All Good Things...

I've been sick for about a month. Which made me very cranky. Very, very cranky. I try not to spread the cranky around. It's no one else's problem that I'm so damn cranky, that's my philosophy (doesn't always translate to husbands though). So just like the movie Groundhog Day where we learned the little pearl of wisdom, 'don't drive angry', I try not to blog cranky. Hmmm...maybe that's why I blog so little anymore. *pause to consider this thought*

Recently though, the sun has finally come out and I've been able to get outside and enjoy our epic deck (it really is depic...have I ever told you about the deck?) and I haven't been cold enough for sweaters or mittens or any sort of wooly, layering type clothing at all. As a matter of fact, yesterday I got half a sunburn. Yes, only the right half of me is burnt. I was sitting partially under the table umbrella, engrossed in the fact that it was the middle of the day and everyone was sleeping (the toddler because she's growing, the husband because he got called out twice the night before and didn't get home till 9am) and I had, what felt like, the whole world to myself. Just me, the sun, the birds and my sock.

As I sat there in my little reverie, it occurred to me, without overstating this too much, that despite how utterly craptacular I've been feeling lately and how focused on that I've been, I've got an awful lot to be grateful for and most of the time, without even realizing it, dreams really come true.

When we bought this ramshackle, run-down, sad, sorry, ugly stepsister of a house four years ago, all I saw beyond the cobwebs and the dust and OhEmGee the dirt was potential. I saw my dream house. Wasn't hard for it to live up to that standard. At that time, my dream house was just a place to call our own. Check. As we started to clear away the cobwebs and sweep up the dirt (and tear down plaster and rip out lath and sand floors and put up drywall and paint and paint and paint), my visions started to take shape and slowly over time, I've seen them materialize into concrete reality.

And it has been slowly. So slowly that it really drives me bonkers some days. But then we have a day, like the other day, where we finish up something, or get it to a point where you can allow yourself to get excited about the fact that maybe sooner than you thought, it really will be finished.

See, our kitchen has this big picture window. In front of that window sits my little kitchen table and chairs. Outside that window used to be the rotten and punky deck that was hideous and unsafe and really only good for going back and forth to the shed. I used to sit at my kitchen table and dream about the day when we'd have a nice deck, one that wasn't terrifying, and when I could look out that window across to the wall of the shed and instead of seeing bare plywood, I'd see siding and in front of that, container gardens full of kitcheny goodness; herbs, tomatoes, small veg. That sort of thing.




Well, there's the deck at the end of summer 2010...(kitchen window over by the 'chimney')


...and from the scraps of decking etc., the constable built me the first of three container gardens to sit across from my kitchen window. His own design, which all in all was rather ingenious. It's on casters so I can roll them around (since they are rather big and heavy) and there is storage underneath with doors on the opposite side so all of my gardening crap is right there where I need it.



T'would appear as though I have a helper as well. And an enthusiastic one at that. Here she is helping me get the plants in while her dad finishes up the container.

For yesterdays supper, I harvested my first bunch of herbs for my homemade pizza crust (pizza on the grill...divine) and a few sprigs of mixed greens for my salad. Really looking forward to those tomatoes so I can make the pizza sauce too ;)

As for knitting, I really did make May Mitts.



The yarn is an alpaca silk blend, so these are crazy soft, cozy and warm. I'm actually quite happy to report that shortly after they were finished, I had little occasion to wear them. Pattern is just improvised to fit my own hands/forearm.



I've recently gotten over a hump with this sweater as well. I started this in September of 2009 and have had stops and starts with it ever since. The end is in sight however. Once I managed to figure out how to count to three on a consistent basis, it practically flew off the needles. Oh fair isle, how I love thee. Let me count the ways (one...when you're going smoothly).



While I'm not exactly finishing a pair per month for my Self Imposed Sock Club, I am still cranking out pairs of socks, the latest being these Owlie Socks, which has been a very satisfying knit. Quick, easy, cute...love them. Love the yarn too. Got it in a swap, not 100% sure what it is, but have been told it is most likely Lucy Neatby. These are definitely for me, and I see myself knitting these again in the future. Not exactly making much head way on the gift sock knitting front. Ah well.

That should get me caught up for now. Now if you excuse me, in contrast to yesterday, I have a non-sleeping 2 yr. old who has done nothing but yell at me from her bedroom upstairs for the past hour and a half. Time to pull the plug on today's nap I think. Le sigh.

Until later...

Twenty-two...

So she's five months old now. Crazy. She had her first big belly laugh last weekend, watching Hank play fetch. She eats food, she can say 'dada', though she hasn't associated it with her dad just yet. We're working on it, she seems interested. I've started doing a bit of sign language with her, she watches me pretty intently. We watched an episode of The Muppets a few days ago, she laughed at Gonzo. She likes listening to me read her story books and when her father walks in the room, she only has eyes for him. She can roll over but we're pretty convinced she just doesn't want to. She sits in her high chair in the kitchen now, and her bouncy chair has been retired to her bedroom, as has the bassinet that stayed beside my bed long after she had moved to her crib. It's now filled with stuffed animals. We got rid of the midnight feeding a week or so ago, and it took her all of one night to start sleeping 12 hours straight through (she was pretty much there already...we were waking her up to feed her). I've already packed up two totes of her itty bitty clothes, including most of the hand-knits I'd made for her. I'll admit, it was a little emotional.

