luck

i love when my birthday week turns out to be lucky. although we really didn't do much for my actual birthday (sundaes at DQ) the rest of the week turned out awesome.

random happies from the last week:
the day after my birthday i traded off my biggest headache - my jimmy. and now i drive a civic back & forth to work twice a day. go fuel economy! seriously... double. even though it is just as old as my jimmy and also is not perfect, i am very happy with it. especially that we were able to just trade & not pay or have to make payments.

i renewed my glamour shot aka drivers license and i hate the picture. but the task is done anyways. and i didn't have to wait very long once i got there.

i got birthday money and went online to buy clothes. i got alot of tops, but no pants. well the pants i did order ended up being sold out. i really need new pants more than tops. everything i got was on mega sale, plus a coupon code for $40 off $100.

last night our little family went to the movie at the park along with my sister & her friend. I had forgot 2 bag chairs at my parents' house so my sister brought those (a kid one and an adult one) and i ended up forgetting our other chair so when we got there we realized we were down a chair.. anyways, they had a scratch ticket thing to win a bag chair so I ended up winning a new chair. talk about luck because I really didn't want to sit on the grass while everyone else had a chair.

and t minus 2 days until my very first week-long vacation since graduating college and working at this 'real job' for the last 4 years. i.am.excited!

white noise

birthday flowers
from my sweet parents

(off-)white raglan
for my sweet boy

also.. i don't know if it's from the cotton yarn or what, but my index finger is cracked right where I touch the point my knitting needles:

owwwww.
I guess it's hard to take a picture of.... meh.

So I got the good stuff out and it is slowly closing back up. hopefully that's the end of that!

Have a good weekend!

A whole sweater

Done!

My pekoe sweater is finished & ready for wear!

Can you believe it?!

I love it!

(even the ultra-clearance color grew on me, original plan was to attempt to dye it gray.)

Next up..... a simple raglan pullover for my little guy. He asked over and over while I was knitting this if I would make him one too. Wellllll, since he asked so nicely .... :)

Also... I'm 26 now... ayyye!

WIP Wednesday - some seaming happening

I am in the finishing stages of my Pekoe top.

Did I ever tell you I've never knit something that needs proper seams?

Seaming.is.scary.

Well, I mean, not that scary because it's not like it's going to explode if I do it wrong, but it could look ugly.

And then it won't be worn. And after all the hours I've knit on this, that would be a real shame.



inside seams



the top is the sleeve and the bottom is the shirt.

I mentioned on the luvinthemommyhood Rav group that I would be researching seaming and I was sent some links. Well they certainly helped! I started sewing the sleeve on today with the help of the backstreet boys (yea, nerd) on pandora. The technique is not all that difficult but since this is my first time I am taking my time. So far, I think it looks OK. Not spectacular but also not terrible. I put this part on over my shoulder and I didn't see any real big errors. Cross your fingers that the rest will go just as smooth, if not better!

green lace sweater

an almost-recognizable top!

So, we're well into the summer sweater knit-a-long.

things are super over here. I love this pattern.

I feel like I'm over halfway done, but I still have more than half my yarn left?

I'm not going to worry about that, though.

I was really enjoying knitting the bottom half of this pattern in the round... now that I've split the front & back, not so much (not gonna lie).

the lace is not really challenging or anything too complicated, I just rather not purl every row. sigh...

at least that part is almost over.. then we do the sleeves!

another thing, I'm starting to feel like the top should have a bit more length below the split for the sleeves.

i am tall, so I added an inch to the pattern measurement, but looking at it, I wonder if it will still be on the short side. booo. I'm thinking (hoping) that blocking will help. we shall see.

little of this..

a little of that...

i love summer.

i know i say it sooo much, but I really do.

i think it has to do with the fact that i was born in early august.

a lot of people i know with summer birthdays really love summer, like excessively, like me.

if the sun is out, i feel guilty for being in the house. at all.

vacation is coming up and it's supposed to be hot and beautiful.

and i'll be out in nature. oh this makes me happy!

sooo, anyways. who wants to see some snapshots of our summer so far?

during the week we go out and do this:

Rob's RC airplane

we can only go when it's not windy (rarely) and only Rob knows how to fly it so me and Devin watch.

and this time we took pictures. 

devin's photog skills. i'm actually in the frame!!

 Rob documented that he lets me drive his car:

tops off!!

Here's how I found devin the other day when I got up for work:

Of course when I went to get my camera, he woke up, so I made him close his eyes... what a good faker haha!

