Here’s the gray alpaca/black tencel scarf I completed weaving.  I did a simple twill pattern on 4 shafts.

I really like how it turned out.  It’s very elegant and simple looking.  Lightweight, soft, yet very warm.

Happy New Year to you all.  May 2007 be blessed beyond measure. 

I finished the Corazon Mittens around 2:00 this morning when I couldn’t sleep.  Now Kelly has to finish hers up.

Was back up at 5:00 casting on for another pair of mittens.  A different pattern this time and different colors.  Pictures to share later.  Would be nice if I could get them done by tomorrow night, but I doubt it.  I guess we will just have to see what tomorrow brings.

Got to work out in my fiber area today.  Almost all put together.  Two more boxes to open and we are good to go.  I like the order to it all out there.  Hopefully I can keep it that way.

Received my Christmas present from hubby today.  It was an order from Knit Picks.  He hit the wrong shipping option, called to make the changes, but they didn’t see the order yet.  They asked him to call back in an hour, but work got in the way and it slipped his mind.  So, regular shipping it went.  He felt so bad, but I didn’t.  He showed me what he ordered and he did good.  Extra sleeves in the single and double size, ID markers (although they sent two size 4’s and no size 5  wah), 4 skeins of alpaca cloud, and 2 skeins of sock yarn.  He did good.  I just love that man.

I apologize to those whom I haven’t responded back to lately.  I have been having email issues.  I pretty much have had to switch everything over to my gmail account because of it, but in the process missed quite a few emails.  So, if you haven’t heard from me lately, that may be why. 

I believe I hear my knitting calling me, and I have the luxury this afternoon of responding.  I am running with it.  Catch ya later.

‘Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. (that’s because we killed it.  Yes, we found we have mice in the garage and I am sorry if some of you think it’s cruel, but these buggers aren’t invading my wool.)

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care (have you ever tried hanging 8 stockings on a fireplace screen?) In hopes that St Nicholas soon would be there.

Hubby and I finally finished wrapping the presents and fell into bed exhausted.  But the tree looked pretty with presents around it.  (ok I failed to get a final shot of the tree with all the presents so this will have to do)

The kids were delighted at the amount of presents under the tree because I kept telling them that I wasn’t “doing Christmas” this year.  One year they WILL believe me. Anyway, it always looks like a lot because well, there’s a lot of people in our family.  This actually was one of our smaller Christmas’s (thank goodness) due to moving and other expenses that needed to transpire.

Jim is a cruel man and likes order to Christmas. (yes, I am blaming him even though in reality it’s probably my fault.)  So, the kids got to see the gifts under the tree and see their stockings hanging by the chimney with care and off to eat our Christmas donuts we went.

The torture was over and the gifting could begin.  Jim wanted to be the “gift master” this year.  Normally, it’s my job to hand out presents but he wanted to do it this year, so I gladly let him so I could sit back and watch.  First he made everyone sit patiently (or not so patiently as it were)

Even the dog had to wait patiently.

Finally….stockings.

Among the candy, hair gel, toothbrushes, combs, perfumes, lip glosses (or chapstick for the boys), and other assorted items was a pair of socks for everyone.  I didn’t make the socks this year, but will plan on doing so for next.  Ack…I can’t believe I bought store socks…but at least they are wool and very soft.

Let the paper fly!!!!

My brother gave us all “handcuff shirts”.  I love these things.  The sweatshirts have fingerless gloves attached.  Most of the kids outgrew theirs from last year and were very happy for new ones this year.

Jess seems entranced with mermaids recently so grandpa bought her mermaid stuff.  Body soap, books, and something else (can’t remember) so she was very happy.

Cassidy received a sock knitting loom and several hand painted skeins of sock yarn.  One thrilled her to no end. I hand painted it with her in mind and it’s called Cassidy’s Dream (scroll to the bottom of the screen to see the colorway)

Grandpa has a new fishing buddy.  Daddy loves to fish and fished a lot with my brother while living with them.  Now he’s recruiting the younger generation.  He gave Jac a fishing pole for his birthday in November.  For Christmas, he gave him a small tackle box Jac can wear around his waist.

Josh got some neat collector cars, an art set, remote control car, and assorted other items.

Chris received an art set and was thrilled.  He’s really blossomed with his drawing in the past few months so this made him very happy.

