White Picket Fence

Balance

Hello everyone :)  I'm hoping you are having a great week!  For me this week has been super busy with work and home life.  S had to fly off on Saturday to see his mom who was in the hospital.  She's back home now but he is still up north and will be back by Tuesday I hope.  He was suppose to be back tomorrow but decided it was best to stay a few more days with the family. 

A and I have been keeping busy with homework, movies and many cuddles with kitties and each other.  The weather has been so crazy this week.  Very warm for this time of year.  However that has completely done a 360 and now it's terribly cold, windy and rainy.  So windy in fact it completely turned up my heavy duty umbrella!  It's snowing further north and I would so love to see some of that white stuff here.  Pretty sure we won't though. 

I finished working on a granny square blanket that I made for a coworker's baby shower that was today.  I think the colors turned out really well together.  It was my first ever crochet completed project and I really enjoyed working on it.  The colors I chose to use you wouldn't think would go really well together. 

Rows of denim, white, navy, purple and pink.  I'm hoping that she will love it!  It's not a huge blanket because I made it more for outings and to be used with a car seat or stroller to knock off the cold and wind. 

I didn't get to go to the shower since I needed to get home quickly since A is coming home from school.  And Thursday's are my usual knit night with the gals so I won't be going out - and in all truth I prefer not to go out in this weather tonight anyway.  So with that in mind I am having my own knit night by myself - just me and my ripple and truly am so excited!  I haven't been able to work on it much this week.  Just a touch last night before bed.  I can see in my future a snuggly me on the sofa with my blanket, a roaring fire and a cup of hot tea. . . now that is an ending to a busy fulfilled day.

January Random

I just got my Laura Ashley calendar that I ordered and I'm so excited to turn to a brand new year.  Full of a fresh new start that I really do need.  I think I will start out each month with a picture from my new calendars.  I just purchased a new magazine that a friend recommended to me called Molly Makes.  All I have to say is my friend was right on that I would love it.  The edition came with a calender too so I hung that one in my kitchen on the frig. I love January's photo and the caption "A New Year's Resolution Goes in One Year and out the other"  That is so true!

I'm not one to make resolutions year after year.  What I like to do is add additional loveliness to my days with new habits or to do more of something that I really love.  2012 I wanted to lose weight like everyone else but I looked at it in a very different way.  I wasn't dieting all year, no not me!  I was just eating healther, making better choices.  I did do really well when I look back now and lost weight as a result.  This year I'm determined to add more color to my life.  Yes that is exactly what I need!  Just look at the calendars - I just love all the fabric and ribbon goodness to this photo, it just makes my heart sing!

I wanted to give you a nice long look into my random morning I had.  Just quick pics of everything around me that was happening -

The one above totally unedited and you can see a bit of my soap making supplies there.  I hate that part of my kitchen/den.  Total eye sore and don't know what to do other than let it be.  One day I will figure out a way to hide it all. 

I stopped by Joanns today to browse but ended up buying the magazine and the book below.  It's full of granny goodness and I couldn't not get it!  Just look at those colors!  It's by Catherine Hirst and I have never seen a book by her but I must say that she has the same tastes as I do. 

Just look at this tea pot cosy below.  What's not to love?  I want to make this but I don't even have a tea pot so I best get one of those eh?  That cupcake is making me so hungry for something sweet now.

I did buy more yarn yesterday,  can you believe it?  I can't I have so much yarn now that I haven't done anything with but I want to make a blanket out of a merino cash mix and saw this new yarn by cascade so I am going to try that brand and see how I like.  It was on sale too so I snatched up several balls of colorful goodness!  Can't wait until I get it and show you. 

What do you think of my additional color I've added to my life?  I just loooove it!  I picked it up from the grocery store this afternoon.  Here's to my fresh start for the year....

Saturday Walk

 

A and I went down to the locks today.  I have never been here and have heard so many say how wonderful it is there.  It's just a short drive down the road from us so with having lovely weather I loaded A up into the car and we walked down the hill to the locks. 

The town we live in has a canal running through it and this is the very beginning and as you can see has been around for a very long time.  It is so tranquil here and the roar of the rushing water completely sent my stress away that had been bottled up all week.

 

This is the Headgates Lock built 1845.  I don't know what it is about the semi circle of stone but I just had to take a picture of this.

This is the 1875 Gate House and Locks and was quite the site!  This is where most of the River flows into the canal and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want to fall into the current there!  It was very breath taking see the power of water as it jetted by. 