A couple weeks ago, we went to our friends' house and Rob decided to wash his truck.

then devin decided to wash his friend's trike for her. I thought this was hilarious:

 We washed the baby jeep too but I didn't get a picture of that:

and finally, my little french boy:

we are not french. at all.

there was a picnic/block party put on by the city in our park a few weeks ago.

there was a bounce house, free hot dogs, face painting, balloon animals, chalk, etc.

it was so fun. we got to see the insides of a fire truck too.

so anyways, i was walking with Devin over to the face paints and I asked what he wanted the girl to paint on his face. A mustache..

Funny kid. So when we told the girl she decided a swirly one would be good.

So hilarious.

ps. today is cast-on day for the KAL! finally!!



look what came!

my order came in the mail on Friday, Yippeeee!

you guys, I have been excitedly rubbing my hands together all weekend.

it's painful to have the supplies for my project and not be able to start!

 

JUNE

Don't you just love june? time just goes and goes - seriously this last week I've stayed up til midnight every night. the sun made me do it! That is waaay past my bedtime, and I'm exhausted today! Wish I had a coffee pot at work right about now...

Also, I was really concentrated on this project I was knitting. (big surprise)

[pickles]

My goal was to finish it before luvinthemommyhood's summer sweater knit-a-long. I didn't get to participate last year, because I was not prepared yarn- or time-wise. This year, I'm prepared for cast-on next week sometime.  I think I am anyway, I got the confirmation email that my yarn is in the mail, so I'm really hoping it comes today (rather than tomorrow, i had it delivered to work and I won't be here on a saturday... not even for yarn!)

The sweater I have queued up for the KAL is Pekoe, and I'm really excited to get started. It was sooo hard to pick a pattern! There are so many many pretty sweaters to choose from! I decided to go for my first pullover sweater. My red cardigan has been finished but not finished for awhile.. ya I'm lazy like that..I'm sure I'll finish it in a snap this fall, for now I have no need obviously. I guess I just like doing things in opposites because the Pekoe will be more of a summer top and I'm guessing I won't finish until the weather starts cooling down, mainly because it is knit with sock yarn, aye aye aye!! that detail would hardly matter to me if I wore a size small.... it is definitely going to be a ton of knitting!

The best sister

(that's me btw)


My sisters are so glad to have an older sister like me that they randomly make me things that I love:
(is that statement grammatically correct?)

Just kidding, my sister is taking a ceramics class in high school, and she said they have a wildcard type project to do by the end of the semester and she didn't know what to make! i said yarnbowl! like immediately and made her do the work of googling it. and she followed through.  it.is.perfect! plus she chose this color on her own. My favorite!!
I can't wait to see it in person!
p.s. dont ask me about the projects in the background, i have no idea LOL. they do look interesting though

put a sleeve on it

oh my wow! I only have one sleeve left to knit (and about 844 ends to weave in) before I officially complete my first sweater!

Mr. Curdy says I should wear it like this, he says he likes it, but then if i get bored I can just work on it some hahaa.

oh shoot, i just remembered she will need buttons too. 10 of them. got a little carried away with the buttonholes, but I think it'll do!

cruisin'

check out my temp ride:

so cute. (thats my shadow, not a dent on the front fender)

my truck is broke (big suprise, not.) so i'm borrowing my MIL's car for now while we work out what we want to do with mine (fix or dump). It already went to the shop, and is running now, and even better than before but is still a big turd so...

adult life is so awesome... *sigh*

Rob now wants me to have my own PT (i pretty much do too) but he says if we get me one, it must be all tinted so nobody can see him driving it. I guess it's not masculine enough.... ha. good thing he has his own pickup.

Devin thinks its awesome riding in grandma's car and thinks that we must hunt for other PTs while driving it.. he's so funny. He also knows other (GMC) Jimmy's really well too now.

twins!

Glasses pictures - haha!

Devin is the green lantern.

(and looks a little tipsy maybe?)

don't even ask me how he knows what green lantern is

I know I didn't tell him, cuz I don't know either LOL

why I didn't win the megamillion

I know this is topic is sooo last week, but I wanted you all to know: I didn't win the megamillions because I didn't know how to get a ticket - LOL.
Like, I know you get it from the gas station, or the grocery store.
I asked like 5 of my friends "how do I buy a ticket, like, what do I say?" haha
in the end I ended up not getting one. Oh well. just goes to show I'm not addicted to gambling haha.
too bad.

easter weekend

Ya know, i've gotten so bad with my camera I rarely take pics anymore, here's a couple from my phone from the weekend. Me and Devin got to stay home on Friday, it was awesome. In the afternoon we went over to the park, check out D's hair - the wind was nuts this weekend! Also, love his little sweater jacket from grandma! Reminds me of cookie monster lol.

this is actually from the previous weekend, but we dyed more at grandma&grandpas house on Easter!

