There’s alot of regular readers and commenters that I haven’t heard from now that I’ve gone back to Blogger. Just want to make sure I don’t lose you guys! I love my loyal readers!
Moving Time
Alright readers. It’s official. I’m moving back to blogger. I’ve had so many issues here with WordPress. Especially as of late. So please change your RSS feeds to my new address – http://suddenexpression.blogspot.com (link at the bottom) ! I really don’t want to lose any readers!! Besides the address, not much will change. It will take a bit of time for housekeep though so be patient!!
Something Old, Something New
I’ve worked on most of my WIPs this week, but I’ve also been naughty and cast on a few new things! One of which, believe or not, is finished! The other new item is The Happy Place Baby Blanket. My daughter has so many crocheted and hand sewn blankets, that a new one won’t even make a blip on her radar. But being a knitter and a Momma proud of her craft I want her to have one. Even if the pattern has a very peculiar name!
I’ve been working on getting my Marr Haven Farms BFL spun up. I’ve spun half of it to singles and started plying them. I really need a suggestion. I’ve found that when I ply my spindle gets too full and I have to cut the yarn, skein it, then start again. Is there a way to avoid this? What do other spindlers do? I may not finish spinning all this fiber, and hold off on the second half. As I posted yesterday, I am very excited to start using some of my Moonshine Fiber!
Also on the needles: Roo Two, Anastasia Socks with my A Stash Addict yarn, worked on some hexipuffs for the Beekeepers Quilt (my very long term project), and did some work on my Grad Gift. That, you will be seeing on Friday as well though!! I might have a very full FO Friday post!! So make sure to come back! But for now, go check out other WIP Wednesday posts!
Let me know if you like the new look. It wasn’t really by choice. Something happened with my old layout and you couldn’t read the font color anymore. I’ve tried getting it back to normal but haven’t had any luck.
It’s Party Time!
Lets get drunk on some moonshine! Moonshine Fiber Company, that is! I got a shipment from them this week! I purchased a 4 oz Merino braid from them in the Jungle Juice colorway (top pic) on their last announced update. But oddly enough Etsy decided to ship it to my old Germany address. Well I got into my account and deleted this address when I discovered that. Then Moonshine announced on Facebook that they were posting a few things on the first football Sunday. I shouldn’t have looked, but I did and couldn’t resist. The color Dia de los Muertos – Calaveras (i’m not going to pretend I know what it means or how to actually say it – bottom pic) was just amazing!! I bought a 4 oz braid in BFL. I think it’s the coolest color I’ve ever seen fiber. Oddly enough, my invoice once again had my shipping address as my German one AGAIN! I immediately contacted the shop owner and they of course made a note to send it to my correct address. Funny part of the story? Apparently she screwed up the postage on the one which was sent to Germany. And it was returned to her THAT DAY! So after an odd coincidence and awesome customer service from Moonshine, I got both my braids in one package a few days ago! They are breathtaking! Even more gorgeous in person than they are on camera!
So I might be enabling here, but please go check them out! They are awesome and I love the bags they send the fiber in. Presentation can be important and they do a great job! Like them on Facebook too……you might see a surprise update like I did! It might be worth mentioning that Susan B Anderson also posted about them this week! The more people buying their stuff the less left over for me to purchase! 🙂
Please Excuse My Funk
I’ve been in a bit of a blogging funk lately. I don’t think I even posted once last week. I will say I’ve thought about posting. Then I think that I don’t have anything to post about. Well, that’s not exactly true. I’ve just been lazy. But I knew I needed to participate in WIP Wednesday this week. I have so much to share!
I do have quite a bit going on in the knitting front. First, I frogged a hat I was trying to design to match Miss A’s Milo Vest. Not a bad attempt, but if was too small. I’ll come back to it soon. I also frogged my surprise gift. I can tell you now, I was making a lace garter for a best friend. She just had a very intimate ceremony and married her fiance, with very short notice. I’ve had this garter in my queue earmarked for her for about 2 years now. I was just waiting for a date. Well, unfortunately 3 weeks wasn’t enough time to get the right yarn, get it knit, blocked and sent to her in time. So sadly I pulled it out. Oh well. I’m glad she had such a great wedding and I don’t think the presence of that gift would have changed much.
On the needles is Roo Two, which I’ve promised to have done for my husband before he leaves for training. He asked if I could get it done by then (6 weeks from now) and I just laughed. I actually don’t have to concentrate on it quite as much as I was if I have a whole six weeks! After starting it, I think the smaller needles and fingering weight yarn is much more appropriate. The worsted weight was going to be way to big for him to put in his uniform pocket.
I’ve made some progress on my Grad Gift – The Boneyard Shawl. I’m not sure if I’ve actually shared that one with my readers, since it’s a gift. But I was home recently and showed the gift to the recipient. So I don’t feel like it needs to stay a secret anymore. I picked the yarn for her – Lang Yarns Tosca Light from my stash, because I knew she would love it. Then went from there. I thought about making handwarmers since I think she would get alot of wear out of them, but decided this yarn was begging me to be a nice chunky shawl. The recipient lives in upstate NY so this should get alot of use in the winter! Sorry about the washout in the picture. Today’s not a good picture day so far, and I took so many pictures of this shawl. This is the only picture that the color was accurate in.