The river in all it's glory :)   and below shows just how down it is now.  The trees looks so grey and bare now.  Many of the trees are covered in spanish moss which really adds to the grey tones.

Stepping stone for A.

The towpath.  Horses would pull the boats through the canal on this path.  Today it's used for jogging, biking and walking.  There were many people there today which surprised me.  I didn't realize how many come down here.  It was actually difficult to get a picture because I didn't want to get lots of people in them!

We saw this brightly orange colored canoe docked.  The water isn't completely still since it was a bit breezy.

We came upon a flock of beautiful white birds resting on the rocks in the middle of the river.  A was beside herself wanting to talk to the birds.

At the edge of the park was this gorgeous creek that empties into the canal.  I just love waterfalls!

Beautiful green palms around the canal are about the only bright colors we saw today. 

A and I had a great time trecking along the canal today!  I can see this is going to become a favorite spot :)  I enjoy getting out and feeling the crisp, cool winter air.  It wasn't cold but cool enough for a light jacket.  I'm really excited to visit here during other parts of the year to see how the scenery changes through the seasons. 

I think tonight will be a good night to relax by the fireplace and get some knitting done perhaps.

Until next time, thanks for dropping by :)

 

A New Year

Well the first day of the year is a grey and dreary day.  I actually love this time of year and while others may find that a tad odd all I know is I enjoy the cool, crisp air and how it feels just a bit darker throughout the day.  It looked like it could rain at any moment all day and I was waiting to hear the drip, drip, drip but it never did.  We actually spent most of the day putting up Christmas decorations. 

And such colorful babbles they are!  Normally I feel a bit sad putting up the decorations after the holidays are over but for whatever reason this year I just didn't have it in me.  I won't lie I just didn't feel in the spirit.  I had all the best intentions to take photos of the front of the house with the garland and bows decorating the fence but never got to it.  Even for Halloween my soul just wasn't in me.  I am very determined to shake this off!  Get back to my usually excited self. 

One thing I love about this time of year is lighting the fireplace.  So warm and cozy and I plan to spend the rest of the night knitting on my hubby's sweater.  I'm getting so close to finishing it. Just this one sleeve and then the zipper.  So I'm going to slip into my pjs and snuggle up to the fire and get some major knitting done!  I was on Facebook just a bit ago and Webs has a 31 days to Get Organized.  I think that is a great way to start the year!  I definately could use some tips on organizing my yarn and needles ;)

Dec 25, 2012

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas to you and your family! Here's to a new start and a great 2013!

An Indoor Kind of Saturday

Saturday!  I enjoy Saturday's so much.  Weather as you can see is gorgeous today.  The only thing wrong is the fact that I've been home sick for a few days now all germy and sniffly. Yuck!  The only good thing is the fact that I get to stay in my pjs all day.  We did manage to get some of the plants trimed around the fence last weekend and all that is left to do is cut the lantana down for the winter.  Our fence needs painting terribly!  After that I'm planning to grab my yearly fall plantings.  I'm thinking of transplanting the daylilies and the lantana once they are cut to the back yard.  I want to get a few new types of plants in the front and once I get that done it will be fun to show you what I have for the fence!  There is so much to do and I'm so glad the weather is turning colder.  Won't be long before the berch tree leaves turns it's beautiful yellow color and that is such a great - bright color. 

S has been busy at the laptop this morning along with his tell tell sign :: Dunkin Donut's coffee :: S has a love of everything coffee.  I myself am a big tea drinker.  Earl Grey...  That's where my love affair is :)  I thought I would show you this little bit of our house... The kitchen table.  Here we do sit down for all of our meals - together as a family.  Mealtime was always an important part of my family up bringing.  I remember going to my grandma's house and having dinner with them.  My grandfather never failed to sit at the table early with a small bowl of ice cream.  He never seemed to be able to wait for the meal to be brought out.  We would all sit down TV had to be turned off.  (This is the case in our house as well).  Glasses full of ice and a pitcher of cold iced tea on the table.  We always, always had corn bread with our meals there.  Yum Yum I do miss that!

We lead a simple, old style life and I love that!  I just need to do more decorating around the house.  It's so drab without my flowers on the table.  Need to do better there.   

Our cat Frannie has been a great nurse to me these past few days while I've been sick.  She has been sleeping at the foot of my bed most of the day.  Frannie was busy early this morning checking on the goings on around the neighborhood.  She is so curious of what is happening outside.  I later found that she was staring at a green lizard sitting on the rocking chair.  Frannie is an ace at catching lizards and we keep having to save them every once and a while when they manage to get into our house.