<3 Happy Easter

really doing it!

this project is well underway, and i got about 4 inches under the arms and decided to try it on.
Exciting news... it fits! It's hard eyeball when you have a 40-something inch bust and are knitting the bust on a 29" needle - unless you take it off the needles and put some waste yarn in to allow it to stretch out.
I'm so happy!
also, i look like valentine barf with a pink shirt under the red lol.

turqoise and red

don't they look nice together?

Happy friday!

i'm hoping to get some time with this project this weekend.

spring!



my sweeties!

 We have weather that is nice enough for the park as of... yesterday! Who knows if it will last and turn right into summer, but I, for sure, am crossing my fingers. I'm pretty sure my kid is suffering from cabin fever, he goes from my sweet little boy who tells me in the sweetest voice "you're my girl mama", to a total monster in about 3 seconds flat these days. Needless to say, the first day we had sun, and no snow left on the ground, we were at the park working off the his energy. (also, no flood this year so the park is completely dry unlike this time last year when the play equipment was completely in the river!)

Another thing we have a tough time with lately is sleeping. He wants to stay up late, sleep in our bed, have water, go potty... you name it, in order to stay up late. Now, in addition he also wakes up extremely early. (thinking back from babyhood, sleep disturbances happened when he was about to reach a milestone, which is common.... maybe, just maybe, this means potty training is almost over. but i'm not holding my breath) This morning I found him fast asleep on his belly, on a chair in the livingroom with a pillow against the back of the chair and his legs just hanging down. It was super adorable.

Anyways, I have some knitting and stuff to talk about but I've gotta go for now. be back soon.

for now, go check out this hilarious and brave doggie.

and the moral of this story is..

that I'm awesome.

So we'll start at the beginning about... june. I don't know... could have been may or july, I'm horrible at keeping track. My boss bought me a new chair for my desk. Because the arms were breaking off the old one. I have no idea how long the chair had been here, it was probably time to replace it anyways.

So, I got this brand new chair from the office store. I was so happy to have a nice new chair with arms that were intact, until like one month later... things started to slip. My chair continuously sunk down during the day and I was reaching down about 1000 times a day to raise it back up again, only to be back down within the hour. Apparently, this is a common problem. (I love google.)

So after suffering for like... months, I researched (googled) and the results were that you can 1. take apart the mechanism, or 2. add a dryer hose clamp, or 3. get a new chair (which i was afraid to even ask after only having this one for under a year.)

And then, there's option 4 (my very own brilliant idea). Exchange the mechanism with a good one from another chair. There's like 4 chairs here that nobody sits in, in fact they are found in a seperate part of our office that is usually locked off. We were expecting carpet people to come finish installing our new carpet on Friday in the locked off part, so it was open. I got out the tool kit and had workshop hour on friday afternoon after everyone left*. BOOM! Chair is like new now and I am so happy!

*we have a rotating schedule on fridays so that everyone gets a chance to go home early a couple times a month, but our office remains open by the one person (me, last week) staying until regular closing time.

I spent my weekend knitting a sock

Aaaaannnd....
my baby turned 3! Unbelievable.

Devin is so happy to be 3 and even more happy that he got to go to Chuck.e.cheese with grandma & grandpa. Also, his 3rd birthday was also his 3rd day wearing underwear with NO accidents! Thank God, because 3 years of diapers is quite enough!

BOO!

did I scare you..?
been pretty quiet around here.

and in the life of curdy too. pretty quiet. been laying low, and finally now that january is over, I have a few things to look forward to in february. 1. i just place a knit picks order for a sweaters' worth of yarn. my first adult sweater. (plus some other yarn too) 2. my little boy's 3rd b-day - also birthday pictures and birthday haircut. 3. monster trucks! this weekend! and then winter day at the lake and superbowl. I think it's going to be a great weekend.

Back to the sweater thing. I think I have decided on the shapely boyfriend sweater, in red. I'm guessing that I'll be doing 3/4 sleeves because I LOVE 3/4 sleeves, but otherwise I'll probably follow the pattern exactly.

cute, right?!

I'm also thinking really hard about getting yarn to make a short-sleeved-open-front cardigan. I found two patterns that I really love and that seem somewhat similar to me.


Abalone

&

Leaflet

Wouldn't that be cute?!  I think I can figure out how to combine the patterns, it'll be just like a math problem.. And I love math!

anyways, i have been participating in luvinthemommyhood's warm up to winter KAL and having a blast knitting up some warm winter accessories (hats & mitts). So far I'm at 4 projects completed or almost completed. I really wish for a pom-pom maker, I am no good at making poms the resourceful way!