Best Beachcombing Ever?

A couple of weeks before Christmas holidays when DH was in Abu Dhabi, Mudder and I ventured out for a visit to Middle Cove Beach with the boys. It was a gorgeous misty morning.

Buckets were essential to the adventure.

Rocks were chosen with precision and great concentration.

Rubber boots were also essential adventure equipment.

Watch those shaky rocks, Grandma!

"Mudder entranced by the beach."

I love beachcombing (and hate it when Auto Correct keeps making that into two words. Take this, Auto Correct!!!).

I love this one: "Middlest entranced by the sea."

The best foraged item for the whole day? Do you know what this is? No, nothing to do with fishing or sea faring but much to do with sea watching...

Anyone? It's one of these. Talk about the perfect beach combing day for a knitter.

After A Storm

Yesterday was a wonderful snow day. Crazy busy with screaming children (for both good and naughty reasons), home baked chocolate chip cookies (used this recipe for the first time. Not too bad but I'm still seeking a 'best' cream cheese chocolate chip cookies recipe. Any suggestions that don't include chilling the dough two hours before baking?), "snow storming" (that's playing outside in the snow in Littlest's language - his new creative word for the day. He asked his brothers if they wanted to go "snow storming" with him and so they did) and general lazing about. We took down the living room Christmas tree and I was thrilled that Eldest in particular was home to do that. He struggles with changes and the transition from full on Christmas decorating to none is always easier if he is involved in the process. We leave our trees and holiday decorations up until Old Christmas Day (January 6th) and I waited a bit longer to start dismantling this year as the weather office was 'promising' a snow day. Luckily for me it worked out.

It took me all day to unravel another mistake I'd made in my knitting between the jigs and reels of the day. I had it fixed and then my needles disconnected from the cable and I lost a few stitches so had to catch them and frog (that's taking out your knitting painstakingly stitch by stitch for you non-knitters) a couple of rows back. Can you lock circular needles to their cables? Mine seem to unwind regularly.

Mudder, Fadder, Sister, Niece, my three boys and I were all at home sharing the snow day fun. Naturally, DH went off to work. We had a lot of snow fall but it was fairly windy so the main part of our lawn is barely covered and you can still see grass.

This morning, the world seemed whipped clear and we enjoyed a beautiful sun rise.

We are leaving our outside lights on for awhile yet. They are clear white and help me through the winter darkness. Neighbourhood rebels we are!

Foot patterns from sliding yesterday during the storm.

One of the reason's we were up early enough to enjoy the sunrise was that my sister and niece were off on their first of two flights back home. So, a sad morning from that perspective though we had a wonderful two weeks of intensive family time. I am hoping that Littlest and I can visit them in CO sometime in 2015. Fingers crossed.

Our beautiful Christmas tree got well covered by blowing snow.

We might have had a storm but our regular feathered visitors kept coming so much that I refilled the bird feeder yesterday. When you're that small, you have to eat to stay warm and alive. I love seeing their little tracks.

Winter magic.

WIP's

Hey there! Whatcha working on? I'm working on this...

Like my new KnitPicks needles? I can get them local at Fiberlilly,
one of my Local Yarn Stores (LYS) These particular ones
are presents from a Christmas gift certificate. Thanks, Sis!

I started a new knitting project on New Years Eve as I decided that I should have a new project going into 2015. I hope to finish it in 2015 too. It's the free Calbuco Cardigan pattern from Tangle. This is the second pattern I've knit from Tangle's original designs and I continue to be impressed. Impressed enough that I might even knit this cardi again in a cotton yarn. But I'd better concentrate on this one first as we all know (and if you don't, be warned) how many WIPs I have lurking about in this house, falling out of closets, from under beds, and stuffed to the back of the fridge (well, no, not really. But it could happen). I'm using a gorgeous yarn called Canopy Fingering by The Fibre Company in the colour way Parakeet. If you think the pictures look nice believe me when I say (write?) it is 100 times better in real life. It's a baby alpaca, merino, viscose bamboo blend. I picked up three skeins of it on sale at my other local yarn shop, COCO. Lucky, lucky, luck!