The last few weeks since returning home from Ontario have been less than stellar. Teething, the heat, growth spurt and vaccinations (a little overdue since we were away) all contributed to a very unhappy baby, the past few days especially. Very little sleep...on both our parts. But she seems back to her usual bubbly, happy self this morning so keep your fingers crossed for us. I feel like I've aged significantly this past week.



Remember this post? Well, I finally got around to painting and mounting them. I'm quite pleased with them. Matches the whole little letter theme I've got going on with her crib set as well.

No other crafting to speak of really. I'm working away on some plain ribbed socks, finishing up some sewing for my nephew and plugging away at the Babette blanket that I took with me but did not touch once on our massive road trip. I'm starting to get really anxious for it to be done, but in a good way. I think it's going to be quite pretty once it's finished and I'm looking forward to seeing the whole thing put together.

If I get around to dragging it out this weekend, I'll post about my new toy. It's quite something. That outta keep you hanging. Until later...

The End of the 4th Trimester...

A weird angle, but she fell asleep in my lap like this and I thought it was rather amusing.

So six weeks. Sort of a bittersweet milestone. Some refer to it as the 4th trimester, the 'getting to know this wonderful little weirdo' phase. You'd think that the giving birth part would feel like the end of the pregnancy, but it sort of feels like the six week mark is. Getting the pregnancy out of your head seems to take a little while, and as odd as it sounds, even to me, there were times when I quite missed it. You can't ever be as close to another human like that and while there is a whole litany of things that suck about it to be sure, there are an equal number of things are quite wonderful. So it's with just a tinge of sadness that it now seems to be officially over and onward and upward into the great unknown we go.

A is doing great. She's discovered her hands and likes to chomp on them when she's hungry. She's smiling a lot more and cooing a whole bunch and is just generally content most of the time when she's awake. She's grown out of a handful of her sleepers already and has slept 7 hours the last three or four nights in a row. Crazy. Yesterday we took a big two hour trip to do some shopping in Bayers Lake and she pretty much slept through the whole day. It was awesome. I'm a worrier, I seem to enjoy envisioning worst case scenarios, which actually may work in my favour sometimes. She was so easy and relaxed and content that the day turned into an exceptionally wonderful outing for me, as I had foreseen any number of stressful or awkward outcomes. And the added bonus? I now have jeans that fit. Yay me. I'm not *quite* fitting into my own pre-preg. pants just yet and rather than walk around feeling conspicuous and overstuffed, I opted for comfort. Better than arguing with myself over whether or not to commit the ultimate fashion faux pas; going out in public in pajama pants.



While in Bayers Lake, I hit up Michael's, as I had wanted to get some wooden letters for A's room. I want to put these up over her crib. I'm either going to paint them to match the colours in her room, (crimson, light green, light blue...one in each colour) or leave them white. Thoughts? As of right now, I can't make up my mind.



Work on my Clapotis (pronounced CLAP-oh-TEE in case anyone was wondering) is coming along swimmingly. It's dead easy, that is, once I figured out what the hell I was doing. Complete mental block when I started this. I think I ripped it three times before I figured out what I was doing wrong. Duh. Seriously, brain turning to mush over here. I really really need to start reading more. And not just knitting mags. and patterns. In any case, I'm loving this project all because of the yarn. It's soooo luxurious. Sheds like the dickens, but soft and warm and I can't wait to wrap myself up in this.



And because I can't leave well enough alone, I've started another baby sweater, another top-down cardigan, again with the Jr. Jacquards. Hey, the yarn shop was having a sale, what can I say. This one will likely be for my nephew. His big sister got all kinds of hand-knits when she was wee, I feel it only fair that he get some too.

That's the round-up for this week. They're going by so fast I can hardly keep up. Until later...

Floats like a butter fly, stings like a

Five weeks old

BEE :0)

A has about a total of fifteen minutes of happy awake time at this point in her life (spread out over the whole day...you get five minute doses at a time and had better make the most of it), and on Tuesday I was able to capture it on...geez, can't even say film anymore. Capture it on...memory card? It was crazy hot here, like 30+ degrees or something like that and it was just a fluke that I ended up putting this little sun suit on her. It usually stays pretty cool in the house, so until about midday, I was unaware of how warm it was outside. I had A in a long sleeved onesie and overalls, and had she not spit up all over herself, we may never have known just how bee-autiful she could, um, well, bee. I got lots of smiles for this little photo shoot. I think there's at least ten in this series alone.

The post is a day late, but days get long sometimes, ya know? A is doing that cluster feeding thing at the moment, which is making doing anything else pretty irrelevant. I've tried explaining to her that as unfortunate a circumstance as it may be, formula is a bit on the pricey side and would she mind just finishing up the bottles I make for her in a timely manner? I don't think our little talk was effective. Her father and I had also to have a little sit down with her about the virtues of sleep at around 2:30-3:30 am this morning. It took a few hours, most of a bottle and two poopy diapers before that conversation sunk in.



