-)

Gettin' in on the Sweater Action

Recently my dear sweet son, while patiently following me up and down the aisle at Jo Ann's while I petted all the yarns, tossed out this little gem.

"When are you going to make ME a sweater mom?"

Ruh-Roh Shaggy.

My youngest offspring has realized the crochet imbalance that exists in our household.

I tried to explain that crochet stitches, by nature, look girly and lacy.  No 7-year-old boy wants to wear a girl sweater to school. right? What if I spent hours and hours on this thing and he was ridiculed on the playground?

"Nope!  That won't happen", he calmly said.  His friends were good friends, he assured me, and they would think it was neat that his mom made him a sweater.

Really?  I doubted the authenticity of that.  But if my boy wanted his Momma to make him a sweater, I was gonna go forth and crochet it.  It was like I'd been double-dog dared.

My son selected a shade of blue, super-soft baby yarn, and tossed it into my basket.

Once I arrived at home, though, reality set in.  Nearly every crochet sweater pattern out there is for a girl.  Out of the hundreds and hundreds I studied, only four weren't ridiculously feminine.  A bigger problem ensued when my son didn't like any of them.  He wanted something simple, with vertical stripes.  "And the edges should be orange!" he proudly declared.

Well, ok.  The Raglan Boys Pullover was born this past weekend during a weekend marathon of watching the Transformers Trilogy.  Good thing those movies are long.

 I didn't really write this pattern down, but I did take cryptic notes.  Attempt at your own risk.  :-)

Boy's Raglan Pullover

I measured a raglan-style shirt from his closet to get the piece shapes and dimensions in the photo.

Next, I crocheted the pieces vertically, alternating each row with hdc blo and hdc flo, working increases and decreases as necessary to make the shape work.

On the slanted edges, I added 3 rows of sl st for a bit of style.

Whipstitch the seams together.

Work sc evenly around neck edge, sleeve edges, and bottom band.

With alternate color, work ribbing in hdc blo, connecting with 3 sl st at each pass. Neck and sleeve ribbing is 6 sc tall; bottom band is 12 sc tall.

A blizzard is coming!

And it's about time!  After the non-winter last year, I'm ready for a Real Winter Storm.  Just in time for Christmas, too.

Lots of snow also means lots of hats!  I do love hat making.  It's about as close to instant gratification you can get in the world of handmade.  A simple hat can be completed in the time it takes to watch a movie with the family.  (Well...they watch.  I crochet.  And glance up at the screen from time to time and try not to miss any important parts.)

Recently my husband found this picture somewhere on the Interwebs.

It just oozes awesomeness.

And he jokingly said," I want one of these!"  At least I think he was joking.  Not sure on that.  Either way, the take home message here is Never Ever Joke About Goofy Crochet Projects with a Crocheter, because you never know what they might do when left alone with hooks, yarn, and a 2-hour block of time.

Yeah, that's my husband.

Absolutely it's hinged and functional!

And, he actually wears it.  In public.  Like, to stores and stuff.  He's a good man.  (on a related note, today is our 14-year anniversary.  Go us!)

I have no idea who the original designer of this Knight Hat is, but whoever you are, thanks for the inspiration!

My daughter also got a new hat this season, because I had some hot pink and white sparkly yarn hanging around that matched her coat.  I made this one weeks ago but I kept forgetting to snap a photo when she's home to model it.

So, I asked the cat to model it instead.

Hey lady, I don't recall signing a modeling contract.

Teddy Bear is more cooperative.  He refused to smile though.

Simple staggered shell stitch pattern

Love the big flower and button detail.

My daughter is also a crafter in her own right.  This weekend, after listening to hours of the "I'm soooo boooorred!" wailing, she made an owl from some fabric scraps.  I cut the pieces; she stitched it together and stuffed it.  This is a pattern I found at a delightful quilt shop in Wichita, KS.  The designer has a blog, here, and she has other stuffed creature designs.  They're really easy and fun to make.

Meet Olive the Owl

Between now and Christmas, I'm going to try and finish the Kitty Couch (just about done!) and a last minute sweater for me.  Because I'm always cold.  More to come soon!

Taa-Daa!

The front edges DO line up.  I was standing crooked.

Finished up the non smoking jacket.  It doesn't look exactly like what it set out to be, but it's a keeper anyway.  :-)  The post stitches give it some 3D texture, and I love the vertical stripe effect.

It was supposed to have a shawl collar and belt.  But I didn't like the belt, and I didn't like how the collar hung open more than I wanted it to.  So I added 6 buttons and made it a double-breasted jacket instead.

And the good news is I actually WROTE DOWN THE PATTERN this time!  Sort of.  It's in my own crochet shorthand and partially charted, but at least I can make it again sometime.

In other news, you may have heard about a recent small event called Hurricane Sandy.  Well, one of my fellow Ravelers lives in a part of New York that was impacted, and she is collecting hand knit and crocheted items to distribute.  I quickly whipped up a baby afghan to pop in the mail.

This pattern is a freebie, called Cerulean Harmony Throw, designed by Carrie Carpenter.  If you're new to changing colors in crochet without cutting the yarn, this is an excellent pattern to learn the technique.   I modified her pattern an eensy bit, and only did two rows of each color instead of three, like the pattern states.  