Jess got a Barbie Computer.  Cass had one from a few years ago and everyone loves playing with it.  We thought Jess would like one of her own this year.  It was a hit.

Caleb got a new bone and the cats got FAKE mice.  The real ones in the garage are a little more then I could handle.

Of course half the fun of getting presents is playing with them.  I didn’t realize at the time, but I think the boys put on every new item of clothing they received.  They um….were colorful.

This is how I felt after the gifts were all opened.  I wanted to take a nap….but alas, there was dinner to cook as we opened the house to soldiers with no place to go.  While we didn’t have as many as we have had in years past (we had tons in KY) we had a good showing and it was fun.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night. 

Ok…I told you I was behind on Christmas posts, so I am trying to catch up.

Our family celebrates Christmas Adam.  It started with just hubby and I a few years ago.  I had read about a homeschooling family that did this.  As the story goes, someone in the family said, “Tomorrow is Christmas Eve.”  Another child then stated, “Well, then today must be Christmas Adam because Adam came before Eve.”  That family then started celebrating Christmas Adam.  Jim and I didn’t do anything special for it, just watched a movie and said Happy Christmas Adam.  Along came our first child.  His first Christmas with us, he was 9.  He had just come to live with us the month before and we were still getting to know him.  Jim had to work late, so Josh and I stayed on Christmas Adam watching a movie.  We both fell asleep in the living room.  When I woke up, Jim was on the couch sleeping too.  Somehow this started the trend.  The next Christmas, we had 4 more children to enter into the ranks.  We bought a new fiber optic tree (mom was tired of stringing lights) and the kids asked to watch a movie and sleep out in the living room around the tree.  We agreed.  Last year, we simply didn’t have the room to do this.  The kids asked, but there was no room at the inn.  Ok, there was no room in the living room to have everyone lay out especially since my dad was visiting and had to sleep in the living room too.  Just wasn’t going to work.  The kids were bummed and I thought it was forgotten about.  Until this Christmas.  I mentioned to everyone that it was Christmas Adam.  Josh perked up and said that meant a movie and falling asleep in the living room.  I couldn’t believe he remembered.  So, we piled into the living room on Christmas Adam, watched a movie and all (except for Grandpa who now has his OWN room ) slept out in the living room.  I captured this picture early Sunday morning (Christmas Even morning) I brightened it a bit to show the kids all snuggled in their blankeys and hubby sleeping peacefully on the couch (with the dog at his feet of course)

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas.  I will post about Christmas later.  I am a little (ok a lot) burned out and just need to recoup.

 I still am not feeling up to par.  Was feeling better and then this week, my stomach just is in all kinds of knots and food isn’t settling too well.  Jim is feeling the same way, so whatever bug we picked up, still lingers.  I needed some really easy knitting so I cast on these Kidz Mittenz (done finger up with an afterthought thumb) Christmas night.  Didn’t work on them a whole lot yesterday and finished them up this morning.  They fit Jessi and will be given away.

My friend, Kel and I have I have talking about doing these mittens together as a KAL.  She cast on last night and here is her progress so far. (Hey, convince her she needs a blog and you would visit and see what she’s up to.  She’s really talented and smart and makes awesome things)  I sent Jessi out to my yarn bin (I can now get to most of my fibery stuff…tomorrow it should all be arranged out in the garage…whoot whoot) and asked her to pick two colors of wool for me to make the mittens.  When she came in with red and white I had to laugh and thought to myself that “it figures”.  Kel and I are so much alike sometimes (other then the math thing) it’s scary.  So, I just had to knit these in the same color she is.  Here’s my progress so far.

I didn’t realize it til I really got into the mitten, but there is a slight bow in the fingertip area.  I think because I was pulling too tightly.  But when on my hand, it’s not noticable.

Other then that, not a whole lot going on here today.  More later.

I received a little package of sunshine in the mail.  I admit the yarn, pattern, and bag are great.  But you know what?  Your note meant more to me then everything.  Thanks for touching my heart today.  I do hope, however, you meant a GOOD “surprise beyond measure” by the way

Here’s what I got.

My girly girls are fighting over the bag.  My youngest is currently folding a mountain of laundry in hopes that will convince me to let her have it.  My sons are estatic over the “Army” yarn and wanting to know who’s going to get mittens out of it. :)  I think with the hectic-ness of last week, I forgot to post my public thanks for the array of Starbuck’s coffees and the chocolate peppermint treat I got from you too.