A has been a busy artist as of late.  Here is her drawing of me going to work.  Aside from wearing a dress and a hot pink bag she is spot one with how I tend to dress for work. (I'm always in slacks and shirt)  It just makes me chuckle to see how she draws me :)  Perhaps she is trying to tell me I should wear dresses to work???  I'm still working on losing weight so perhaps by next year I will get brave enough wear one.  We will see and I'm not making any promises!  Any way it is such a cute drawing I had to share and capture it in blogland.

On the knitting/crochet front I thought I would share some of my projects that I've been working on.  Below is a pair of socks that I finally finished about a month ago and decided I needed to photograph them.  You probably know from other posts that I tend to work on several projects and have hardly anything complete.  Well I wanted to change that.  So I finally completed the last sock to this pair.  I suffer from second sock syndrom and have a difficult time finishing them off.  In this case I actually lost my pattern I was using but had gotten down to the toe shaping and with a suggestion of a friend found a similar pattern so I could shape the toe and finish it off.  So I loaded this up to my Ravelry projects page and now have 3 things completed!  Yah me :)

I thought I would take a picture of this baby blanket I'm working on.  It's for one of my coworkers who is expecting in February.  I'm using up some baby yarn I had on me and then I plan to add a border with a pink ribbon on it since she is having a girl!  I'm just making it as a big granny square.  Nothing exciting and just going to see how big it gets when I run out of this last skein.  Then I will pick out the border colors to use with the ribbon.  I think I will just make a scallop edging so I can run the ribbon up along through the spaces it will create.  I will just have to play around with it as I'm not going by any pattern.  Once I get it down I will be sure to write what I do and will share it with you.  It's all in my head what I want this to look like and can't wait to see it materialize.

S's sweater is coming along well.  I finally finished the length of the sweater last night.  The bottom of the sweater and the sleeves have Icord bind offs on them and that took a bit of getting use to working that particular order but it worked out nicely I think.  I hope it lays a little bit flatter once I block the sweater.  All I have left is two sleeves and a zipper! 

The ripple blanket is coming along nicely I think!  I'm around 25% finished but truth be told not completely sure how long I will go.  I'm thinking 100 stripes but may go a bit longer.  It's ment for the sofa so I know it doesn't need to get too long.  So far I'm liking all the colors I have chosen for it.  Each color is now included in this piece.  I picked up a couple of interesting colors from a shop but once those two colors are gone that is it.  I can't find the colors anywhere on the net.  I'm just going to have to just space them out between the top half and the bottom because I only get two stripes per ball out of these. 

It's been so nice being able to stay in my pajama's for days now but could do without the snotty nose and coughing.  The only thing I've been doing is taking it easy and working on some of these.  I'm not sure when I will get this blanket done ~ probably by spring next year.  I'm working to have S's sweater finished by next month so I know I will be spending some time finishing that and then I need to finish the baby blanket.  It will be wonderful to have several of these projects completed!  The sweater and the ripple are getting a bit big to carry with me on knit nights so I guess I will start taking the baby blanket instead.  I've missed going to my knit nights!  Can't wait for this Thursday!

Well thanks for visiting me this weekend!  It was so fun chatting away with you and what all has been going on these past few days.  I think I will just have to stay in my pjs the rest of the day and make a mug of hot tea :)

Re-Grouping

I've been on a bit of a hyatious as of late.  Busy, busy times in the house as of the last few months.  Lots happening with my work routines.  I work full time out of the house and also work here from home as well so there hasn't been much time to blog.  S is hopefully getting a full time gig soon so keep your fingers crossed for him and this will open up a good bit of time for me as we redirect both of our work loads.  I'm looking so forward to getting back to a normal household and concentrate more on my family - it's a much wanted change that I really need.  I can't believe I'm actually looking forward to working more around the house and get back to making it more a "home".  Right now it doesn't feel that way.  I tried to get into a house cleaning routine a few months ago but totally blew that out of the water and couldn't devote much time to it so I totally failed there.

I have been working on my knitting and crochet projects though (it's the only way I keep my sanity)  It relaxs me so much that I really need it to be able to turn off my busy brain after working.  You can see above how my ripple blanket is going.  There is something wonderful about creating these little waves that it truely calms me kind of like the ocean can.  Complete peacefulness!  I just completed the 21st row and added a couple more colors that I was able to find at the yarn stores that I've been visiting.  Everytime we go out of town I enjoy finding a LYS so I can try to find the yarns I'm using in other colors.  I was able to get a few when I went to Macon and am loving how they are adding to the blanket. 

