WIP Roundup - The Waiting

Today I'm sharing some of my other works in progress (WIPs). These are the projects I haven't worked on in the past week or so, but I plan to start working on again soon.

First up is my Rhapsody in Cables sweater.  I fell in love with this sweater as soon as the pattern was released and had to start it immediately!  I initially started it in the yarn I'm using for my Sweet Chilly sweater I talked about yesterday, but between the darkness and slight variegation of that yarn, the cables just weren't showing up well, so I ripped it out and started the Sweet Chilly with that yarn.  But I still really wanted to cast on this pattern, so I'm doing it now in some Morning Meadows yarn in a natural colorway I bought at SAFF in 2015.  I got started at the end of January, but then I started to realize I didn't have too long to finish all the things I wanted to finish before Frolic, so this one has gotten set aside for the past few weeks and doesn't look like much right now, but as soon as my Sweet Chilly sweater is done, this one is getting some serious attention.

 The next two projects that are getting ready to go back into the regular rotation are a couple of baby blankets.  My daughter is pregnant with her first child and due in June with a boy, so of course I'm making a blanket for him.  I don't think it will be any surprise to her if she sees this that I'm making him a blanket, but I will hold off disclosing the details until I've finished it and gifted it.  I'm hoping to get it finished by the time or shortly after he's born.

I've also got a blanket I started for my grandson (my son's son) when he was a couple of months old that's been hibernating way too long.  That's a Baby Dragon Blanket  that I'm making in Cascade 220 Sport.  I made him one blanket before he was born, but his older sister got two, including one with a castle on it when she was born, so I thought a dragon would be cool for him.  He'll be 2 in July so that's my artificial deadline for finishing it this year, and really 2 years old is the perfect age to appreciate a blanket with a dragon on it right?

I'm also planning to get back to spinning regularly as well.  I've currently got a gradient set from Three Waters Farm in progress, but I haven't spun in a while.  Here's what I've spun so far and the waiting fiber. 

Towards the end of last year I started working on counted cross stitch again.  I pulled out a couple of old projects that had been hibernating for years and started a couple of new ones, that are now hibernating.  But I signed up this year for the Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery's year long Happily Ever After pattern.  They send a portion of the pattern each month, and I started out doing well in January, but that's fallen by the wayside as well.  I want to get back to working on it again regularly so I don't get so far behind.  I still haven't finished January, so it will take a couple of months, but if I start actually working on it sometime soon it's possible.

So those are the things I plan to try to put some work into in the next few weeks, but sadly, they're not the only things in progress.  Next time I'll talk about the blankets.

Bits and Bobs from July

I don't know what I was thinking, but my only excuse for trying to start writing here again so close to crazy time at work was that when I wrote last I didn't yet realize that the final craziness was upon us.

The NCGA wrapped up their session around midnight, Friday, July 1, 2016, a month ago and I've spent the month of July recovering, at least I think I've recovered...almost.  I'm still feeling a bit brain dead most of the time, but it seems to be getting better.

We celebrated my grandson's first birthday at the beginning of the month, and in typical one-year-old birthday style, there was a lot of food, a lot of presents, and a lot of messy toddler.

Before the messy part

 The only other event of any note in July was a quilt class my mother and I took together this past Saturday.  One of my goals for the year was to learn to sew, and I've been slowly doing that.  My mother used to sew a lot when I was a child, but hasn't really in a long time.  She bought a new machine about the time I did and we took a mystery quilt class at the fabric store in Sanford this weekend, just to spend time doing something together.  I'll probably never finish the quilt, at least not the size it's supposed to be, but it was fun.  As usual, I had good intentions of taking some pictures, at least of my mother and I, but I totally forgot.  I'll insert a picture of what I got done sometime soon if I can remember to take it when I'm home.

Other than that, it's now August, and I need to get moving, literally.  I started taking a tap class again about 3 weeks ago, and so far I'm enjoying that.  Class right now is on Tuesday nights, but will shift to Monday nights in the fall.  So I should be able to attend until early January at least.  2017 is a long session year, so session will start in mid-late January and at that point Monday night classes won't be possible.  There is a Thursday night class, but it's more advanced, so if I feel I can keep up in that class by that point I may be able to switch to that.

I'm going to try this month to start getting back into an exercise habit.  Rob signed up for a 10K race the end of the month, so I signed up for the 5K FunRun with the intention of walking it.  Need to get some walking in before then though if I'm going to make it.  Just ordered a new swimsuit so I can start swimming laps again, and I'm considering making an appointment with a personal trainer if I can find one I like through the Y.  Grand plans for sure, we'll see if they actually happen.

Until next time....

Long Time Gone

The longer I go without blogging, the harder it seems to be to come back to it, primarily because I feel like I should tell you everything that's happened of any significance since the last time I posted.  But that's just not realistic, so here I am back again, and I'll hit a few highlights and we'll just pretend it hasn't been that long OK?

My son and his family are back North Carolina, at least for the next couple of years until the Army decides to send him somewhere else, so we've been able to spend more time with him, his wife and the grandkids.  I love my kids, I love my grandkids, but spending a few hours with the grands makes me glad I'm done with the kid-raising phase of my life.  The joy of being a grandparent is being able to enjoy some time with them then send them back home with Mom & Dad!

We took a trip to Louisiana in March to celebrate the 90th birthday of Rob's Aunt Sue.  It was good to see some of his family that we rarely see and my DIL was able to bring the grandkids down too even though my son couldn't get leave.  Sue is my MIL's sister and is quite a bit older than her, but you can see the family resemblance.

