Road Trip!

Tomorrow we leave for gingersnap's first road trip ... which has left me more than a little anxious for the past week.  She was not a great car baby for the first few months of her life; 3 minutes in, no matter where you were or how long there was to go she was screaming.  And screaming for the duration of the trip.  It was awful.

She's gotten much *much* better - we went to Washington a few weeks ago and had to sit in a horrendous border line and she did great.  So I'm hopeful.  This is not to say that I haven't done a lot to make this as painless as possible for all three of us.  (As a side note, this is the first time we're leaving the dog for any length of time.  We'll see how that goes :P )

When I was weak and bought the stacking toy the other day, the purpose of my trip was actually to get stuff for the car; specifically this (doesn't this child look happy?!?).

I feel like it has great potential for a long time, since they're required to be in a car seat until they're like 12 or something now ;).
To go with it, since we're going to try and have all her meals in the car, I bought a silicone placemat, a sippy cup, and a new block set.  I figure new toys are exciting right?  Even at 10 months?

Music, books, food, toys ... I think I have more stuff for the car than for the week at our destination!!

Anywho: 5 hours tomorrow, then 7 on Sunday.  Oh my.  Thinking about it makes my stomach queesy. I'm going to go prep more food.  Wish us luck!!

Too Much of a Good Thing?

I have to admit - infants are not all that fun.  Sure they're cute, and relatively easy to care for (especially if yours slept as well as ours did at first ...) but *nothing happens*.  After a few months of that, I wasn't sure how anyone could be a stay-at-home mom; I was so bored.

But gingersnap is growing leaps and bounds and gets more fun and interactive every day, and now I'm not sure how I'm going to survive leaving her with someone else.  It's amusing to me, and probably obvious to every mom out there, how quickly my opinions of such things changed ;)

Anywho, lately I have been so enthralled with how she is learning.  Toys she used to pick up and put down she is actually learning how they work and is *so* impressed with herself when she figures it out!  Her most recent obsession is stacking; anything stackable will do, but her favorites are these

The one on the left is from Fisher Price, and the right is Ikea.  Both were Christmas presents from grandparents, and though we hardly needed 2 of *basically* the same thing, we kept them both.  Watching her dump all the pieces off, then figuring out how to put them back on was wonderful entertainment for me.  Problem solving at work!

So since she was enjoying these so much, wouldn't she enjoy a third too?!?

Never send me to a toy store by myself - general rule of thumb that Lukie should probably learn pretty quickly ;)

New Sweater!

So we crawled under a rock last week to wait out the storm that was the stomach flu.  Nothing was done.  We are going to forget that week ever existed and move on.

I have a new sweater!!  It had a rocky start but came out more wearable then I could have hoped for ...

First:  the yarn is MarigoldJen BFL sock yarn in Amy's Punky Plum - I bought it for the knit-a-long that the Stockinette Zombies hosted over the last 2 months.  I have high hopes for this sweater as the swatch has been through the washer and dryer at least 5 times (I lost it in the pocket of a pair of jeans for a while) and come out soft, drapey, and not a pill on it :)

 I did on the other hand have a moment when I openend the package - the skeins were not very well matched.  Two matched perfectly and one looked like a different colour all together (can you spot it?)  But with some artful alternating which I would have done either way, I was getting a fabric I was happy with.

Next: the pattern is the Serina Cardigan, a $6 download from Ravelry.  The yardage requirements on the pattern page state the following

Yardage Requirements:    850 - 1600 yards (777 - 1463 m)
Sizes Available:            32"-50" bust

I wanted to make around a 44" size and had around 1450 yards of yarn.  Wonderful .... or not.  Bought the pattern only to find that size needs 1600 yards.  What?!?  Grrrrrrrrrr ....

I took a deep breath and read the pattern.  Conveniently the bottom of the sweater had a lot more fabric than I originally thought so I got rid of some of it to get back some of that yarn and crossed my fingers. I left the arms to the end, intending to split whatever was left from the body in half and getting as far as I could but I needent have planned so much.

The bottom of the sweater for my size was intended to be about 50" around and mine is only about 42" so I actually have yarn left over:

And I'm happy.  I definitely needed a closure of some sort and since I thought buttons might be too heavy, opted for a really light weight shawl stick from Black Sheep Yarns.

(And I'm still on track for my 13 sweaters of the year ;) )

Sweaters!

This for me, like many other people, has become the year of the sweater.  I've finished 3 me sized sweaters already this year with another in progress and also a birthday sweater for my nephew!

