Is She a Girl?

One thing about not knowing the sex of our new baby is the suspense. But how can I not knit gender-specific items when they are so cute? So, this is for our baby if she is a girl. If not, I will pass it along to one of my childbearing friends. I wouldn't be lying if I said I hope she's a girl after having 3 boys in a row!

I got the pattern here: "A Little Hat"
It knits together very quickly. I will definitely be making more of these charmers.

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Peace Fleece Baby Sweater

I just finished this baby sweater that has been sitting in in my knitting basket since I was pregnant with my 6-yr old!! I came to a stop when I didn't understand the instructions and just put it away. With help from people on Knitter's Review board, it is now completed and I am thrilled! It was bought as a kit from Peace Fleece in Maine. This was the first time I have used a chart for the collar. The buttons are as cute as can be!

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More Baby Socks

Finished another pair of infant socks. This yarn is so yummy - it's a 3-ply of navy, plum, and aqua. I don't even know what kind it is - it was leftover from an infant sweater project I completed 11 yrs ago. This is the first time I've made a picot edge - I love it! Knitted using magic loop method on 2.5 mm Addi Turbos.

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Our Family's Christmas Celebration

Our Favorite Things at Christmas

Christmas Carolers

Our 15-yr old son pieced this table runner and Pearly-girl (11 yrs) machine quilted it. I will always treasure this table runner!

The children woke up around 7:30 a.m. and opened their stockings. The stockings were stuffed with all kinds of snacks (nuts, mango, gum, corn nuts, hot chocolate or mocha packages, little gifts, juice boxes, etc). While the children were snacking and opening their stocking gifts, dh and I slept in. Dh woke up a little later and prepared our special tradition of crepes for Christmas morning breakfast.

Pearly lighting the candles for Christmas breakfast.

Dh's homemade crepes

This is what we look forward to each year!

The crepes are filled with cream cheese and cherries, topped with a drizzling of powdered sugar.

After a delicious breakfast, we sat around while Papa read the Christmas story from the children's Bible.


And, of course, could a day ever be complete without rough-housing with Papa? Not with 4 boys!



Finally by the time the Christmas story is over, it's about noon and time to open gifts. Here's one happy camper.

The rest of the day was spent playing with our new Christmas toys. Later, dh made a superb standing rib roast, mashed potatoes/gravy, peas, etc. It was out of this world. Dh was wonderful - he did all the cooking which gave me the freedom to take care of my nearly 37-wk pregnant body that is not doing so well lately! My dh is a keeper!

Merry Christmas to all of our friends and family!

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Happenings at the Homefront

This is what has been going on at my house. Uncle R. came over and helped the kids build this Lincoln Log structure for our train we put up every Christmas. The train takes up the entire living room. I guess my dh doesn't think there is a need to entertain guests in the living room. As it is, when the flute teacher comes over, she has to straddle the tracks so they can have the lesson there - lol. But oh what fun! This train has brought hours and hours of fun to the kids - all of them from the 42-yr- old Dad down to 3-yr old son!

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What kind of a knitter are you?

Here are my results:


You appear to be a Knitting Guru. You love knitting
and do it all the time. While finishing a piece
is the plan, you still love the process, and
can't imagine a day going by without giving
some time to your yarn. Packing for vacation
involves leaving ample space for the stash and
supplies. It can be hard to tell where the yarn
ends and you begin.
http://marniemaclean.com


1118 other people got this result!
This quiz has been taken 3120 times.
36% of people had this result.



What Kind of Knitter Are You?
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Finished Baby Sweater!

Finally - a finished project! I am on a roll finishing unfinished projects. This was one I started 3-1/2 yrs ago. It is Sirdar 3959 size 12 mos.


There were a couple of new skills I learned with this sweater. First was intarsia - working different balls of yarn and twisting the yarns behind the work to avoid holes. This is a bit challenging as it causes the yarn to get twisted. I'm still need to refine this skill. You can see the result of twisting on the inside of the sweater (where the yellow and pink yarns stay put neatly in the blue section).


Ok, I'm ashamed to admit it, but I was never taught how to seam a sweater and I have made quite a few sweaters since learning how to knit in 1992! I have been sewing for years, and so when a pattern said to "seam" the pieces, I assumed you put right sides together just like sewing. I never could figure out how people got flat seams! After purchasing some great reference books: The Knitter's Book of Finishing Techniques, by Nancy Wiseman and The Knitter's Companion, by Vicki Square, I have now figured out how to have nice seams. I am so pleased with this side seam!

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Great Reference Books

These two books are wonderful! They both are smaller-sized and spiral bound which definitely is beneficial so you can hold the book on your lap while holding your knitting in your hands. The Knitter's Companion is made with thicker cardstock paper (definitely a plus) and loaded with quick tips, knitting techniques, different increases/decreases, cast ons, bind offs, yarn requirements, formulas, etc.

The Knitter's Book of Finishing Techniques gives nice instructions on finishing techniques. The photos are in color and Nancy does a great job detailing the reasons to do various finishing techniques.

Both are great resources and I know they will be put to use often and better yet, either one are small enough to fit in your knitting bag just in case you run into a trouble spot!

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Christmas Tree Farm

Did you know that Oregon sells the most Christmas trees in the US? This is a picture taken from a friend's small Christmas tree lot. It's so pretty. Our tree was a 7-ft tree for $15 - not bad!



