Crafting On

Well, sometimes my work and my leisure get to intersect, and this was one of those times. 

I am teaching a class on Grettir, a sweater by Jared Flood of Brooklyn Tweed.

While I was planning out how to teach knitting fair isle in the round without a color jog I realized that if I cast on a few repeats of the yoke chart, in this case six repeats, I'd end up with a little tree.

Now I am all fired up to make lots of these with different yoke patterns and then I can have a fair isle forest decorating my Christmas village this year.

So, I ended up with an item that was very helpful as a class tool, but can also be completely frivolous at Christmas time.
What are you creating today?
Joining up with Nicole at Frontier Dreams

43/52

The Eldest - Airborne
The Youngest - Surprise face at the zoo
The Younger - He is Ironman
Late to the party with Jodi for 52 portraits

Crafting On

I've been so busy the past few weeks with work that I haven't had much of a chance to do any crafting.
I decided that's not o.k. with me, so in a few stolen moments since Saturday I cast on and started knitting a little dress for The Youngest.
The multi-colored yarn was a gift from a friend. She messaged me on Ravelry a couple of weeks ago asking if I could use some Kauni Effektgarn. I am never one to turn down yarn, so I said yes!
When the package came it was bursting with all sorts of yarny goodness.

I decided that I needed to make The Youngest a fair isle sweater with the Kauni with another yarn as a foil.
The yarn I settled on (with help from my boss and co-worker) is Alpaca 2 from Isager.
It's so soft, it'll balance the hard texture of the Kauni.
As I was perusing patterns I came across a little dress with a stranded yoke.
So, of course, I switched it up and now it's going to be a dress.
I found a pattern on Ravelry for a fair isle yoke pattern,

and using that as a template I am going to add in some patterns of my own.
I don't plan on knitting the hearts or the squirrels, but I am going to add the paper doll ladies from the sweater on the cover of Rowan Summer Baby and maybe the squiggles and vines. I haven't decided yet.

What's on your needles today?
Joining Nicole with KCCO.

42/52

The Youngest - We were at dinner and all I could think of was "By the third kid, you know, you let them juggle knives" from Parenthood (the movie, not the tv show)
The Younger - All set for Halloween
The Elder - Pippi Longstocking in the pillow pit
As Jodi pointed out, there's only 10 more weeks in this project (and the year) I can't believe how fast it's gone.
52 portraits

Mama Had a Little Lamb

I hope your fall is glorious where you are, out there in internet land, because it's sublime here. 

Perfect for a walk around the lake,

or through our neighborhood. (a Halloween costume is a great substitute for a warm sweater in a pinch)

In other news - 

This little lady is the joy of my day-to-day.

She is now eighteen months old. 

There is so much happening.

New foods (she loves chicken soup with rice), new friends, lots and lots of new words.

The other night while I was attempting to start night-weaning I held her close and said "Now it's time to get into your cribby, are you ready?" 

Her reply - "No: Hug, Milk"

It's going to be a grand thing when she is finished up with that 2 AM feeding.

I haven't slept through the night in about 19 months, and it's starting to affect my work.

Be well, friends.

41/52

The Youngest - Hanging with the punkin's
The Younger - Chillin at the playground
The Elder - 4th grade has lots of homework.

Joining Jodi for a belated 52 portraits.

6 years

Today is my 6th bloggy birthday.
I celebrated by stopping at the fifth lamp on my way home from school, and what a view was there to greet me!

The leaves are just about at peak color, and the grumpy weather is breaking up.
What fun I have here in my little corner of the internet.
Thanks for hanging out with me for these 6 eventful years.

40/52

It was too hard to narrow these down this week.
Dropping off and picking up at school, we end up spending all of our together time at the playground.
In other news, The Elder started band last week, and this but they didn't play their instruments until Tuesday.
The Younger is almost always in motion. It's tricky to get a shot of him at rest.
Also, I couldn't resist the self-portrait by The Youngest.