I luckly have today off with it being Columbus Day and it's a bank holiday so yours truly gets to enjoy being off!  However I got a quick set back because I woke up with a sore throat :( Not the way I planned to spend the day.  But since I'm in bed I'm rippling away ~~~ripple~~~ripple.

Wonderful Weekend

Well S & A are off in the windy city Chicago.  Which left you know who by herself for a full week (plus two kitties)!  So what is a gal to do when she is all alone?  Well a road trip to a yarn shop of course! My friend N and I set out to Macon to visit Creative Yarns.  We had never been to this one but heard soo many great things about it.  I will tell you we weren't disappointed at all.  They had so many great yarns there it was very difficult to decide what to buy. 

But in the end bought Rowan Handknit Cotton.  Just look at these yummy colors!  Now I didn't really need any new yarn.  You see I have loads of projects that I want to do and I end up purchasing the yarn for them.  Some of the projects that I have yarn for aren't even started yet.  Others have.  I do know that with this yarn I'm going to make a hexagon blanket with it.  This yarn feels like the perfect yarn for it.  A little stiff so I think it will have great stitch detail when crocheted.  I can't wait to get started but it will have to wait since I want to finish my other blankets first.  I really need to stop buying yarns for projects but at least when I get ready to start them I will have the yarn for it.  I may just have to break my rule and crochet a few hexs here and there.  Will be a good take along project. 

While at the grocery store I saw some beautiful flowers and just had to get them to brighten up the house.  I think these are carnations???  What do you think?
I just love fresh flowers and especially in my bathroom where I can see them first thing in the morning.  They just brighten my start of the day and just love to take in all the beautiful color and scent they have to offer.  I also have some in my den but the lighting is just terrible and I couldn't get a decent photo of them. Oh well. 

I've been working on my first ever ripple blanket!  Well it's actually my first blanket in crochet.  I normally knit but have been bitten by the crochet bug since many others at knit night crochet.  I started this back in June while on a cruise and I'm so in love with this and it's totally relaxing ~ ripple, ripple, ripple tee hee :) I'm using Debbie Bliss Prima for this.  It's the perfect summer project because it's mostly bamboo with merino wool.  That is important here in the south since we have all been having temps over 105 lately. Thank goodness it's not that hot this weekend!  This blanket is destined to go over the back of our sofa to use during the beginning of summer when it can be a bit chilly in the house but warm outside.  

Well tonight I think I'm going to catch a movie so I best get going since I need to finish up on a few things before I go.  Thanks so much for stopping by to read my blog.  I've really enjoyed reading your comments!  Until next time, hope you are all having a wonderful weekend!

Thursday's Stitch N Bitch Night

Every Thursday I meet with a group of gals for some knitting or crocheting, good food and of course lots of talking and laughing.  Last night I brought with me the Log Cabin Project.  I'm working on my second square.  This is an easy pattern to follow.  You can get this pattern over on VeryPink's website with video tutorial to talk you through it. 

I've just about finished with the second block.  Was able to get the long yellow stripe in last night so I feel that I accomplished something for once.  I do love to chitty chat! 

The back looks pretty cool too but all those ends to darn in!  I think I better nip that in the bud as I get these blocks done eh.

Saturday S and A are leaving to visit S's parents.  A is so excited to be spending two weeks with her grandparents.  S is staying for just over a week so that leaves me here with lots of me time!  I'm planning a trip to a yarn store, catch a movie and get my hooky on.  :)  I can't wait to check out this yarn store everyone at SNB keeps talking about.  They do happen to have Rowan yarns which are one of my favorites.  I have had an idea in my head for some Halloween Bunting that I want to materialize so I'm hoping to get the needed color of yarn for this.  Yep, already thinking about Halloween.

The Beginning

I've wanted to have a personable blogging journal for quite some time so that I can have a place to look back year after year to watch my family's life unfold.  Time slips by so quickly that I don't want to miss out on all these wonderful memories of our daughter A growing up, our still new house that I've been trying little by little to turn into a "warm homely" type of home which I still feel has lots of room for improvement.  Not only will S and I be able to look back when we are older but also when A has a family of her own she will always be able to look over this blog of her childhood and perhaps even one day take over and journal her own story.

I plan to share with you my turning our house into our home sweet home, my creative projects, outtings, gardening, and other family fun!  This will be a great and enjoyable ride for sure!  See you soon :)

Barb