It's been a while

I guess chasing after a crawling 7 month old keeps a person busy. That and fishing Mary's toys out of Ellie's mouth.

We finally finished this project:


And after! Woohooo!


When John hung the door back up, Mary noticed we had painted the edges a light green. She said we now need to paint the rest of the kitchen! I agree! But, that's way down at the bottom of the list. I think I'll just go with the dated fake wood paneling until we remodel (in 10 years).

I forgot to blog about Earth Day. Well, I think every day should be Earth Day. So we waited until the weekend and we planted a new tree (to replace a dead one) in our front yard.




It's a maple tree that has bright read leaves in the fall. We have one out back too. John has since cut down the dead sumac tree. I'll take a new pic if the sun ever comes out. I think the tree has some leaves on it now too.

Alright, it's madness here.

Project 33: the chop

This is the stylist's version of what she did to me. I'll never get it to lay that nice since I don't own a blow dryer or flat iron. Or styling products for that matter. I just washed it (which was totally freaky!!!) and am letting it air dry.

My neck and head feel funny.

Who is this kid?

Seriously! Miss Ellie is growing up too fast. She learned to crawl about a week before she turned 7 months old. A week later, she was on to pulling up. I really hope it takes a while before she learns to walk. She gets into everything as it is, and since she's too young to understand "no" all I can do is try to keep things out of her reach.


I actually stood her up at this chair and let go of her for the pic. But as soon as she saw me sitting on the floor, she let go with one hand. Then she fell, crawled to me, and used me as her personal jungle gym.


This is a little old toy of Mary's. Ellie can pull right up on it like a pro. (I'll have to see what my Mom thinks, but I think Ellie looks just like me in the picture. Mainly in the eyes.)


She stood there and played forever. What a big girl! She's a sweetie too. I told John last night that when I'm out at the store (or wherever), I always noticed people smiling at me. It's nice, but sort of strange. Yesterday I realized they are smiling because Ellie is smiling. She loves to smile at people! It's also strange (to me) that Ellie weighs at 7 months what Mary weighed about 3 months.

Here's Mary at 7 months. She was probably 21-22 pounds. Yay! My big healthy girl. I was so looking forward to having another butterball baby, and then I got skinny little Ellie.


Their personalities are completely different too. It amazes us daily how different they are considering they are sisters. I love my girls so much.

a small project

Inspired by Karen, I came home from Evansville ready to tackle some home improvement projects. In some ways, it seems like we just moved here. It seems like just the other day we were unpacking boxes and trying to get things looking like we lived here so we could have John's 30th b-day party. Then we were busy getting ready to host 18 people for Christmas. Then I was pregnant. Then I had a baby. So the house is largely the same way it was the month we moved in. Our big, big project is to get new windows. But that won't happen for probably another year. I've been thinking we shouldn't do anything before that, but now I guess I just want SOMETHING done. So, first off, this little window I've been saving.


Mary provided the artwork. Top L to R: Mommy and Daddy. Bottom L to R: Mary and Ellie. Don't mind the horrible paneling on the walls. I want to take the paneling down and paint. But that means that I want to put up new trim work. But I don't want to do that until we get new windows. Plus, I have NO IDEA what color to paint the dining room. And trust me, I think about it a lot. Sometimes I think about just jumping out of my seat and running in there and ripping the paneling off while John's at work so that we HAVE to paint.

I have another project in the works, but it will probably be the weekend before it's done. Oh, and a HUGE change coming next week.

In other news, Ellie can crawl. Last week she'd only do a few feet every so often. Now she crawls everywhere! And pulls up. She's a pulling up FOOL. Ugh. She's dangerous. I can't tell her no because she can't understand me. She just turned 7 months old last Friday.

Speaking of Ellie......gotta go.......

busy, busy

I feel like we've been so busy the last couple weeks, yet I feel like I haven't done a darn thing. Ah, life. Last weekend we went to Ft. Wayne to John's Grandma's 85th birthday. Now Mary has a cold. And we are leaving Monday for a week in Evansville. I haven't really had time to knit. I've been super tired for some reason. Ugh.

But, I have a few pics. First, my shrug. So, I found this pattern on Ravelry. I loved how it looked, so I bought the yarn and took off. I noticed that a couple people noted it took more yarn than the pattern called for and also that the sleeves ended up shorter than they wanted. I knit the entire thing, and it was awful!!! Argh!!!! So, I thought about it. I figured I could take the general shape of the shrug and knit it more to my liking. I love the way it turned out!!!