Next up is probably my favorite thing on the needles right now. Favorite project actually intended for me, I would say. I special ordered yarn from A Stash Addict. If you haven’t checked out her shop, go right now! She is awesome. Her colors are so bright and playful! She has a line called “dark arts” and they are half black and half another color. Oh, and they sparkle!! Well, I ordered a skein with the same effect, but with a dark brown and pink. Not only did she dye two shades to choose from (awesome customer service right there, and I just noticed the other skein is up in her shop!!) but it turned out exactly like what I was picturing in my head. I had this pink and brown comforter when I was in college and I’ve always loved it. Somehow those colors popped into my head one day and I had to have her dye it for me. Not only is the yarn itself amazing, but it’s knitting up beautifully…..now. I had to cast-on this pattern 4 times with new modifications every time. I don’t think I’ve never taken as many notes on a pattern as I have had to do so far on the Anastasia socks. I think these socks do however, show-off the colors of the yarn without adding too much. It’s such a nice and simple pattern. The part where the twist wraps from one needle to the next I was a bit hard to figure out but I’ve pushed through! Can’t wait till they are done and I can wear them!
Firsts
I know you all like to see pictures of Miss A, but that’s all you really get. I don’t really talk about her a lot. That’s not because of privacy, or because I don’t care. Nor do I think my readers don’t care. It’s more of less because I don’t have the words. I read all kinds of blogs that talk so genuinely about their children and really describe well their development and the love they have for them. A great example would be Jasmin’s (of the Knitmore Girls) blog Better Than Yarn. She is able to put things into words so well. She’s entertaining and clever. And our daughter’s are very close in age (and development, which I can’t usually say)!
After a teething biscuit! Messy Missy!
When I write about my daughter I feel like it comes out more like Tina Fey news bit Weekend Update (minus the actual humor). Here’s my news bit: Miss A has been crawling for quite a while now. She started before she even turned 6 months. It’s like crawling turned on a switch for her. The next weekend she started pulling herself up on Mommy & Daddy, then suddenly she could pull herself up on anything. We’ve invested in stair gates now. And wouldn’t you know it, she’s started furniture surfing and trying to stand on her own! I really think she’s going to be walking soon.
We had another first yesterday. Our first hospital visit. She’s fine, but her parents have what is known as “New Parent Freak Out Syndrome”. She’s had a cold, the doctor couldn’t fit her in yesterday and it was just better safe than sorry by last night. And then she pulled the whole “let’s make my parents look like big liars” routine once we were there by flirting with everyone!
I have been doing some knitting this week. I’m working on a surprise gift for a friend.
I cast on my husband’s Roo Two. I purchased fingering weight yarn for it. I bought Valley Yarns Huntington in the Brown Sugar color way. This time it should be small enough to be a flying buddy.
I’ve also been doing some spinning. It’s gorgeous BFL that I purchased on my Michigan trip. I got it from Marr Haven Wool Farm in Allegan. The owner does amazing dye work there!
Go on over and check out more WIP Wednesday posts!
Fudge
Im sure I’ve got your attention now! Oh my gawd!! I found something you all must try! I made a run of the mill boxed cake today. No biggie, just felt like cake. Then I went searching for a frosting recipe.
Found one! Fudge Frosting! It was so easy to make, very simple to spread and after a quick 10 minutes or so not messy at all! I highly suggest you look it up and try it. You will not be disappointed. (Oh, and make sure to check out my awesome polish pottery aka my cake plate! I finally got to use it!) I’m off to search for the Chocolate Frosted Marshmallow Cookies mentioned at the end of the recipe now. YUM!
The Full Effect
Here’s the full effect. The babe. IN the Milo vest. I love it! She’s a little model in training I swear. She sure is cute enough!
Surprise
I wasn’t expecting to have an FO today, so surprise to me (and you!). I picked up Miss A’s Milo Handspun vest and worked on it for just a little bit and all of a sudden it was done! It is perfect size and turned out great! I used US size 4 needles and knit the 3 month size. The pattern calls for US size 6, but I knew with the handspun yarn (and after reading other peoples notes) it would still turn out a bit bigger than the 6 month size. The Milo pattern is a great one if you haven’t seen it. It can work for boys and girls and goes from newborn to size 2. Great variation and I’m sure I will be making more! It fits her perfectly and as you can tell she was very excited! Go check out more FO Friday posts!
Winner Winner, Chicken Dinner
Not really. Winner winner, balls of yarn doesn’t sound quite as good though. I have to apologize again about my tardiness on announcing the winner of my blog giveaway. I picked the winner on time but my timing was also pretty bad with this. I’ve been planning on doing a giveaway for my 200th post for a long time, and it unfortunatley happened to line up right along with my surprise visit back home! I didn’t take my computer since my husband stayed here, and my parents computer isn’t the greatest, it’s hard to post from my phone and truthfully I didn’t have all that much time to spare. But enough of the excuses! Let’s get on with it. I had a giveaway for 2 balls of Lang Yarns Alpaca Superlight. I used a random number generator to determine the winner! I only had 8 comments and I’m happy to say the winner is commenter #3! That is Michaela who said “Congrats on your 200th post. So very exciting, I’m sure! Since I am from Germany (now living in Canada), I enjoyed reading your posts about Germany. My favourite was “To The Castle”, partially because of all the pics that remind me of home so much. Whenever I go back, I always bring back Lang Yarns yarn as well If I won, this would be a nice little treat!” You’re comment was very sweet and sometimes I wish I could still be posting about my travels of Germany! Please e-mail me at LauraMB42@gmail.com or send me a message on Ravelry!
As for WIP Wednesday, I haven’t made much progress on anything. I thought I’d be done with my Milo vest by now, but didn’t have virtually any knitting time on my visit home. And definitely no knitting on the plane traveling alone with a 7 month old. I am casting on for a present too and am hoping that will be done by Friday! It’s a bit time-pending. I will be using MMMmalibrigo Lace in Jet Blue. I love working with Malabrigo!
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