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My knitty history

Posted on January 20, 2008 10:50 pm by TheAngelForever

When I went to the yarn store the other day the woman was shocked to hear that I had been knitting for over 20 years. It is true, just not on a regular basis (thus the reason I had to relearn some things). I originally learned how to knit when I was in elementary school. Most summers when I was in school, my friend across the street and I would knit together to pass time at night when it was too warm or buggy to sit outside.

She would always do small projects or more complicated items since her mother knew how to knit and could assist her. Her mother used to make gorgeous sweaters and other amazing things. Anyway, one year I decided I wanted to knit an afghan. I believe I started this either at the end of high school or when I was in college. I figured I would do it like the blankets that my grandmother and aunt make. This would mean knitting three super long strips and connecting them at the end.

Last night while at my parent’s house I went to my old room and opened up my craft bin. Inside I found that old project.

Those are the two finished strips. In addition to this, I found more. Still on the needles was another strip that is probably half done.

Eventually I want to finish this since I put a lot of hard work into it. I am going to talk to my Aunt T to see if she can help me to piece it together once I finish the last strip (between other projects – while relearning how to purl).

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Earlier Saturday, Laura told me to get some cotton yarn at the store. She thought it would be a good idea to make some wash cloths to practice casting on, purling, and binding-off. Ya know, make smaller projects that one can finish once the scarf for JSL is done (which it practically is). The reason is I do not want to use the nice new yarn for my scarf to practice on.

Since the yarn was really inexpensive (and I can use the practice), I thought it would be fun for all of us to pick a color for me to make. JL and NHL were both game too.

I selected a yarn that was colorful, not too bold and made me know that I am the Estrogen queen in this house! It is called Potpourri.

JL selected a masculine mix of blues. It is called Faded Denim.

Then it was NHL’s turn to pick. Well, it speaks for itself. *sigh* *shudders* This is called Lemon-Lime, but I believe I will have more colorful names for this soon.

Right after his own selection, NHL picked one for his little brother (thank goodness there were none with orange). This one is called Sea Mist.

So to recap these are the yarns that were purchased for me to relearn how to do all things knitty.

A special thanks to Laura for agreeing to help me with this and suggesting the cool new mini-projects. Now can someone please buy me some shades for when I tackle the one for NHL. . . ugh!

Categories:
friends knitting looking back weekend

He’s on his feet – ACK!

Posted on January 19, 2008 10:26 pm by TheAngelForever

So much for taking things slow. JSL seems to be in a hurry to grow up. He is just eight month old and already giving us a run for our money. When he and I are home during the day he does not want to sit and play. He often will ~~baby bitch~~ complain until I give him my hands to use to stand up. Then he is happy and dances. He has also learned that he can move his feet underneath to get places. This is very intriguing to him. The other night he and JL were playing. JSL wanted to let go of Daddy’s hands, so JL did it. The little monkey stayed up for a while. They kept doing this for quite some time. JSL thinks it is hilarious to stand and then crash onto his bottom or fly into Daddy’s arms.

This morning he wanted to do it again. This time I grabbed my camera to get photos. Below are pictures of JSL, the next generation of Chipendale,strutting his stuff.

First Daddy must help the little guy to get steady on his feet. This gets more difficult later on when he is laughing and wiggling too much. Please note the cute, chubby baby thighs (sad how it is acceptable and adored at this age).

Now JSL gets very serious and even a little annoyed with the peanut gallery making too much noise. He really was trying to concentrate at this point.

He is now in the zone and ready to go!

Look Ma . . . no hands!!!!!

No, he was not standing long, but he was up. We knew we were in trouble before, but this solidifies that is is coming soon – ACK!

Categories:
jsl milestone photos weekend

Bonding brothers, car naps and birthday party fun!

Posted on December 24, 2007 11:10 pm by TheAngelForever

This part Saturday was a busy day. In the morning JL went outside to remove ice from the driveway since the temperature was going to get close to 45 degrees during the day. While he went outside the two boys were playing together. As mentioned before JSL loves to watch NHL and laughs at everything he does. NHL just eats this attention up.