I have been blessed with you as my pal.  Thanks so much.

It’s been awhile since I blogged hasn’t it?  I had a ton of things to share with you last week but the batteries in my camera died and I couldn’t find the charger so I just kept putting it off.  Friday, I got the bestest Christmas surprise in the world but still I didn’t blog.  Saturday, a kitty tragedy happened, and still no blogging.  Monday I was too busy throwing up and trying to keep from falling off the planet so I obviously didn’t blog.  Tuesday and Wednesday are a bit of blur….but here I am today.  Let’s see if I can recap the events of the past several days….be warned now…this is a LONG post.

Last week I found the joy of stranded knitting and decided to try a few different things and threw these two bags together with little or no pattern or thought to them.  Ok, so they aren’t finished yet since I haven’t attached the straps, but when you read about the events followng the bag making, perhaps you will cut me some slack and let me finish them AFTER Christmas.

I really liked the way they turned out.  I will post finished photos of them later along with patterns if you all are interested.

Thursday of last week brought an early morning training session for hubby at work.  That meant getting up at 1:00 am (as if 4:00 every day isn’t good enough) and him being into work by 1:30.  That also meant me being awake to receive kiddos from soldiers who need child care at that crazy hour of the morning.  I had a hard time going to sleep the night before so I was working on about 3 hours sleep.  I never made it back to bed after all the kids arrived so I stayed up and knitted and worked on other things.  By 9:00 am all the extra kids were gone, but at 9:30 we ushered in another homeschool family for a morning of candy making.  It counted as a school day.  The kids didn’t understand how making candy could count as a school day.  But, as my friend Kelly would hopefully agree, there’s a lot of math and science that goes into cooking.  We needed to use measurements and weights.  We needed to learn how to double and even triple a recipe.  We learned how solids change to liquids and then back to solids again.  I will even venture on a limb and tell you that we learned things like if you put a bowl of hot melted chocolate on a plastic table, it will melt the table, or if you put globs of chocolate on wax paper that’s directly under a fan, the chocolate will harden sometimes even before you can get it out of the bowl.  So, it was EASY to call it school that day.

Above you see my friend, Ginger leading the candy making.  Jac is in the background giving her the same respect he gives me most days.  Yes, those are his fingers in his ears not wanting to listen. 

Reading plays an important role in not only cooking but society, so Jac had to tell us how to melt the Almond Bark before he and B could begin their project.

A shows us how when an object is put under stress it can crack.  The girls all got a chance to crush the peppermint candies to put on top of the melted Almond Bark.

Just a small portion of the fruits of our labor.  We had gobs of chocolate things to share.

Then we entered into the totally fun, be as creative, don’t follow many rules (ok in my family you can’t say don’t follow ANY rules or total chaos will reign) kind of decorating.  This was so fun and easy for the kids and they loved it.  Take a sugar cone (you know the pointed ice cream cone…just make sure you have one that has a flat rim unlike us who actually had waffle sugar cones and I had to saw off the ruffled edges…but it gave our trees character..anyway I strayed from the recipe) and ice it with green cake frosting (just buy a tub of your favorite white icing and add green food coloring)  Let the kids go crazy with sprinkles and mini M&M’s and you have a cute Christmas Tree Cone.

Then let them eat and enjoy.

I ended up with the extra kids the rest of the afternoon so their mommy could get a much needed break and go chat (on the computer) with her hubby who is deployed to Iraq right now.  The kids all played and watched some TV.

