Swapy Birthday Fun

Ok, so my birthday was the beginning of April, but I've been a lazy blogger (well, a busy mommy) so here's my Birthday Post:

After taking a year off from swaps, I decided to participate (again) in the Ravelry Birthday Swap group. I was partnered up with someone else who had my same birthday and we sent nifty little packages to each other. She had mentioned that a mustard colored yarn would be cool - and look what I found on etsy:



So I spun it into a true 3-ply (haven't done many of those - usually a navajo ply it) and came up with this:


(the big skein is the 3-ply, the small skein is navajo plied of the extra singles)

Pretty yarn :)

I was pretty pleased with how it came out - didn't get a completely accurate yardage measurement, but it came out I think close to a DK (If I remember correctly?)

I then took a fun trip to Webs to finish off the package (and get some yarn for a couple other projects and such of course). So here's the complete package I sent to her:




And here was what she sent me for my birthday:


The chocolates and candies disappeared quickly, the kerchief went right on my head, the apron I have been using a lot already, and the sachet I haven't decided yet where to put it. The yarn and ribbons were for a project that she had seen on my favorites page, since the pattern is free she got me the other supplies needed so I could make it. It took me a couple days to cast on, and about a week or so to finish it:




So I had a great birthday! (My sweet husband also took the day off of work and did the homeschooling for me, made me take a bubble bath, took us out to lunch, and bowling, and then someone watched the kids while we ran errands and had a calmer dinner out... and presents spread throughout the day) Oh right, and one of the presents was three months of Yarn Pirate's new fiber club :) ...the first fiber came earlier this week...

Bear and Socks and Fiber... oh my!

I had this post almost ready to go out about a week ago, when suddenly our DSL wasn't working... it took 5 days to get it back and then another day to make sure everything was working again, so finally, here's the post!

My husband has a co-worker who recently had a child (well, he's the father, so he didn't *have* the child, but yeah...) so my sweet husband asked if I'd be willing to make a bear for them.




Then of course another co-worker saw the bear and asked if I'd make one for him to give away, so we coordinated and got more colors...




At this point the second bear is actually done and photos will be in the next post!


I also finished the stripe-y socks!



My husband now has a pair of tall warm winter socks (and he actually wore them while it was still really cold).



He did say that the shaping started a bit late, so it's a bit tight right before the increases start.



...and the ribbing still had too many stitches in it (didn't decrease enough), so it stretches a bit big - we're trying to decide if it's worth fixing or if we'll just keep it in mind if (when?) I make another pair sometime before next winter. Since we keep the house so cool during the winter these were definitely appreciated!





...and completely unrelated...

While shopping for a swap I'm participating in I saw this roving in an etsy shop and loved the colors! So... this came to my house and gets to stay :)

My fiber-y stash and Ravelry

At the end of January my husband decided that he needed to take stock of his yarn. So we set up some white posterboard, a couple of good lights, and used our newish camera to take pictures of all of his yarn. Of course, while he was setting it up (with his yarn sitting calmly off to the side) I brought my yarn into the other end of the kitchen and quietly piled it up. The spinning fiber snuck in also.

My husband of course was able to get his yarn uploaded into ravelry that night. My stash on the other hand.... I ended up entering it mostly in an all day marathon a week or so later. I entered everything. 8 grams of raccoon fiber? into the database it went. 3 big bags of alpaca fiber? Weighed and recorded. Lots of scraps of Lopi yarn? Ummm... maybe entered it all together, but with all the information I have. I really want to forward these scraps onto others (already mailed off two envelopes to people on ravelry who needed just a bit more of something I had) or I want to use these up in a productive way. I figured I had to enter every single bit - or toss them, because if I don't know what's there, then there is no way I'll ever use it.

So everything is up there... and now, for those of you who have no clue what ravelry is, and therefore couldn't follow those links... go sign up. wait a couple of days. ...and then you will know. Ravelry is about knitting and crocheting. It has forums to find people to talk to, places to record the projects you have finished (or those that you will never finish). It has databases of patterns and yarns for you to browse through... and of course, you can keep track of other people's projects that you like... or those you plan to make.

After putting up my stash I decided to go through my queue. I know that many people use their queues in different ways... I personally use it to keep track of those projects that I would really like to make. Perhaps I won't cast on in the exact order that they are listed, but when it makes it to the queue it means I really do plan to make these and usually already have the yarn on hand. Of course, there are already 12 patterns there. So I guess I know what I'll be doing for a while... (of course, I'm not locked into any of these, but there are reasons that they made it to the queue)

Now that my fiber is all listed, and my queue is set up, I really am excited about some of my future projects... of course, I still enjoy my current ones.. I just wish they were a lot shorter :)

Slippers

Part of my Christmas presents from my husband was a slipper kit. It came with slipper bottoms and a gift card to my LYS so I could knit myself up a pair of felted clog slippers (cuz I made a pair for him and he loves them so much).

So I finished up a couple of projects and then went to the LYS and picked up some Cascade 220, and then a little while later I whipped them up.





I then felted them and tried them for a while



I then decided I needed to felt them a tiny bit more, and then, true to his word, he sewed the bottoms on for me (knitting my own slippers - okay... sewing them on - ulgh). I've now been walking around with warm feet...





...now just to make new ones for the girls (well, maybe in the fall... and the boy will need a pair by then too)

Scooting and Rocking (Videos)

As you have seen, I rarely put my kids up on the blog (first because this is a craft blog, and second, for their privacy) but I've had a number of requests to see these videos of Mr Little Tomato... We'll see if this works.

The first is of him moving across the room. He now will crawl (on his stomach) if we put him down that way, but he used to scream and cry and then put his head down and just wait for us to sit him up, so this is the way he learned to move around from his preferred sitting position.



This second video is of him on the rocking horse that one of his grandpa's made for older sister (when she was just a bit bigger than he is now). He can't quite get on it by himself yet, but when someone puts him on it we get rewarded with huge grins ...usually. Even though he can't get on, he can almost always get off of it without help when he's done.




Hope you enjoyed the rare pics of one of the kids!