Here are the boys hanging out on the couch together. NHL just loves to hug his little brother and JSL is tolerates SO much since he is a very easy going baby.

NHL is not the only one that tries to entertain. Here is the little guy trying to get his big brother’s attention. Instead of NHL laughing you can see JSL is the one about to laugh.

Can you tell the wheels are turning inside NHL’s head?

Please note who now likes a binky. JSL is trying to be shy while thinking about playing peek-a-boo with his buddy.

Soon after JL came in from outside it was time to get the boys ready to head to Chuck E Cheese. NHL decided that he wanted to go to his friend’s party that was there. Cool right? Well, we were a little hesitant because NHL is petrified of Chuck E Cheese. Still he wanted to go, so we opted to try it. Last time he went to a party there (over a year ago) he stayed in a corner in tears the entire time until we left. When we got in the car it quickly became very quiet. Here is how the boys looked when we got to Chuck E Cheese:

We decided to wake NHL up to head inside. BIG MISTAKE!!!! The kid was a mess. He had a full blown temper tantrum in the parking lot. I let JL go ahead while I told NHL to be a big boy and go in. He suddenly did not want to go inside where the costume would be. I practically dragged him inside. He immediately wanted to hide inside the bathroom. B’s mother knew about NHL’s fear. She told me that they promised to warn us when the costume would come out and it would only be out at cake time. We told NHL this and after a little while he eased into playing some games.

Getting him to the table (where the cake and Chuck E Cheese would later be) would be tricky, but he eventually went with JL standing nearby. As promised we told him when and where the costume would be coming and he was pretty calm. The poor birthday did not do as well. He was shaking and VERY upset by the appearance of Chuck E Cheese. JL and I were floored that NHL actually wanted to Conga around the place with the costume! At the end of the time NHL did not want to go. He loved it and kept talking about wanting to go back – WAHOO! Now I do not feel as bad about being a "mean mommy" – LOL!

Here are some sketches that we had made there using our tokens:

And here is NHL on a ride with Chuck E Cheese that takes a photo when you aren’t paying attention:

Now NHL keeps asking to go back – it looks like we may have created a monster. Mind you I reserve the right to wait and see if he goes in without kicking and screaming next time before I officially consider this a done deal.

Categories:
birthday brothers jsl nhl photos sleep weekend

Snow, sleet, sledding, secret ingredient cookies & sleepy babies

Posted on December 17, 2007 12:15 am by TheAngelForever

Storm #2 of the not even officially winter season is heading out (I think). As of this morning we had 5-6 inches of snow and the ice kept on coming all day. Our plan was to stay home, watch movies, dig out, and bake cookies. Some of those were accomplished. We are partially out from under the snow and ice, we never had a chance to watch a movie (thanks to a certain little monkey), and we ate cookies that were delicious.

By mid-morning JL finally decided that it was time to head out into the snowy cold "fun" and took NHL with him to get out some energy. The poor kid was experiencing some serious cabin fever from being in the house since early Thursday afternoon. Here is Darth Daddy with his camera of course!

Now please note the dorky Abominable Cameraman taking a photo here while measuring the snow fall:

Finally it was time for NHL and JL to dig out at least the front area of the house:

After some time they finally made it further down the sidewalk to clean up more of the snow. Look at the little guy following his daddy – AWWWWW!

Digging, digging. . . . and yes more digging!

I went back inside to check on the little guy who was keeping warm. As you can see he was having a blast playing, but you can also see his poor little nose was very sore looking. He now cries when he sees a tissue coming toward him.

A little while later JL came in to get me for some photos. The boys had decided to take a break from cleaning up snow to play in it. Here is a mosaic of their sledding fun.

The smiles one both of their faces were just SO big!

Soon after this the boys came inside to get warm and eat lunch. We had lunch that NHL picked out – tomato soup with alphabet noodles in it. Mommy thought he might get a kick out of them and bought them. After this we noticed that NHL was getting tired. We knew he would not go to his bed. Instead we got him to snuggle up on the couch under a blanket. After fighting the nap we finally noticed that he was quiet and calm. Here is how I found the little guy. It still amazes me how kids can fall asleep in the most odd ways.

