Baby Eli Arriving Soon!

My sister and her husband are expecting a baby boy and he's due to arrive in less than 2 weeks.  His name will be Elijah Allan, and we're all VERY excited to meet him.  :) 

We had a baby shower last weekend, and my mom and I made the decorations.  We made the cupcake toppers and the baby banner using the Cricut and the Cuttlebug.  The little onsies on the cupcake toppers were painstakingly cut out by my mom, all 48 of them!  :)  The centerpiece is a diaper cake, which we decorated with ribbon, and some felt hearts and a little felt sign with Eli's name that we stitched using the embroidery machine.  We also made a bunch of little diaper favors, which we forgot to take a picture of. 

Instead of all the traditional baby shower games, we put paper crafting supplies on each table with some blank cards and had all the guests each make baby Eli a first birthday card that will be given to him next year at his first birthday party.  Everyone seemed to enjoy that, and we're looking forward to seeing them all next year. 



Baby quilt in progress...

I have also been working on a baby quilt for Eli.  I really need to get it finished before he gets here!  It's all pieced and today I plan to add the borders and get started on the quilting. 

February's been a very busy month for me, and because of all my baby projects, I didn't have time to make a pair of socks for my sock stash reduction project.  I'm glad March is a long month!  I'm hoping to get back on track and get a pair made during the month, but I'm also planning on doing a lot of baby cuddling, so who knows!  :)

Lazy Gus

Now THIS is lazy! Gus can't even be bothered to stand up to play with his toy. :) 

And that ratty cardboard thing beside the toy is their scratching pad, which Grace always uses like she's supposed to. Gus never scratches on it, he lays on it, he chews on it, and bites little pieces off of it (which is why it looks like it does), but he never, ever scratches on it.   He is such a stinker!  :)

Grand Central Station...

I'm doing a happy dance that we've had lots of sunshine and warmer temps this week.  All that snow is almost gone!  But when we were getting all of that snow, our bird feeders turned into Grand Central Station.  We had all sorts of visitors show up to grab some nibbles.  Unfortunately, our feeders didn't fare too well thru all of this. The turkeys especially tend to be hard on them and knock them to the ground.  And one of the feeders is actually now missing.  Apparently, one of the critters dragged it off to enjoy his snack in peace.  :)

Sometimes even the birds get a chance to eat from the BIRD feeders. 

Notice the  black squirrel hanging upside down and eating from the feeder on the right

Grace and Gus have loved watching all the action at the bird feeders. Those tails were swinging like crazy!



It's a Hoot! Owl Potholder Pattern - New in Etsy Shop

I have been inspired by all the cute owls I keep seeing around, and decided I needed to make some of these cute little guys into a new potholder pattern :).  Pattern is available in both my etsy shop

Snowflake Dishcloth - Free Pattern

I've harped talked about how much I don't like snow.  But I do like snow if it's made out of yarn.  :)  So I designed a snowflake dishcloth that will never melt and never make your hands cold.  :)
Click on the "Download Now" link below the picture to get pdf pattern.

download now

Icicles Scarf Pattern & Knitpicks

 Hello everyone! I'm very excited to announce that I've had another scarf pattern accepted into Knitpicks Independent Designer Program.  It was listed on their site today.  This scarf was so much fun to design. I've seen a lot of knitted scarves that have the long, curved edge with a decorative stitch, but I haven't seen too many crochet patterns for something like that and decided to try my hand at it.

It's made with Knitpicks Swish Worsted Yarn, which was so nice to work with and it really is perfect for this pattern.  The scarf is crocheted all in one piece, with the body of the scarf stitched from tip to tip, then the piece is turned, and the lacy, scallop border is worked along the long, curved edge.  It's finished by stitching a single crochet border along the remaining edges. The finished size is 6" wide (at the widest point) and it's about 6' long, although the length can be adjusted if desired.

My beautiful sister Becky is modeling it for me (she's due to have a baby in just a month!).  My wonderful, photographer dad took these great pictures. And a big thank you to Stacey at Knitpicks, who, as always does a great job and is wonderful to work with.  :)

Scarf is available for download here at Knitpicks, and is also available in my etsy shop.

Computer Malfunction..

I was having a hard time using my computer the other day.  Turns out it just had a little cat hair in it.  :)

"Dreaming of Spring" Dishcloth Pattern - New in Etsy Shop

I'm ignoring the huge piles of  nasty white, cold stuff  snow outside and I am dreaming of spring. In honor of the hopefully, fast approaching spring, I designed a new set of dishcloth patterns.  :)
These are available in my etsy shop