Since My Last Post We've Been...

Exploring every nook and cranny of our house.
Climbing, climbing and more climbing.

Knitting as much as my children will allow.

Taking bubble baths.

Finding a stinky old cat to play with.

Getting in the way of any possibility of Mommy loading the dishwasher. Discovering creative new ways to get out of the dishwasher.

Finishing one mitten with the hopes of finishing a second sometime this week :).

Yes, we've been busy little bees around here. Ani is our great explorer and seems most happy when we get out of her way and let her do her thing. Unfortunately, that means a lot of emptying bookshelves, laundry baskets, sock drawers and toy bins. She's a one woman wrecking crew and it has been exhausting. She has three people (me, Todd and Norrin) all picking up after her and still she's able to make more messes in less time than any child I've ever met. As for Norrin, one minute he loves his sister and the next minute I'm pretty sure he's trying to kill her. He's at an age where order and rules are a matter of life and death...or you'd think so with the complete meltdown that occurs when things deviate from the plan. So, needless to say, his little sister is not meshing well with what he expects to happen. Luckily, he has school and he's happy to be there. His name is on a chair, he has scheduled activities and there are rules that are not negotiable...he's totally in his element :). As for me, I've been knitting as much as humanly possible. I'm slowly working through my stash yarn first and have successfully avoided buying any new yarn since my NY trip. I feel tremendous pressure to get a few more things made for the kiddos for some reason. Probably because Ani is growing at breakneck speed and I want her in as many hand knits as possible before she grows up and gets an opinion :). As for Todd, he's our quiet photographer. I appreciate his documentation of our life...although he was suppose to be watching the kids in the bathtub, not taking sneaky pictures of me knitting on the floor (surprisingly good photo since I'm not sure how much sleep I'd had the night before) and without him, this blog would be a lot less pretty. I'm endlessly impressed with the angles that he gets and how he can turn the most basic activity into a work of art.

If You Think Knitting Is Boring...

Then you should probably just skip over this post all together. I've been wielding my knitting needles as fiercely as anyone can to produce lots of warm goodness for my family and now I'd like to document just a little bit of it.

This is a simple slouchy hat I made out of some gorgeous yarn I got while visiting my family in upstate NY. The colors were so beautiful that I didn't want to distract from them with a complicated pattern. Todd says it looks like a baker's hat. I do love to bake, so I'm going to try to ignore that remark and just love that its a lightweight wool that keeps my ears warm.
This is the start of a dragon scarf for Norrin. On Monday, it was Chinese New Year. As I was driving my darling little angel to school, he told me he was upset with me because I didn't knit him a sweater for the Chinese New Year and that Amanda's mommy probably knit her a sweater (never mind that Amanda is actually Chinese...and that her mama doesn't knit). So, I rose to the challenge, took the bait, allowed my 4 year old to guilt me into making him something for the Chinese New Year. For the record, I don't do colorwork very much...at all...and it took me a full day of just knitting with very few breaks to eat and use the bathroom to knit this dragon. And my darling little angel, Norrin came up to me this morning, looked at his future scarf and told me he wanted another dragon on the other end. Uh, huh.

And this very last piece is a sweater for Ani. Its a simple sleeveless sweater that will just be a quick extra layer. I also have hopes of making a simple pair of legwarmers since I can't seem to find anything fleecy and the stupid cotton leggings are not keeping her chunky legs warm. We'll see. I'm not sure how much time I'll have before its spring and the legwarmers will be obsolete.

Up To No Good

We got a little bit of snow this weekend. It was immediately followed by an icy coating that forced us to be housebound for the day. So, that meant a whole lot of cooking, baking and knitting. It also meant it was the perfect opportunity for a bored little baby to learn some new skills. Thanks to what I believe is her brother's influence (Norrin will climb anything that holds still long enough), Ani has found an absolute love for climbing the stairs. She only goes up, but if she is awake and someone is foolish enough to bring her downstairs, she's on those stairs so fast it'll make your head spin. So, here's our wild woman in action. She just turned 9 months old and I would like everyone to please note that the shirt she is wearing in this picture is an 18 month size. Man, my kids are huge.

Yeah...climbing makes her one happy lil girl.