Rob & I celebrated our 16th anniversary last week, and I can't believe he's put up with me this long.  There are days it seems like our wedding was yesterday, and others when it feels like it's been forever.  But that's true of most marriages I suppose, but I'm glad he's stuck with me for yet another year.

I took a sewing class for a few weeks and have actually learned how to use my sewing machine, although it will be a long time for I feel like I have any degree of expertise. I've also attended a couple of fiber events this spring, but I'll talk more about those in separate posts.

Other than that, it's my busy time of year at work, so my hours are erratic.  Some days I work relatively normal hours and other days I work until late at night just to get things done that need to be done for the next day.  I've been in my current job over 20 years now, and although some days I would like to find something different, for the most part I still like my job, and every time I try to imagine doing something else I think of all the things I would miss about my current job.  I keep my eyes open for something else that might be interesting, but I've essentially resigned myself to being here another 9 years and 8 months at which point I can retire with full benefits, and hope to do so!

O.k. quick and dirty update done, more crafting and other tidbits to come, assuming I don't get totally distracted again right?

Finally FO Friday

After taking a couple of weeks off for the holidays, the last two weeks of work have seemed inordinately long.  So I'm glad it's finally Friday, and it's a 3-day weekend to boot!

I was feeling the need to work on some quick projects this week and get the sense of accomplishment that comes with actually finishing something, so I made up these three hats.  Aren't they adorable?! The blue & green monkey is for my 6-month old grandson, the pink & purple unicorn is for my 3-year old granddaughter, and the blue & white bear is for my 17-month old nephew.

The yarn is Top This! by DMC and it comes with the cute little animal heads to make these.  Each one knits up in just an hour or two, so I made these in three consecutive nights this week.  One caution if you want to make these, the pattern runs very small.  I actually knit the monkey one twice.  I had heard that the pattern ran small, so I knit the toddler size for my 6-month old grandson, but even that looked too small to me.  So I ripped it out and made the small child size for him, and I made the full child size for my granddaughter and nephew.  If they're a little big, that's always better than too small.

I'm hoping for a relaxing weekend.  I've got some yarn to ply off the bobbin so that I can get started on my Spin the Bin goals for 2016.  I finished spinning the singles last weekend, but didn't want to start spinning something else until this last thing left from last year is completely done.  I also need to sort and organize some clothes this weekend and see what can be donated. Finally, I want to get Scrivener reinstalled on my laptop because so far I have made no progress on my goal to actually write for 30 minutes 3 times per week.  I reloaded my laptop early in 2015 and I've never reloaded Scrivener, which tells you how little writing I've actually done in the past year.  Hoping to change that.

So that's it for today.  Happy Friday!

Holidays Approacheth

This week it has suddenly dawned on me that next week is Thanksgiving, and that means that Christmas is not far behind!

I have to be done with Christmas presents early this year since we're going to TX to spend it with our son and his family.  I want to ship most of the presents out there ahead of time rather than trying to pack them all in our luggage for the flight.

The trip will also be our first time meeting Cadence, our new granddaughter.  Isn't she adorable?!?!

So this week I've been trying to figure out what to get and/or knit for everyone on the Christmas list.  The knitting is the main thing I've got to figure out, as I've got to get started, but I don't want to plan more than I can actually do.  I think I've got the few knitted items figured out, including making the  yarn selections, and hope to get started this weekend.  I also need to finish up the baby blanket I've been working on FOREVER (well it seems that way) which is a really cute blanket but extremely slow and boring to knit, so I haven't worked on it as much as I should.

The only presents I'm having difficulty figuring out really are Rob's parents.  We won't actually see them on Christmas this year, but we're flying in and out of Charlotte, where they live, so we'll probably see them for a few hours the day after we get back, before we drive home.  They're always the hardest to buy something for, because I never know what to get them, and Rob is no help!

I'm sad that for the 3rd year in a row we will not have a Christmas tree at our house.  Last year I swore we would have one this year because I really love the decorating part of Christmas, but it's another year of it being just not practical to put one up since we will be gone.  I don't think I'll even put up my outside lights this year, although I might change my mind about that after Thanksgiving.

Decorations or not, Christmas is always one of my favorite times of year, and I'm sure this year will be no different.  How can it be bad when I get to spend it with this cutie pie?

In a Nutshell

I keep meaning to take the time to post here, but every time I think about it, I get overwhelmed by the number of things that I have not yet blogged about and I don't know where to begin.

So here is the past 2 months or so in a nutshell, and mostly chronological order.....

• Had a great visit to the John C. Campbell Folk School, where I learned to tat.
• Became a grandmother on September 19 to Cadence Annette Sitze.
• Had a knock down doors and shoot up bad guys good time at the Writer's Police Academy.
• Turned 44 years old and got an iPad from Rob, which I'm still learning how to best use. (I'm typing this post on it now.)
• Went to the land of cheese (i.e. Wisconsin) for a work related conference.
• Went to a corn maze with Rob, my brother, his wife and my 3 nieces.  
• Went to SAFF with my knitting group. My first visit, but definitely not my last!
• Spent this past weekend hanging out with my daughter and her boyfriend.
• Spent a couple of nice Saturdays hanging out with Rob and going to a fall festival, an antique tractor show & a local historic site.
• Did a lot of knitting.
• Have had the "crud", a cold, and now a chronic cough.

Overall, a good couple of months, other than the cold & cough bit.  So now that I've caught you all up, maybe I can get back to writing here on a regular basis.  And some of these events may show up again in more detail.