I am in love and...concerned. You see, I'm not a fan of fingering weight yarn. I prefer me some DK or worsted weight. They get the job done faster and I don't need to concentrate quite as hard on making my stitches. I don't mind fine yarn when I'm crocheting likely because I have more experience with it. With knitting, I tend to avoid (thats a lie, I DO avoid) lace patterns and fine yarns. I have a lovely skein of baby alpaca balled up in a craft drawer somewhere with a pattern that I've started three times and three times had to break the yarn off to start over because I'd created such an unholy, knotted mess.

So, I'm really wondering if this project and I are going to go the distance. I have a horrendous record with finishing sweaters for myself. In fact, of the three I've started and put considerable time and tears into, only one is finished, fits and is regularly worn. Sad I know. This is number four. Hopefully the knitting gods will grant me a free break for sheer optimism and determination.

Now, I must go back upstairs and reknit half of what I've already knit on the thing. I've already had to unravel most of it (right back to the 'cast on 80 stitches and knit four rows in garter stitch beginning...) and, for once, I haven't left the yarn in too much of a snarl.

Question: is it cruel to let your cat escape your house
just after the first snow fall of the year? I held the door open for her
when, after taking this picture, she ran back to the house and
warm floors. Still...

Holiday Decorating

I mentioned in an earlier post that this is the first year in many I've been interested in Christmas and the inevitable decorating that the season brings with it. The decreasing sunlight and my energy and mood start to go downhill the beginning of September and, this year at least, I managed to get help and extra support early enough in the season that the holidays weren't as traumatic as they have historically been. That doesn't mean that our Christmas cards for 2014 are out yet though so if you haven't received yours yet, I hope to have them in the mail soon. December 25th is just an arbitrary deadline, right?

This post is never going to make it to the 'who's who' in the decorative blogger world and I'm posting it after the holidays which seems to be a faux pas as a lot of other gorgeous decorative blogs posted their genius before the big day. I figure they must have taken their pictures last year to make them look so good for this year. Or in July. Obviously they have also managed to do away with the 24 hour in a day problem I have despite their having four children, six dogs, three cats, home schooling all children full time and maintaining a gorgeous and active blog. Yes, I'm jealous and a big enough girl to admit it!

So, just in case you are more like me and have not yet scraped all of Christmas dinner off the floor underneath the dining room table, here are some little Christmas vignettes I created for the 2014 season that made me smile each time I saw them. Nothing fancy or expensive and I usually did one a day or every other day keeping the pace slow and simple. The only frantic decorating bit was when the boys helped me decorate our upstairs tree and their downstairs tree (artificial so we can put it up and start decorating eons before a live tree would survive to Old Christmas Day around when the decorations start to disappear). Apart from that hour and a half of scarred for life memory, things were downright civilized.

Our decorations this year were edited from previous years. I haven't even opened all of our Christmas boxes. I bought a Martha Stewart turquoise and silver shatterproof ball set in late November and  used those to freshen up my whole scheme. I think that was a good investment of decorations that we will have for many years and shatterproof is pretty much a necessity as, as usual, a few much loved decorations got destroyed by too much boy loving again this year.

Other than that one new package of Christmas balls, I wanted to use what we had in and around the house rather than going out and buying more. The boys and I found four small trees from the local area to dig up, pot and use rather than me buying more small artificial trees. I have hopes of keeping them alive until Spring to replant them on our property. I am also considering turning the one above into a "Winter Tree" to assist Eldest and I with the post-Christmas 'take the tree down' blues.

A small ironstone platter (a Kijiji score from earlier in the fall - 5 for $20!) and a $6 ironstone jug also from a fall purchase at Value Village made the cut. The branches and geranium are real and from the window sill (flower) and back yard (branches cut from the real Christmas tree).