This is the Serina Cardigan by Gretchen Ronnevik ($6 on Ravelry) in Marigoldjen's BFL sock base. After a few initial problems this sweater is flying!  I only have the sleeves to go ... but man was it a rough start ... but I'll chat more about that when it's finished ;)

Next: Diplodocus by Kate Oates

My nephew is turning 4 this year and if it has anything to do with dinosaurs or the movie Cars, that kid is *all* over it.  I can oblige that pretty easily!  He said the sweetest thing to me recently - it's important to know that one of his shower presents (long before he was born and I knew he was going to be *huge*) was a sweater that never fit him, so now it belongs to one of his babies.  He got 2 new babies for Christmas and a few weeks ago told me

"This baby is nice and warm, but these 2 are so cold.  We need to make them sweaters.  This one likes red and this one like orange.  We should make them in those colours.  Can we make them tomorrow?"

Melt my heart you are so freaking cute.  His babies will also get sweaters for his birthday.  Obviously.

Oh Pets ...

So we have a few pets ... three to be exact.  Two cats and a dog.



Since the introduction of gingersnap, there has been a little less love for all three.  We know it and though it's sad, we also know that in a year or two it will go back to the way it was ... the dog does not want to wait :P

Lately, she has gotten super fearful toward strangers (dogs and people alike) to the point where I'm no longer comfortable walking her next to the stroller.  If she gets it in her head to bolt, I'm not strong enough to do anything about it and we are *all* going down.  So Lukie started taking her for her morning walk and then whoever has time is responsible for the evening.  It's not working.

She runs out the door whenever she can now and it is *impossible* to get her back.  Last night was one of these cases and it was scary.  She was gone for 2 hours while I was out tutoring; Lukie was taking care of gingersnap and minding our nephew.  It is nearly impossible to chase a dog that does not want to be caught with a toddler and a baby in tow (not that he didn't try) ...

It's the fear that makes this frightening.  If she was just running and enjoying life it wouldn't matter!  She's registered with our city so there's a little fine if she's found by someone other than us but who cares really.  Her fear makes her super unpredictable and if she felt she had been backed into a corner I don't know that I could say for certain that she wouldn't become agressive.

We love her to bits and pieces and are willing to do almost anything - but we don't even know where to start ...

An Apple a Day

At the beginning of the year, we started having SPUD delivering our produce and milk once a week.  It's pretty awesome.  Our deliveries are every Thursday and this means by Wednesday I'm looking to finish up the stuff from last week.  We have had some definite flops ... for example we will never put parsnips and beets in the same stir fry again :P

But last week I had a surprising success!

Firstly, please don't judge the colour of my cheese - I'm finishing up the last few boxes of Annie's mac and cheese that Lukie likes.  I would prefer if the focus is on what is added to it and the potential I feel this has if I made it properly!

The idea started with a recipe posted by Naturally Ella, and was changed based on my leftover SPUD veggies:

1. Sautée some onions and garlic together in EVOO on medium heat until the onions were translucent, then add a medium, peeled sliced up sweet potato.  Cook that until the sweet potato is soft, but not finished then add 1-2 sliced (not peeled) apples.  Finish of this concoction by adding 2 de-cased chorizo and continue leave on the heat until the sausages are cooked.
2. At the same time get your mac and cheese going, whether it be from a box or from scratch.
3. Get a bigger serving dish and mix the contents of both pots together, and lastly mix in a couple of generous handfuls of kale until it is wilted.

I only used kale because that's what I had, and I feel that it wilts just as nicely as spinach.  I added the chorizo because it's hard to sell Lukie on a vegetarian dinner (and who doesn't love chorizo ;) ) and the apple was added as an after thought because it was to soft to eat on its own but I really liked the combination!!

I think what I really love about this dinner is that very shorty it will be something that the whole family will be able to enjoy!  It's always at the back of my mind when I cook now - the more often there's only one dinner to prepare, the more successful I can be at getting us all fed!

Oodles of Toques

I've been on a sweater kick this year, but as of the last few weeks was having a hard time finding mojo for my fourth sweater of the year.  The answer (in the form of *many* bad pictures ... sorry - I am working on that ...)?

Toques!!!

The first two are for my mother-in-law.  She requested some this year and I *almost* never turn down a request ;)  The first one is the Pressed Leaves from Alana's new collection Botanical Knits made from some Madelinetosh DK in tart.  The next is the Antler Toque from Tin Can Knit's collection Pacific Knits (I want to make just about everything in this book ... but I digress).  I made it from Berocco Ultra Alpaca, trying to work through the last few balls in my stash.  My supply appears to be endless :P

Finally there's Selkie for the gingersnap for next fall/winter from Wooly Wormhead's upcoming collection Playful Wooly Toppers (with the first 3 patterns available now).  I *will* get a better picture of this one - I love it to bits and pieces and will be making it again.  It used up the perfect amount of scraps I had of Madelinetosh Vintage (light blue/Mourning Dove) and DK (dark blue/Stovepipe).

I think I can now get back to my sweater and not hate every moment of endless stockinette ... but that doesn't stop me from dreaming of the next project(s)!!