Project: Owl Quilt

Here is a sneak peek at an owl quilt on which I'm currently working... it goes to the quilter's on Monday (NEXT Monday, the 18th), so I need to finish it by then, but it's going swimmingly so far, so with a few more nights of the kids going to bed "on time", I'm sure I will be able to finish it...

erin

Project: Miss Lena's Sweater

Lately I've been blessed with the desire to work on projects (needle-related), and while my house may be suffering a bit, my creative side is on fire and spitting like a madcat... in a Happy Madcat sort of way.  :)

This picture is of an almost-finished sweater (it is waiting for buttons only!) for a friend's daughter, Miss Lena.  My first sweater attempt didn't turn out so well... well, the sweater turned out beautifully but it was the wrong size (by a long shot), despite following the gauge, and I was severely disappointed in the finished product after the amount of time I spent on it.  But, I was wanting to try another and offered to make a sweater for a friend of mine's daughter, and while again the sweater is a little larger than expected (and again, I followed the gauge), I'm really happy with how it turned out and it will fit well enough that it won't be an issue.

I found the pattern through a sweater search on Ravelry.com and it ended up being a free pattern through Lion Brand. 

 

My friend picked out the yarn after I suggested another of blends and colors through KnitPicks (this yarn in color Planetarium).  I think that I barely have about 50 inches left of the yarn that I purchased... just enough to put the buttons on. 

I'm excited to receive the buttons, which are heirloom buttons from the friend, and she graciously is allowing me to keep the rest of them... so wonderful of her!  I will post a finished project picture as soon as I have one!

Erin

Fall Festival

Saturday we attended a local Fall Festival with the girls.  Raven and Julia enjoyed the corn "sand" box, the baby kittens, and watching the horses, tricycles, and train.  I also gave Julia a wheelbarrow ride and we poked our heads through the pumpkin cutouts.  And, it wouldn't be a festival without a balloon animal (or two), and Julia was excited to take home a balloon dog and flower.  So glad we were able to spend some time together as a family at the festival Saturday morning.  Next year we might attempt the pumpkin painting and also getting Julia ONTO the horses, tricycles, and train, instead of just watching them.  It was a really neat outing and it was ALL FREE.

erin

Walking

It is such a fun thing to be able to say that Raven Is Walking now, as in, she is choosing to walk more than crawl and it is SO fun to experience!  She is doing this at a younger age than Julia did (by a couple of months), so it is fun to see her "know" less but still be trying... for example, Julia knew not to run into things much by the time she started walking but Raven just doesn't *get* that part of it yet... so much fun!  Next we need to work on going DOWN the stairs because she has a bit of daredevil in her and I think she's going to take a nasty tumble one of these days.

More video to post soon... yay!

erin

Julia Says Her Name

Love this little video of Julia... I thought I would teach her how to say her name... since she has been able to repeat the names of all of our family members.  How fun!

World Piece

A few weeks ago I took a quilt class on a pattern called World Piece, taught by Kelly Irwin, the owner of the quilt shop in Ames, Iowa.  It is always fun and interesting to take a class where you learn new ways of seeing and doing things, so while the pattern LOOKS simple, the piecing is definitive and creates a really neat effect.  It was also fun to take a day for myself (well, part of a day!) and do something for me!

This quilt was inspired by some Strawberry Shortcake fabric that I have had stashed for years, and I plan for this quilt to be Raven's when i finish it.

erin

Springfield

This last weekend I took the girls to Springfield, IL, to visit a dear friend of mine (W) and her son (X).  W is a friend of my from my online "baby board" and though she only lives about 4.5 hours away, we haven't had a lot of chances to get together.  I last saw her in April and was so excited to visit her where she lived!

We left Friday afternoon and after a long drive (mommy finally got smart with some of Raven's personal effects and clipping them ALL to the car seat so she couldn't toss them and then screech) we arrived and how fun it was to see W and X!  We unpacked and then took the kids out to eat... though the name of the restaurant is blanking me... kids eat free!  Heh!

Saturday morning we spent time in downtown Springfield seeing the sites such as the Lincoln Memorial Library, the Old Capitol, and a beautiful park/train station area that contained some really neat Lincoln statues.  (It turns out that Julia was EXTREMELY frightened by the statues, which is hard to see in the pictures.)  We also took a trip to Peese's candy shop to buy some gifities for Daddy.  On our way to lunch, all three kids fell asleep in the car, so we opted for a driving tour of the military cemetery and home to Lincoln's tomb.  We saw a lot of really neat tombstones including those of past governors and President Lincoln.  (Well, and you know me... I like a good cemetery... I'm weird that way.)

After the kids woke up, we went to the Irish pub for a late lunch and a horseshoe.  Umm, yum!  After lunch, we took the kids back to the house because W and Mommy were up VERY late talking and the kids were up VERY early to start the day.  We had a lot of fun watching the kids play and interact, watched movies, and I made W some gluten-free fried cheese curds (YUM!) and fried pickles (YUCK!  ha!  W liked them!.  Raven went down early and we let Julia and X play a little bit longer before sending them off to bed and watching the latest episode of Glee.

All three kids slept in X's bedroom and they did WONDERFULLY sleeping in there for the weekend... yay!  So glad that they did so well together!