Don't mind the funny look on my face. I was talking to Mary through the back door. She was freaking out because I wouldn't let her out with me. Oh, and don't mind the bags under my eyes. I plan on sleeping when I'm dead.

So, that was one part of Project 33--to make something for myself. I still have one more thing I want to make for myself out of some pretty yarn my friend Sarah sent me. Hopefully I'll get to it this summer. While I'm thinking about Project 33, I am still doing my push ups, though it is taking longer than 6 weeks. I'm cool with that. I continue to do more each week. When I started I could only do 7 push ups. Yesterday's workout I did the following sets: 20, 25, 20, 20, 29.

Next up, a skirtie for Ellie. This pic is of it wet, so the colors are a bit off. I still need to make a drawstring and it will be ready to go.





Ellie's asleep in my left arm, and I'm typing one handed so I think I better call this entry done.

Out with the old......

and in with my new stove!!!! Yippie!!!! I think I am way more excited than anyone should be about a new stove. But I am. I cook all the time. Pretty much everything we eat is from scratch. When we moved here, the house came with a stove. It was 39 years old, but it worked. Plus we had just bought the house, and didn't really want to buy a new stove. But then a couple weeks ago, some muffins took 35-40 minutes to cook instead of 20-25. I had a bad feeling the oven was dying, so it was time.

Good-bye, old stove. I'll miss you. Thanks for feeding us for (almost) two years.

And in with my new baby!!! So fresh and clean and with a clock and a timer and delayed start on the oven. You are my new best friend. I'll probably gain 10 pounds because of you.


(Plugged in 15 minutes and already cooking lunch!!!!) We got a new hood/fan too, but John installed that after lunch and I guess I didn't get a pic. Mary and I are both excited about the window on the oven door and an oven light that actually works!

In other news, I'm in a knitting funk. I finished the shrug (well, almost finished, I need to weave in 3 or 4 ends and block it, but am totally uninspired about doing it). I moved on to the gnome project for Beth. Gnome #1--I didn't like the color after knitting the legs. Gnome #2---I knit the entire thing, then realized it was too small for the cradle. The body and head are done and stuffed but the arms and hat aren't attached. Gnome #3--I finished 2/3 of it or so, but was worried I'd run out of yarn. Gnome #4 was good enough to give her. Thank goodness.




Next up, a skirtie for Ellie. The last skirtie I tried to make was a waste of my time. It was for Mary and a different pattern. Well, I don't even have a pattern this time. I'm winging it. Which will either pull me out of my knitting funk or make me never knit again.

We are off to story time at the library. It's a beautiful day outside!

working on my to do list

I just didn't have it in me to craft at my normal speed last week. I went to bed early almost every night. But now I need to get back to it. Crafting keeps me sane. I have ideas beyond my current to do list, but I feel like I need to work on it first before I move on. After that, I need to work on a gift for John's cousin's new baby. John's Mom asked us to make something that will be a gift from her, and she's paying us to make it. Cool! John will be making a cradle like Mary's snowmen have, and I'll be making a knitted gnome, pillow and quilt. So, I need to get moving on my current list before I can do that.

So:
1. "gotta finish my shrug"--not yet. It's next. I've already finished it once and didn't like it. So I ripped it out and started over. It seems to be a theme around here these days.

2. "gotta dye up that yarn"--dyed and skeined. need to wind it into balls.
That's only half of the variegated. I dyed up a full 8 oz since I didn't know how much I needed and I can always use the scraps later.

3. "want to make something for April"--done. I made this freaking bag 4 times before I was happy with it. Ugh. I seriously considered giving up on it. Not that it was hard, it just didn't look the way I wanted it to. So I started over. And over.
The handles and base aren't that blue in real life. They are really purple. It is super overcast out today. I hope she likes it.

4. "want to start on the girls bunnies AND knit up a dozen Easter eggs to hide with Mary"--this is on the bottom of the list now, but will be done before Easter.

5. " oh and that painting I started last weekend" done. I want to start a collection of small houses for my desk area. The felt one with the crocheted roof came from Etsy and I love it.

I'll be working on the shrug tonight. Even though I don't want to. But I just can't put it off any longer.