Anyway...knitting. Some FO's. The Blackrose socks are done. Love.



As are the Chevron Lace baby socks. Adorable.



As is this oldie-mouldy from a-way back. This is that baby hoodie I've been yacking about for months, sans hood. Just needs buttons at this point, of which I don't have five of any one kind. Grr. And as I've said before about it, meh.



Then I got on a bib jag there for a few days. Crochet even. A can be a bit of a cuddle monster, sleeping only on or beside me and crochet can be somewhat safer in that it's a blunt hook instead of a pointy sticks near soft and squishy baby parts. But they work up so fast and so bloody cute that I'm finding myself a bit obsessed. I'm planning on gifting them. The green and white is Bernat Handicrafter and I had some Bernat Cottontots yarn in yellow and white in the stash that I burned through. Then I found some lime green buried in a stash box yesterday and I got unreasonably excited about the prospect of making another one. I'd like to thank Carrie for inspiring the bib jag. She's been making them herself and sent me a few, but it wasn't until I was staring at my offspring, regurgitating her lunch for the umpteenth time, wearing one of these kinds of bibs that I thought 'hey, I could make that too.'

I've also decided to finally get on the Clapotis bandwagon. I'm what, only five years behind? What can I say, I like to mull things over. And nearly 11 000 Ravelers can't be wrong...can they? Perhaps I am still a bit dense in the head from pregnancy (sure, blame it on that) but I'm not getting where the dropping stitches comes in. At the end? I thought you did it as you went. Perhaps I should read ALL the way through the pattern. Oh the yarn? Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk DK. Mmmm...soft and squishy. And it should be really warm too. I bought a bag of it on impulse last summer and have been staring at it ever since going...now what? Finally ready to commit. I'll let you know how it goes.

Until later...

Two...

I was scolded last night at Knit Nite for not being more prompt in posting some two week photos of little miss. I may have created a monster here with my promise of weekly photos. But yesterday was a busy day for all of us. Doctor's appt. in the morning and then we decided to see how a shopping trip to Bridgewater (approx. 30 min drive away) would go. It went well. We wrapped up our errands just as she was getting hungry and cranky, so there was only a few minutes of screaming until we got back on the highway. Overall, Miss Bean is a well behaved little social butterfly. In this last week, she's been to her first social get together, her first Knit Nite and can now include Shoppers Drug Mart and WalMart in her litany of Marts that she's visited.

Onesie courtesy of Carrie @ Carrie's Work Basket. CBC logo...that girl totally gets me (well, CBC Kids logo...same diff). See Heddy? She does have eyes. And they do open from time to time.

Blogging temporarily interrupted by thoroughly horrifying dirty diaper. I had no idea just how psychologically scarring those could be.

Yes, my wee one seems to enjoy being in a crowd. Just sleeps the whole time, totally content amongst the chatter and the noise and being passed about. Only problem with that seems to be when we get home, where it's apparently TOO quiet for her liking and she's up and cranky when her parents would like to be settling down for the night. C'est la vie. That's the whole parenting gig I suppose.

So, things I've learned over the last two weeks;

-I'm not ready to give up elasticized waist band pants just yet. And I'm not even sure that is possible at this point. The landscape of my belly is now so foreign to me, and I'm totally befuddled as to where to go next in the clothing department. I suspect that there may be a market for a post-partum shop, much like maternity wear. I can't conceive of any regular pant on the market that would a) be comfortable in my current state or b) be at all flattering.

-This may be in direct relation to the previous point, but I think I might be enjoying spending most of the day in my robe a little too much.

-I'm learning to really not mind (perhaps bordering on even enjoy) the taste of cold coffee.

-I had no inkling that baby poop could be that colour. I'm guessing that this is because she is a formula fed baby (can't nurse, long story...okay, not so long but just don't feel like telling it...no judging please).

-She's a very easy going baby who sleeps like ninety-nine percent of the time and I'm still exhausted. Hats off to you parents out there who stick it out through colic. Jebus.

-That it is entirely possible to be absolutely desperate to and yet not give a rat's ass about cleaning one's house, all at that same time. How does that work?

-That two seemingly well-adjusted adults can be reduced to blithering idiots any time their offspring does something remotely cute or indicative of intelligence.

-One of the side effects of giving birth that they don't tell you about is that you will, under no control of your own, add a 'Y' sound to all words concerning the baby. Example; Diaper = diapey; spit-up = spitty.

Anyway...it's an adventure. Occasionally I find a few minutes to knit. Actually, I was never one to really enjoy car knitting (little bit of motion sickness) but the last few trips of any length have yielded quite a bit of progress. Behold...


Blackrose by Suzi Anvin from Knitty Winter 2008; Fleece Artist somethingorother...it was a gift.

I wasn't really digging on this pattern for the longest time, but for some reason, when I started on the foot, it all kinda came together for me. I think this is the right foot. With this pattern, the lace motif falls on opposite sides of the leg, so there is a definite right and left foot. Which is kinda cool.

Alrighty, bloggy time is over. Someone is awake and cranky. Until later...