Friday then brought another twist and surprise.  I was out in the garage with Chris trying to clean it out and get things straightened and unpacked.  I still need to get to my wool, people!!  As he and I drug everything out into the driveway so we could start organizing everything, I got a call from my daddy.  We talk on the phone everyday so it wasn’t a big deal.  Told him I was just thinking about calling him.  We talked for a few minutes and he said he was getting hungry and was thinking of having some lunch.  I asked him where he was going to eat and he said, he really had a craving for Fire Mountain.  Huh…To my knowledge there was no Fire Mountain in Ohio, but there is one down the street.  My daddy was on hour away and was inviting us to lunch.  YAY.  Daddy was coming to town for Christmas.  Daddy wanted to surprise the kids, so I had call their daddy to see if he wanted to go to lunch.  He couldn’t make it, but I didn’t  let them know that.  So they thought we were meeting their daddy at the restaurant.  We quickly put everything back into the gargae, still helter skelter, but a little more neater anyway and went to the restaurant for lunch and their surprise.  They were surprised.  But that wasnt’ the end of it. Daddy arrived with a u-haul.  Daddy was MOVING to town.  WHOOP WHOOP.  I guess he had been planning on it pretty much since he left here in November or at least shortly after he arrived back in Ohio.  Jim knew about it for about a month and kept it quiet.  He did an amazing job of it too.  Jim did tell me that he felt incredibly guilty and kept having to remind himself that it wasn’t a secret it was a surprise.  I’ll say.  We are so thrilled daddy is here.  In the process we had to shift some things around and I don’t have the room with the fire place for my loom anymore, but I got a smaller cozier spot central to all points of the house and a big window.  Everyone seems happy.

Saturday came with the tiles coming off the wall in the bathroom.  Jac bumped the soap dish on the wall and about 12 tiles fell into the tub.  Welcome Grandpa…we’re glad you’re here…to fix things. :)  Jess had a birthday party to go to and looked so cute dressed up in 50’s style garb.  Had my 3 “weekend” kids for a few hours and the owner of the house decided to stop in and meet dad (aka the handyman) and meet us.  I wasn’t actually here to meet her but I am told she’s very nice.  Jim and I decided to sneak out Saturday night for a bite to eat.  We weren’t 5 minutes away from the house when we got called back that there was an emergency at the house.  * WARNING this could be graphic and gross for some to read *  One of the kids slammed the bathroom door and my kitty was in the way.  Her tail to be more specific.  Josh found what we thought was the entire tail laying on the floor but daddy couldn’t find the cat.  We came in the house to 5 very upset children in the living room and my daddy searching the house for my kitty.  We found her behind our bed and then she ran into our bathroom.  It appeared that just the fur was stripped from her tail but that really wasn’t the case.  All the skin had pulled off as well.  So, while the tail wasn’t severed in the door, all the skin and fur got stripped off.  We called our vet and she didnt’ think it was life threatening.  While painful and gross and uncomfortable, she felt it best for us to keep Sarai here at the house, keeping her calm the area as sanitized as possible, and just loving on her.  We would take her to the office first thing Monday morning.  I just couldn’t and still can’t imagine the pain she endured, but she’s a trooper and did well.

Sunday, whew…the Lord made the 7th day a day of rest for a reason.  We got some…a little…not much…maybe an hour’s worth.

Monday came way to quickly and with it brought Jim throwing up and feeling awful.  He trooped off to work with a promise to go to sick call or make an appointment to see the doc.  I was ok until about 6:30 when I started not feeling so hot.  I got Sarai dropped off at the vet’s office and decided to surprise the kids with donuts for breakfast on the way home.  I walked into Wal-Mart and almost lost it.  Got the donuts and got home.  I put everything on the counter and hit the couch for the next few hours.  I woke to throwing up.  I made it back to the couch for another few hours of sleep.  Jim finally made it home with orders for bedrest as we had the flu.  Oh joy.  After throwing up again, I settled into bed and just let daddy take over everything and not even try to stay alert for the kids.  Thank you daddy for being here and thank you God for letting daddy be here when we needed him.

Tuesday brought relief from the flu symtoms but extreme fatigue.  Rest was the order of the day.  Not much else was done.

Yesterday, it’s almost like we weren’t sick at all except the unwillingness to eat anything.  Neither Jim nor I have a desire to eat much and coffee??? Are you kidding, I haven’t had a cup of coffee since Sunday morning (and I am starting to really feel the headache from that).  But we did find that this stomach thing was hitting the church hard and fast.  Everyone has the same symptoms…the desire to die on day 1, too tired to care on day 2 and everything’s better on day 3.  Anyone else going through this?  Sarai did get to come home minus her tail.  She’s doing well other wise.  The other cats missed her greatly and have welcomed her home in great fashion.  They bathed her and loved on her a bit but are still pretty weary of her tail area.  She has about a 3 inch stub that was shaved.  I am told it will look cute when the hair grows back.  Right now…not so cute.

Today…will be, hopefully, finishing up Christmas shopping and trying to get this house put back together.