Another Day at the Please Touch Museum

My brother, aka Uncle, came to visit this weekend. Since he has a full time job, it was a short visit, but we packed a whole lot of fun in one day.


A picture of my two crazy munchkins...Ani is hoarding some of my yarn, as usual and Norrin is starting his day with a healthy breakfast of fruity snacks :(.



Norrin and Da when we first got to the Please Touch Museum. The building they let these kids run loose in is just amazing.

Love this picture...taken by Uncle.

Da attacking Norrin...I think he really means it :).

Norrin doing some art work with Uncle.

Ani and I found a quiet corner with plenty of baby appropriate toys for her to play with.

My beautiful girl...

Todd took lots of pictures of her to get the best shots of the mama-made hat.

Besides, who can resist taking so many pictures of such a happy little girl.

Our wild little family.

Yes, it was a good day.

A Headband For Ani Rose

I like headbands on baby girls. However, I don't like the dents they leave in their heads. So I cast on a headband for Ani Rose. No pattern, just a few stitches knit to an inch shy of her actual head size. Then, I added a button and its done. She looks adorable and as her hair grows all crazy, like her brother's, she'll have something to keep the wispies out of her eyes.

Brother and Sister

Nothing gives me greater joy than watching my kids play. And if they play together, well, that's even better.

The two wild children undoing all the cleaning up their mama did. Ani's emptying her sock drawer and Norrin slowly brings out every toy I've put away.

A drawing Norrin did of him and Ani last night.

Little Miss Cutie Patootie

I knew she'd make even her mama's amateur sewing attempts look pretty darn cute.

Craft Therapy

Whenever things feel a little out of control, sometimes I feel a whole lot better if I immerse myself in something crafty. And sometimes, just sometimes, I decide it needs to be sewing. I have made a grand total of three things for Norrin on my sewing machine. I made him pajama pants from a pillowcase, overalls and a wow wow wubbzy costume. All of these items have turned out as good as can be expected from a beginner seamstress...totally wearable, many visible mistakes hidden by the cuteness of the kid wearing them. My mom gave me a wonderful new sewing machine...awhile ago...and it wasn't until today that I decided to use it. Its been one of those days where I've been feeling overwhelmed, under the weather and just plain blah and knitting wasn't going to cut it. I needed instant gratification. I needed to accomplish something I could see and hold...and that something had to be something I could put on our beautiful baby girl, the fabulous Miss Ani Rose. Unfortunately, I don't have the actual baby here to model it for us, so just the pajama pants will have to do for now.


These are the back with a lil bit of contrast fabric at the top.
And these are the front.

Cute, quick and simple...done in less than 2 hours. Now its almost time to pick up the kiddos and with that, I will have the lovely Miss Ani Rose hide all the flaws in her mama's sewing in a few perfectly modeled, most likely blurry pictures.

Christmas 2011

On Christmas morning, I heard Norrin slide out of bed and make his way to the staircase. He tiptoed to about halfway down the stairs and I listened to the silence that I knew was him taking it all in. He quickly ran back up the stairs and said, "Mommy! Santa came!" I sat up in bed and looked at his perfect, happy, excited little face. It was one of those beautiful moments that I hope will be burned into my brain forever because there's nothing more wonderful than the face of a 4 year old on Christmas.

We all got out of bed and began the craziness of Christmas morning. Norrin opened gifts for him and Ani. He draped a tag on Ani which was just too cute.


I've never seen him open gifts so quickly.

Even Ani got in the spirit of it.

What a crazy, fun, magical morning.

Then, it was off to Grandmom Meatball for more gifts. Norrin knew about the gifts a week in advance and once the Santa gifts were all open and sufficiently played with, he started nagging us to go to Todd's parents' house. Rita spoiled the kiddos rotten and then fed us a delicious meal.

Rita and Ani Rose.

An easel for our little artist.

Kisses from one very happy boy.

The rest of our day was spent at Stevie's house, aka Uncle Millsy. Norrin loves playing with Connor...even though it can be a bit of a love/hate relationship :), Aunt Anne Marie always has a table full of sweets that Norrin can't keep his hands off of and Ani Rose was showered in attention and loved every minute of it. A very busy and very fun day.