Close up of the color changes.  Work 4 double-crochets, then drop the yarn and switch to the other color.  The unused yarn is carried along inside the stitch.  Very clever.

So I made this afghan, and I like it very much.  So much, that I decided to swap it with the one I made months ago for my BFF's baby girl, due this Friday.  I had made her a rainbow stripe afghan because at the time, she didn't know the gender.  Now that she knows she is having a girl, it makes more practical sense to give her this girly pink and purple sparkly thing, and to mail the gender-neutral rainbow stripe one to New York.  It will find an appropriate home there, no doubt.  

Rainbow Ripple baby afghan, for a Hurricane Sandy baby.

It's also germ-central around here.  Both of my kids have been sick, and they have different ailments no less. So there isn't one icky bug in here, but two!  I made an emergency trip to Walgreen's for antibacterial wipes and we're spraying down everything with Lysol.  I do NOT want to spend Thanksgiving in bed with a bucket, thank you very much.

In between the fevers and chills, my son read a couple of the Ugly Guide books, based on the Ugly Dolls.  Then he drew pictures of two of the critters from the books and asked if I could make him some new cuddly creatures.  We rooted through the craft bucket for some fleece scraps and buttons, and whipped out these guys.  

The yellow guy supposedly has 3 brains; one in each piece of his head.

The drawings that inspired the creatures.

There's nothing like new cuddle friends to make you feel better.  I guess Tylenol works too, though.

News Flash

Darling daughter finished her Very First Hat Ever!

It's wonderful!   True, I have to say that because I'm her mother.

But this time it's not a lie.   :-) 

Happy Birthday America!

Where we live, the big fireworks display is on July 3.  Why?  Not a clue.  The show was fabulous and we had an amazing view of the action from the roof of my husband's office building.  However, today is actually Independence Day and it's important to celebrate it, even if the Big Show is already over.

So our day began with Freedom Pancakes!

Mix up about 3 cups worth of pancake batter, and split it into thirds.  Color one batch blue and one batch red, then make all the pancakes.  Let them cool a minute, then cut out the shapes with cookie cutters.  Swap out the colors...and voila!  This is fun for any occasion.  Use hearts for Valentines Day, pumpkins for Halloween, dinos on your 3-year-old son's birthday, blah, blah, blah.

My son snarfed his plate of cakes down and declared this the Best Day Ever.  (I don't read too much into that, though.  He uttered the same statement last night during the fireworks show, and last week when we got a free cookie at the grocery, and before that when he found a forgotten gift card stuck in his dresser drawer...he's easy to please.)

At dusk this July 4, we'll be content with our six boxes of sparklers.  :-)

What have I agreed to?

So, yesterday my daughter came up to me and said, "Mom, can you make me a sweater?"

Since I love 1) making things for others and 2) making sweaters specifically, of course I said, "Yes honey!  What would you like it to look like?"

And she handed me this.

Ginny Weasley

Yup, that's Lego Ginny Weasley from Harry Potter.   And I'm supposed to make her sweater.

Some projects are just meant to be, because a quick rummage through the yarn leftovers bin resulted in the exact shades of gray, burgundy and white for this cute little cardi.

Lucky kid.

Quilt Blocks are like Mogwai

Sure he looks cute and harmless, but remember what happens when the three rules weren't followed?  They multiply.  Everywhere.

That is kind of whats happened with the Craftsy Block of the Month around here.

My Mom visited just over a week ago, and she is also doing the BOM.  April's blocks were those nasty little hexagons which involved English Paper Piecing, and needed to be stitched by hand (she's a rule-follower, which is probably why her block looks so much better than mine).  So she brought her blocks along to work on while she was here.

Perfect, aren't they.  She is using a fat quarter bundle of coordinating prints.  It's going to be just stunning!   Especially if she uses hot pink sashing between the blocks.  But this is her quilt, not mine, so I'll try not to insert myself into her design decisions (too much).  These are all Mom's blocks so far:

On to my quilt.  Remember the drama around the hexagons?   I absolutely did not want to English Paper Piece anything, let alone hand stitch all those stinkin' hexagons together.  Well, my Mom was diligently working on hers, and my Daughter said, "I can do that!" and she did!  She learned the paper piecing technique, and she hand stitched my second April quilt block.  I am eternally grateful and I owe her Something Important for doing that block for me.

This is the block she did.  Fabulous job!  And she's only NINE!  

I finally found time to go back and assemble the March blocks, and they were delightful!  Scrappy, mis-matched, creative little bundles of fun.  Check it out:

These are all my blocks so far:

Lastly...

Having block patterns and colorful fabrics all over the place motivated my daughter to launch her own block of the month journey.  I bought her two fat quarter bundles in pink and lime coordinates, and she got right to work.

She's learned a lot about geometry, seam allowances, chain piecing, and pressing technique.  She also loves the steam feature on the iron for some reason.  Weird kid.

She has the above four blocks finished so far, and the octagons are ready for hand sewing. 

At the end of this journey, we will have three multi-generational quilts to display!  I'll post pictures throughout the process.