Thanks to my generous now UK located friend A, we inherited this gorgeous silvery gold frame. I took it, added a drawing from a chalk board print I saw on Pinterest that I 'Sharpied' (a new Patty word meaning 'to use a black Sharpie marker') onto a piece of brown paper bag and voila! Instant art. This particular piece was for the bedroom my sister and niece are sharing during their visit here and I wanted it to be as warm, welcoming and Christmasy as I could make it. 

An easy bowl of Christmas delight for the guest bathroom. 

The silver owl was a $5 purchase from Target and the
fleurs-de-lys in the background? From the ROD
garage sale!!!

These icicle decorations and the fact that they are currently hung in my home is a major accomplishment for me this year. These gorgeous things are made of glass and are ones that either I or my friend ML purchased for me from Weihnachtsmarkt's all over Germany when we lived there. However, they are too delicate and too precious for me to have hung on our tree (where we used to hang them pre-children) so they have remained carefully wrapped and stuffed to the back of one of our hutch drawers until this Christmas.

This is a Christmas 2014 Market in Prague. The picture was sent to
me by my friend L who was lucky enough to be there over the holidays.
It made me downright home sick! The wee market stalls, lights and
surrounding market square are common themes for European
Christmas markets. 

I had dried roses all along the top of this hutch but decided to purge them, and the years of dust that went with them, for some fresh Spruce branches. I then tied ribbon (from my craft room) and made sure each icicle was carefully hung far enough back on each branch so they wouldn't be jolted onto the floor by some scampering child. You can't see the heavy hardcover books on the ends of the branches making sure that they also didn't take a dive... Another 'free' vignette.

The boys love having their own tree in their bedroom. This was quick and easy and only used Christmas decorations that I already had in my - ahem - fairly massive collection. The stocking is made from Newfoundland tartan and is one I've had for years.

This is a new idea for me. This typewriter belonged to DH's paternal grandfather and is usually front and centre on our bookshelf on the stair landing. For the holiday season, I moved it into the second guest room that my parents are using and coupled it with some branches, the by now familiar ornaments and my piece of MacQueen tartan in tie weight wool underneath. Striking, no?

Finally, and for anyone else who lived in Germany when we did, the Nurenberg Bridal cup (no, I'm not getting a commission! This was the best description I could find from a quick Google search) should be familiar. I thought she looked grand next to my new Christmas decorations.

There you have it, frugal and child friendly holiday decorating by necessity. Did you do anything unique and inexpensive when you decorated this year?

Handmade Holiday

2014 marked a year of many changes as I suppose is usual for a family of three small children who seem to grow, change and yet stay the same every second of every day. One of the things that I really wanted to get back to doing for Christmas presents in 2014 was to start making more of them. Honestly, the past eight years since Eldest was born probably marks one of the longest stints I have ever gone without being regularly creative and my soul has gotten a bit brittle around the edges as a result. I have been making a concentrated effort to clear out our office and my craft room area. It will likely still take another year or so to get it into exactly the order I want but I did manage to clear out one side of the office room and paint one wall in December (because that's exactly the sort of thing your'e meant to do two weeks before Christmas and company coming, right?!?).

Anyways, now that the gifts have been given and received, I wanted to share some of the things I have worked on in 2014.

What started out as a $20 Kijiji find...

...turned into this French inspired end table.

I made a new felt mitten ornament during craft group at the MFRC. I usually bring in and work on my own projects during Wednesday morning craft group but am so glad I decided to put that down and make one of these instead. This is the first of only two new handmade by me Christmas 2014 ornaments.

Knitted hats were certainly a theme for presents from us in 2014. This hat was knit for my oldest nephew who lives in the lovely Big Land. I overstitched a mini Labrador flag on it and am pleased with the results. It's my first time trying overstitching and I was trying to get a similar look to a high end commercially reproduced hat which have fabric brand names on them or sewn into them.

Two other knitted hats for our lovely nieces also living in the Big Land. Older sister (almost ten years old) received the larger version. This is the Bennett Beret from a much loved Etsy store of mine, The Velvet Acorn.

Smallest size.