Meanwhile another little boy in the family was miserable. He refused to eat solid food, wanted to be held and could not sleep. He would settle, get into his crib and wake up crying within 20 minutes or so thanks to his poor nose. Here is how he greeted me after one of the mini-naps. The shine on his nose is vasoline to help the sore areas from constantly wiping all of the dripping.

While NHL was napping JL was ambitious and made some chocolate chip cookies using the recipe from Deceptively Delicious. The secret ingredient in these cookies are whole chickpeas. NHL woke up just in time for the first batch to come out of the oven. JL made one recipe which yielded 40 cookies (Seinfeld’s recipe says it will make 2 dozen – what size cookies does she make?). As you can see NHL approved and wanted more than the two that he was allowed. They truly were YUMMY and you never would know there was something like chickpeas inside.

Now both of the boys are in bed and the house is quiet. The 7 month old was a struggle since he was beyond overtired, congested (did the milk thing to help), and two teeth are really coming in. He also learned a lesson – you do NOT bite mommy when nursing and laugh. If you do that mommy will pass you to Daddy and say "No BOOB for you!"

Night-night for now since the morning will be here soon to finish digging out.

Categories:
food glorious food fun jl jsl nhl photos sick kid teething weather weekend winter yummy

Chanukah Party & Family Day (12-8)

Posted on December 10, 2007 4:16 pm by TheAngelForever

Thursday evening my brother (Uncle I), sister-in-law (Aunt M) and niece (SG) came into town. Due to NHL being really sick Friday we were not able to have dinner with them that evening. Saturday morning all seemed to be well. The high fever disappeared almost as mysteriously as it had appeared. Thanks to this we felt it was fine to make plans and see our family.

Aunt M and Uncle I requested lunch out at the newly opened PF Chang’s. We all said that was fine, so I made a reservation for 12:30 for the nine of us (that included the two babies). We had a very nice lunch, looked around the crazy mall quickly and then stopped at Target. We needed to go there for more Aveeno diaper rash cream as well as frosting and sprinkles for Aunt M’s Chanukah cookies.

After that it was time to head back to my parent’s house. At Nana and Papa’s we all decided to let the kids have some of their Chanukah gifts. Nana and Papa gave NHL the new Fisher Price Smart Cycle. It seems like a great "toy" for in the house during the winter. It will provide him with muscle movement (PT), and nice hand/eye coordination with the joystick (OT) using educational games. Here is a mosaic of NHL opening the gift. Note when he finally sees what is inside. Also included are some photos of him riding on it.

Meanwhile JSL was enjoying his first Chanukah (check out the cool shirt that Nana and Papa got him). It was so fun watching him get into his new toys. He sat on the floor for quite some time playing, talking, watching and enjoying the farm toy that Nana and Papa gave him. He loved finding the places that would make music and kept experimenting with everything. Here are some photos of him including when he got there in his snowsuit, playing with Papa, modeling his "My First Hanukkah" shirt. Unfortunately we never had SG and JSL in a photo together with their matching shirts on. In addition to the farm toy he LOVED the Glow Worm from Uncle I, Aunt M and SG. When we got home Saturday night he kept singing with it. When it would stop glowing he would kiss it on the face and talk to it trying to make it go again.

Of course the Smart Cycle did not come assembled since Santa does not do that for Chanukah – *wink* Thanks to this JL had the opportunity to put it together for NHL. Here’s a shot of that fun.

NHL was quite bored waiting for his Smart Cycle to be ready. Part of the time he watched Papa’s new "baby" play Noggin.

By this point he was starting to really need something to do. Aunt M had him help SG open her Chanukah gifts.

Then he was quite sick of waiting. Note the sour puss.

Since I was getting slightly bored I took the following photo of my shoes and dreidel socks:

SG was quite content when mommy read her a book and Papa came over to chat with her:

Once NHL’s bike was set, everyone just stayed together in the living room waiting for the other family members to come to the Chanukah party.

Even the Chanukah Puppy was just hanging out:

Finally everyone arrived and it was time to eat. Here is a mosaic of all of the family gathering around the lit menorah enjoying our meal together. Oh and of course the goodies!