Nothing

I have nothing to update with. I'm working on a few things. But mostly everything is in progress. I hope to have a cross stitch done sometime this weekend. At which point, I can start on a cross stitch design of my own. It will make absolutely no sense to most people, but be fairly hilarious to Ravelry Rubberneckers. I was inspired by a cross stitch sampler that was "Internet" themed to make a Rubbernecker themed sampler. Hopefully it works out. I am having trouble deciding what color I want the background to be.

One thing I have finished, I can't show. Although it is only 1/2 of a pair, it is also a Christmas present. I just hope it fits. And look at me working on Christmas presents in September. I think I'll only have about 7 presents to make this year. I don't think it will be quite so crazy this year.

I went to the Greek Festival today. Spanakopita and Flogeres for the win. Mostly because they are like the only things I will attempt to pronounce. And the gyro line was about 45 minutes long. I did get some roast lamb. Although the mixed pastries box will keep me very very happy for a while. Nom, nom, nom...

I lied! Speaking of Nom noms, I made my chocolate covered caramel apples. They are so tasty. I get granny smith apples (the tartness goes really well with how sweet the toppings are). I use the caramel wraps from walmart (much easier than dipping into caramel, less prep and less mess). Then I get the chocolate wafers from AC Moore and dip them in. The first one is dipped in milk chocolate then rolled in pecans and then milk and white chocolate was drizzled on it. The second one is dipped in white chocolate and sprinkled with cinammon and brown sugar. So good.

Some Big Pimpin'

I would like to take a moment to pimp an awesome photographer/friend of mine, Justin Brock. He is currently showing some of his more artsy photography at the Java Joint for the rest of September. He also sells prints of what he is showing at his fabulous Etsy store, here.

I'm not sure, but I imagine most money from being a photographer comes from doing shoots for people and weddings. At least when I was looking for a wedding photographer, it seems like they would make a lot of money that way. Anyway, Justin wanted some practice taking pictures of people. In exchange for being his practice, we got our pictures free. We definitely got the better end of the deal.

We got some great pictures. I liked so many of them, I had trouble narrowing down to 4 to send as samples to my family. And they all loved them and want more. It helps that we know them, but everything was very easy going. And in between all the cheesy, loving couple pictures he was able to capture more candid ones that were great. Of course, the cheesy ones looked really good too. I just like the more candid feeling. Less posey. And of course we just looked more comfortable and better when we weren't posing ourselves.

It's Here!

My Fancy Kitty Kitten drumcarder has arrived. Actually it got here on Monday. I loves it. I've already been playing on it. Zach even said how fast my carding was going. He seemed very impressed.








The first batts I made on it. I had been trying to do some fiber blending with my handcards and sort of gave up because there was so much. Took me one night. It is a blend of some blue and brown corridale and natural brown alpaca. Lovely smooshy and soft. Yay!





And just to make myself feel even better, I finished my socks. Yay! Now I can start working on some Christmas socks. If I start now I might finished by Christmas.

Happy Birthday to Me!

My birthday was back on the 16th and I just wanted to say super thank you to everyone. I felt so spoiled and loved. I know I'm not supposed to be selfish and "it is better to give than to receive" but I really love my birthday and getting presents. But even without all of the presents, it would have been great. I really felt the love. And that pancake sundae was huge!!!

And to my SnB girls, you probably saw most of this on Ravelry already, but you get it again just so you know it isn't just the fiber fumes and PMS making me all weepy. I have been blessed every day since you first came into my life a year and a half ago. I hadn't had any really close girl friends since college and I was getting to the point I really needed some and POOF there you all were. You all make me a better person and a much happier person just by your presence. Pretty much the highlight of me week is Thursday and seeing all of you.

But now to the swag I got, because some people have been bugging me to see the pretties I got.

First I'll give the hubby some props. A ballwinder to go with my swift. yay! And a really neat crochet motif book. I think that was added on so he could get free shipping when he ordered the "Colour of Magic" DVD. Very worth it.

I got some fabulous sock yarn. It is by Christina Marie Potter. The colorway is in her Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy line and is called "Marvin". Perfect colors.

Jess got me a book of crochet patterns. Looking through it, it seems to be more stitch motifs than actual patterns. But they have some really neat lace patterns and seeing how I am obsessed with crocheting lace right now. Very cool. And she knit me another square for my blanket. If I ever get out from under all the stuff I HAVE to knit, I need to make a few more squares and start to get that sewn up.

And some fabulosity from Butterfly Girl Designs. My goodness these batts are scrumptious. Especially the Rocky Road (bottom one), it is filled with every sort of softness. Not that the purple one is in any way not soft.

Hobbledehoy Batts. I've been lusting after some of these batts for a while. Now that I have them, I was totally justified in my lusting. These ones have some yak fiber in them. Batts I've been wanting for a while, fiber I've never tried. Win, win.

Ok, first, these socks are hilarious. We can't quite figure out what went wrong. They appear to be Christmas oriented socks that should have said "Ho, Ho, Ho". As you can tell, they do not. Unless you are the person wearing them. When I look down at my socks, they are spelled right. I call them my "Oh" socks. (Office Space reference, ftw). Becca also got me Friday Night Knitting Club (which I have not read) and a super cute window decal that I did not get a picture of. It says "crafty geek" and here is the store she got it from. They are all so cute. It is a shame she doesn't have one that says "Craft Hoar". I think Dana would approve.