And here are two boys looking for the perfect tree.

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Son just got back from bird hunting with dh last week. He shot his first quail!


Here is is showing the bird to little brothers who of course were so excited and proud of big brother. The next day little guy was holding the play rifle and had the orange hunting hat on practically all day.

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Pearly's Quilt

Last year, my 2 daughters (then 17 and 9) joined me at a Block of the Month quilt club. These are the blocks my 9-yr old and I did. I cut and she pieced her squares together. I added my 12 squares to her squares so that she could make a quilt for her bed.

She is beginning a new sewing class at the homeschool co-op and will take these squares to try to complete the quilt by adding borders. It will be fun to see this project completed!

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Infant Sweater UFO

Here's a baby sweater I started a few years ago and left unfinished. I'm on a mission to finish the UFOs. It's an easy Sirdar pattern. Still trying to figure out the best way to hold the yarn in back and keep them from tangling, though. This will be a 12-month size baby sweater when finished.

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Finished the two socks to match the infant hat. It wasn't too difficult to knit two socks at once using the Magic Loop method. The heel was challenging. At one point, I ended up putting some stitches on a stitch holder until I could line everything up properly, but it all worked out. I will definitely try it this way again. It's great to have 2 socks completed at the same time and know that they are the same length!

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Two Socks on One Circular Needle

With each new project, I like to learn a new technique. It's much easier learning new techniques on baby items for me because they are much smaller and less to rip out. Here I am attempting to knit two socks on one needle using the Magic Loop method. I'm not following any book, but it seems to work. If I can get the heel okay, I will definitely continue this method. It's easy to lose track of rows and make one sock larger than another when you are knitting one at a time.

These socks will hopefully be the right size to match the little infant hat I made earlier.

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Pearly Girl

Another year for the Pearly girl. She's 11 now, loves music (piano, flute, and recently violin).


She's also enjoying playing volleyball for the first time this year.

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Infant Socks

Here's a pair of infant socks just completed using Blue Moon Soft Rock 100% Superwash Merino, colorway: Marbles. It will be fine for either sex. I'm hoping to make another infant hat to match, if there's enough yarn. Used Size 1 needles, gauge = 8 sts p/inch.

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Completed Infant Hat

Finished the new infant hat for our baby. I love it. I am going to make socks to match.

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Music to My Ears

Our son (15 yrs) has been playing the guitar for a couple years. He had a teacher for about a year and has been progressing on his own since. H (18 yrs) didn't want to miss out on the action, so she's been trying to keep up with little brother. Here they are playing duets together. They sound great, but of course, I'm a little unbiased.

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I realized that I hadn't started anything for our new baby. We don't know the sex, so white is the perfect color. It will be a rolled rim with i-cord top. I think this one will fit our new baby. There has not been one hat from hospital that has fit my big babies - they stay on for about 10 seconds and slip off!

I'm using Ann Budd's hat pattern from her Handy Book of Patterns. It's such a great book!

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Baby Poncho - more progress

Baby poncho - it's been a while since I have updated on the baby poncho. Frankly, it's taken a lot longer than I had hoped, but I'm getting closer to completion - just about 5 more inches. I am sure hoping that when I block it, it will be be wider. The cables seem to shrink up the width.

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Visitors in our yard this morning . . .

We had visitors in our yard this morning.



Mommy


and her baby!

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Getting ready to celebrate a birthday

Big brother waiting with little brother to get his birthday cake.


I'm three now! Bunny picked carrot cake for his birthday and put his own candles on the cake.

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Made a bunch of new pillow cases for the kids. This little guy loves horses.

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Oversized Booga Bag

Oversized Booga Bag

Okay, a knitting entry has been long overdue, but here is the 2nd Booga Bag I have knit. I made it quite a bit larger than the pattern and added a pocket in the front. The measurements before felting are 17 x 20-inches. I will post the "after" pictures and felted measurements soon. The coloring is correct in the top picture. Something was funky about the lighting in the other picture.

Made with Galway yarn: The bottom is 60 stitches across for 20 rows. Bottom and top wide navy stripe = 13 rows, green stripes are all 17 rows, thin navy stripes = 3 rows. I-cord is 7 feet long.

Pocket is 30 stitches across, 46 rows. After finding center, I picked up one leg of each stitch for 30 stitches, then joined new yarn.

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Pure Sweetness

Recent picture of our baby boy who is almost 3!! The expression says it all :)

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Berry, Berry Good!!

Oregon is known for its wonderful berries. We picked 24 pounds of raspberries.



My 10-yr old daughter helped me make pies. We ended up making 4 raspberry pies, 2 raspberry/blueberry pies, and 2 blueberry pies. Oh, did I mention we picked 110 pounds of blueberries? The berries literally fell into our hands as we tickled them from underneath a cluster. We only spent 2 hours of picking and our freezer is loaded with them! We will use them for muffins, smoothies. coffee cakes, pancakes during the year.

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4th of July Camping Trip (dh & 5 kids)

Mt. Bachelor

Dh took the kids (except the baby) to Sparks Lake, near Mt. Bachelor in Oregon over the 4th of July weekend. The first couple nights were very cold - down to 32 degrees. (so glad I didn't go!). Here are some pictures of their trip.


South Sister - one of many volcanoes in the Pacific Northwest.


The girls in front of the South Sister.


The boys in front of Broken Top.


Big brother so happy to greet baby brother upon return!

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