Larger size. Believe it or not, both hats were knit
from the same skein and dye lot. The top photo is
the most true to colour.

LOVE that ruffle!

Another nephew and another hat! This time for our youngest, Ninja turtle obsessed nephew. He is a big Raphael fan. This pattern was a combination of one from my wonderful friend M who restarted my knitting button when she was here for a visit this past summer plus this Ninja Turtle Hat Pattern that I found on Ravelry. I used Cascade Pacific yarn (that I purchased when we were in BC this past summer at this shop as a memento of our trip) for this project and am in love with how soft it knits up.

Using the same model and hat pattern from above (believe it or not!?!), I knit this men's hat for a dear friend's husband. A and her family returned back to the UK this past summer and we all really miss them. Here is proof that I not only started my Christmas knitting in the summer but that I also make really cute children too! Sadly, I sent their Christmas parcel to the UK on November 17th via Pony Express and It. Still. Has. Not. Arrived. 

Modelled by one of my gorgeous younger brother's. Sadly, neither
of my brother's received a hat this year. There's always 2015!

Another Velvet Acorn pattern, the Paisley Cloche, knit for our niece living in Colorado (or 'Coloralo' as Middlest used to call it). Honestly, if you want well written, quick and trendy knitted hat and/or accessories to knit, Heidi, the talent behind The Velvet Acorn, is a genius.

Not a hat! And also not ready in time for Christmas. However, here is a play toy that I made for the cats during the holidays. It took me a day to make and I filled the ball with cat nip and stuffing. This toy is now far from the door knob where it originated and is looking rather felted so I think I can determine it as a hit. Ravelry to the rescue as always for this pattern.

Proof of play.

I know, it's hard to believe I play with anything that isn't fibre. Here is a Pinterest inspired wreath that cost me $0. I love it when that happens!

Just before Christmas, one of my very organized friends organized a cookie exchange. Apart from A, I knew none of the other ladies in attendance and still managed to laugh so hard I was crying! A great night with new girlfriends. I had fun with the packaging. 

I crocheted this little number between Christmas Day and New Years Day. It's my first amigurumi attempt and I am in LOVE (don't tell DH!)!!! I used this pattern from Stephanie's lovely 'All About Ami' blog and intend on making it several more times. I went with an all white Polar Bear. I'm going to make two more - one of each boy with different coloured scarves and then make some other variations. I'd really like to make a penguin too...and a cow...and a sheep.....

Finally, a gratuitous feline picture as Bella got on and read my post from yesterday and was jealous so she purred me to distraction last night until I agreed to post a flattering picture of her;). Our cat amidst the holiday chaos.

Happy New Year 2015!

It has been a wonderful start to a new year for my family and I. I am intimately aware that this has not been the case for some of our very closest friends for whom this Christmas 2014 and the New Year mark their first without their dearest loved ones. The past six months have been a poignant and painful reminder that life is fleeting and can come to an end suddenly, with little or no warning. 

I stopped making a specific New Year's resolution a long time ago. However, if I can change that habit and choose a resolution for 2015 at all it would be to try and be more present in each moment and squeeze the most I can from each day. Our children and extended families are more or less in good general health, ear infections and getting older aside. I was in the mood for the Christmas season this year for the first time I have been in several years and for that I am thankful. We also have been playing host to my parents and my little sister and niece over the past two weeks which has been an absolute blessing even if the two three years old (Littlest and my niece are six weeks apart in age) have a love/hate relationship (they are as cute playing together as they are all riled up and yelling at each other!).

Here are a few moments from the past couple of wonderful, busy, exhausting and satisfying weeks:

Grabbing a satisfying nap took hard work.

The boys created a Santa's sleigh directional landing strip of their own accord. DH and I thought it was brilliant!

December 25, 2014

DH found a dried up pot of tulips in the dark of the garage that were showing some signs of life. I added water. It looks as though we may have begun our first 'forced' tulip garden.

Stocking stuffer fun.

And a bovine invasion...

Happy New Year 2015!