And although no one got this for me, I consider it a present. It arrived from the publisher on my birthday. My pattern is in the 2010 Crochet Pattern-a-Day calendar. Woot!

And there are unfortunately presents I didn't get pictures of (yay for fiestaware), but I loved them all. And I was even able to buy myself a little present. Ta Da! She shipped today. ZOMG! I can't wait. Funny story. My friend Grace and I had been wanting drum carders and have been talking about them and trying to find used ones and all that. Well, I finally bit the bullet last night. I had to make Zach push the "Commit to Buy" button because it was a lot of money. But I found out this morning that Grace bought hers last night too. Great minds really do think alike. I also picked up some silk noil and a llama fleece. Cause I really need more fleece before I even get what I have processed. But I am thinking of starting an Etsy store selling fiber batts. I think I need some practice before I do that. Anyone have any suggestions of what they would like in a batt that isn't already out there?

very busy

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Life has been busy to say the least. Lots of traveling and just some general laziness when I get home from work. I haven't even had enough time/motivation to play Farmtown. Plus in our travels we were able to kidnap all of Zach's Terry Pratchett Discworld novels. So I have been distracted by those in the evenings.

Here is where we went to visit Bill and Lauren in their new house. Didn't get any pictures of the house but I did get a picture of Zach snuggling with Heidi's arch-nemesis. :) Actually I think it is totally fair that Pixie is showing Heidi how pesty she was when she was a puppy. Pixie always wants to play and fight. So to be honest I don't think this picture was really snuggling more than it was holding Pixie down so Heidi could have a moment.

And they like a day later, we went to Zach's parents so we could attend a wedding of a college friend. Doesn't Zach look handsome in a tux. Awwwww...

They also gave us some yummies from their garden. I can't wait until I can attempt to not kill plants. They gave us a ton of tomatos and the biggest zuchinni I have ever seen. We were able to get 6 cups of it shredded for zuchinni bread and we still had enough to have a very filling meal of just grilled zuchinni. Craziness.

And I finished a hat. It is the Hermione Loves Ron hat. It is based on the hat that Hermione wears in the 6th Harry Potter movie. Her's is grey, but I really love this yarn. It is Knitpicks DK swish in Clematis Heather. It is mostly purple with pretty much every other color in there somehow. I do love Knitpicks heather colorways.

I have become obsessed with crocheting lace shawls. This one is the Crocus Bud Lace Shawl. I am using Skacel Merino lace that I dyed myself with wilson's cake icing dyes. Love. After the chain cast on and the first row, it is just a repeat of row two until you run out of yarn or your brain falls out. Considering how in love with this yarn and color I am, I am prediciting the end of the yarn. It is a great project for SnB since it is one row consisting of two stitches. I can, for the most part, work on this and talk without screwing it up. For the most part.

The only thing with crocheted shawls is that they require a lot more yardage than knit shawls. But again thanks to Knitpicks I was able to get about 1300 yards of merino/silk lace weight for about 12 dollars. Love (1) This will someday become the Solaris Shawl. It is undyed because I plan to attempt to dip dye this to get a gradiated color change from the bottom edge to the top. Wish me luck on this crazy idea/endevor. It seems like a really good idea now. But I can overdye if it sucks.

And then there was more traveling for my birthday. Here is my dad riding an out of order horse backwards. We were waiting to go to dinner. I didn't get a good picture of my brother otherwise you would get one of those as well. I'll be doing a separate post for my birthday. I felt very spoiled and want the chance to shout out to everyone.

Piggyback

A friend is having a contest in honor of her birthday, to get donations for the Interim House Inc. in the form of yarn and knitting and crochet implements.

In honor of my birthday, I am going to help spread the word. So go here to find out more about how to enter to win. I am in the process of putting my box together, which is conviniently coming at a time after I just went through my stash. Woohoo!

Blanket time

Sorry it has been so long. The last time I tried to do a post, Blogger wouldn't save and there are a lot of pictures to upload and I didn't want it all to go to waste. So today I shall regale you with my awesome Ron blanket squares that I received from all over. Mostly it will just be a lot of pictures with some links if I have their blog and stuff. If they have what appears to be a strange name, it is because I am using their Ravelry name.

This is my ballband dishcloth. I decided I liked the colors so much I was going to turn it into a blanket square








Another square by me. Knitted Bobbles the Sheep square. I have decided I do not like knitting bobbles.






This square is from the swap and is by SpinningAthena.








Square from swap by SamSaraKnitter









Square from lovely knitting group member Sam. This is made from some of her first handspun. I love it.







Swap square by MOEgirl198.









Swap square by Kreachr









Square by knitting group gal, Jess









Swap square by Jane-H-Potter









Mitered square by me out of some of my first handspun.









Square by knitting group gal, Haley











Square by knitting group girl, Dana










Random square by me.











Tapestry crochet square by me.









Swap square by Biogrrl









Swap square by Angie01









Swap square by Apicklenose

Swap square by Befriendmantic

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