Sunday we got ready and went for lunch at a local Mexican recipe (YUM!) and then spent a good bit of money at Friar Tuck's picking up Oktoberfest and Pumpkin beer and Unibroue for Adam (well, and me too!).

Such a fun weekend!  So good to see our friends again!

erin

Mommy's Doll

So... today I let Julia pick out her own outfit, but yesterday I dressed her in what I wanted her to wear... :)  I love her little clothes and can't help but pick out outfits that match and convince her it is the best thing in the world to wear.   (Yay for consignment shop deals!)

It is hard to believe that Julia will be three in less than two months.  I can still remember her birth like it was yesterday, so it seems funny to me that she is technically old enough for preschool (2-year-old - though she doesn't go), dance classes, and Sunday school.  Even though the first couple of weeks of Sunday school were rough, she seemed better the last time she went and really seemed to enjoy herself.

Julia is a mother and mothers her babies with care and love and always makes sure they have clean pants on.  (I had no idea a baby could "poot" so many times in one day; takes me back to Raven's early days.)  Though it's possible that Raven could really enjoy dolls, Julia doesn't give her much chance, but occasionally will give a baby to Raven.  I'm quite certain Julia can make ANYTHING a baby... even a flamingo, as she did this morning.

Julia's vocabulary and pronunciation has grown by leaps and bounds in the last few months and for that I am thankful.  I can understand most of what she says now, or at the very least, I can figure it out.  I remember that she cannot really say "L" at the beginning of words, so "lion" becomes "ion" and "light" becomes "ight".  She can even say her full name now (well, when prompted and as separate words), which I tried one day after talking with my online mommy friends.  What she is capable of amazes me and each day I try to think of something new.

Colors she knows seem to be blue, white, and pink, and who knows about the rest or when they will stick except she DOES know that yellow is a "ducky" color.  (Ssh, don't tell her that ducks come in A LOT of colors.)  We work on hair color too, which is a lot of fun for her, and colors that are the same.

Julia is definitely entering a more... defiant... stage in her life and she experiences a lot of timeouts and has been sent to her room to calm down a few times too.  It seems her favorite words are "No" and "Now" (instead of "please") and while she is normally a happy child, there are those moments in the day when she will get the bug and start spouting off.  This always seems to be perfectly timed with Raven going from "content" to "squawky" and goodness knows why all of my hair isn't gray yet.

It is amazing, though... I think that you can see that the girls REALLY do love each other and while they squabble now and again, more often than not Julia is protective of Raven and Raven loves to be around Julia.

Julia enjoys getting in and out of her carseat on her own and also likes to shut the car door (but she has trouble opening it).  A few times we have found her outside looking for daddy in the garage and it seems that for now she has learned that she isn't supposed to do that without asking first.  It scares my heart a little bit to think that is okay to let her walk from the house to the garage by herself as I watch from the deck while she searches out her daddy in the garage.  I've sent her on little missions now and again such as telling daddy it is time for dinner, and while the communication doesn't always translate or even make it to him, she still finds him... and then I am left to go and fetch both of them.  However, I know that in time she will remember to tell daddy why I sent her and to think that time is soon coming...

 

Physically she's becoming more able and can run well now, and jumps like a rabbit or a frog, and swings on the big-girl swing.  I don't mind that she isn't a daredevil; I think we have one of those coming up quickly behind Julia... hee.

Just a little update on the big kid...

love,

erin

Family Time

We had much needed "family time" last night, during which we whipped out our video cameras to capture the craziness that is our family after dinner each night. Adam and I shared a lot of great laughs watching the kids dancing and run and play together.  Oh, yes, and for once, I left the kitchen in a state of "unclean" and played and danced and laughed instead.  Ah, sweet life.

It Starts Young

I apologize for being lax in blog updates... sometimes I simply don't feel like it... sometimes life is so busy that I don't have time for it... and sometimes the busy-ness is overwhelming and I have 500 pictures I haven't sorted and I have anxiety and don't blog about ANYTHING... so, I'm attempting to get back on that horse. 

To kick it off, I'm posting a picture of Julia from this morning.  I'll have you know that side from the shoes, which were my addition, Julia picked this outfit out ALL BY HERSELF.  After much deliberation.  And, after trying on many different things.  Pants.  Skirts.  Shorts.  Tights.  Long Sleeved. Short Sleeved.  What she REALLY wanted to wear was a tank dress, but it was only 44 degrees outside and I vetoed it because she doesn't have much of anything to wear under it.  And so ensued quite the dressing fiasco this morning.

This morning was a reminder that my little girl isn't a baby anymore and that she wants to make decisions and have influence on her own life.  Even if it's simply getting dressed in the morning, she wants more and more control, and as a parent, it's my responsibility to know when and how to give her control so that she is learning how to make good decisions but yet not allow her to be overwhelmed by the decisions before her at such a young age.

And, this morning was also a reminder that Julia is 2 going on 30.  Ha.

(The Converse were a gift from a dear friend; SO CUTE!  If you can't tell, they are black with sparkly purple stars.  If anyone is looking for gift ideas for Julia, she would also love some Sketcher Twinkle Toes in size 7.  Wink, wink.  HA!)

erin