To my SP9 partner and my Feet to Prayers partner….A HUGE PUBLIC APOLOGY for not getting out your package.  I still have stuff packed from the move that I wanted to include so I am changing my strategies a little bit and something else will be coming your way soon, I promise.  Thanks for being so wonderfully understanding.

Remind me never to move in December again, ok?

Hope everyone has a wonderful day and if you stayed through the end of this post…bless you.

I joined the Stash Swap over at Swap-bot and received my envelope from Patty.  In it was some neat cotton yarns great for weaving, some alpaca/silk yarn, and some fur yarn.

Cass swiped the fur yarn and I found her knitting up a storm on her loom.

Thanks again Patty for the enveloped stuffed with stash!

This morning was another EARLY morning.  Aren’t they all?  Anyway, I was drinking a wonderful coffee blend just surfing around on the internet and stumbled across this website.  I watched the video, grabbed some needles and started playing around with the sampler pattern.  While I am not following their pattern directly  (ok, at 4:00 am it was a tad too confusing) I did follow one color repeat and here’s what I have done so far.

It’s been fun to work this up and I have been working on getting even tension and stuff.  I shall try something a tad harder later on.  My friend Kel and I are going to do a knit along after the first of the year, so I am getting in my practice now.  By the way, in looking at this picture, I realized I made a glaring mistake.  Oh well…I am NOT going to tink this!

Speaking of my friend Kel…look what she made using some of my handpainted yarn.  First, she sewed the fleece top and then made the matching hat, scarf, and mittens.  I tried to get her to make me a fleece top but she said no.  :(  Thanks for letting me show it off, Kel.

This morning I am trying to put up some Christmas things.  Daddy brought me a few things of momma’s and his from their home together.  One item is a set of musical Christmas bells that I used to love to listen to.

I have discoverred that I still love to listen to them.  They play 25 different Christmas songs.  I used to be in the handbell choir at church and these bells remind me of that.  Anyway, this is the first time the kids have ever seen them or heard them and they are entranced as well.  However, today, things are a little different.  As I sat listening to them, I couldn’t help but hear the howitzer’s in the background.  Our new house is much closer to the back gate and therefore the field and training grounds for some of the exercises that go on the post.  You can hear the repeative boom, boom, boom and the windows rattle (believe me, you become used to it and it becomes a reassuring sound most days.  You actually miss the sound of field artillery exercises or air support when you are away from your home on leave….it’s an Army thing I guess)  Anyway, I was listening to the bells and the booms and somehow felt almost transported into one of the opening scenes in Bing Crosby’s White Christmas where they are singing and there is all the bombing going on all around them.  I just couldn’t help but wonder if those sounds are anyway similar to what our Troops are going through in Iraq and Afghanistan?  They hear all the artillery, the bombing, the air cover and yet are listening to sounds of “home” and are transported to their loved ones missing them like crazy.  Please remember to pray for our troops AND their families this holiday season.  We were blessed that Jim’s deployment did not come to pass (although there’s always the next wave in the spring) and he’s here in the states with us.  There are so many that are without their loved ones yet again for another year.  No matter what your political stance, I urge you to remember all the military men and women (and their families) who give up so much in order to do their job.

Speaking of doing their job, Jim has entered into the “busy” time again.  He took over the job he had earlier in the year which keeps him at work for long hours.  For example, Wednesday he left before 5:00 am and he got home around 8:30 pm.  Yesterday, out of the house by 5:00 am and home at 7:45 pm only to get a call as he was walking in the door.  He downed 4 reheated meatballs, hugged a few kids good night and was back out the door by 8:00 with a call into the SRT for an emergency going down.  He was finally home and in bed somewhere around 2:00 this morning and back out the door by 6:30 this morning.  We are supposed to go to the unit’s Christmas party tonight for the kids.  I think mommy will be taking the kids alone.  The next few months are going to be like this.  But like I mentioned above, we give up a lot in order to get the job done.

Well, it’s back to trying to get the last loads from the old house to the new house.  Not sure if I can get anymore into my SUV, but we will do our level best to make it work and get stuff done.  We have to turn in the keys tomorrow.  ARGH.

I finished spinning the gray/pink and started on spinning the Salsa.  The kids and I are watching Miracle and 34th Street (for the like the 4th time this week) and it’s spinning up so festively.