She's here!

Introducing Baby E, my most ambitious FO. Born on August 24th, 2008 at 10:21am.

A shocking 8lbs 11 oz, 21.5" long of pure perfection.

Sorry for the blog update delay, we were held up at the hospital while Baby E worked on her tan. We were (finally) released and got home today.

Thank you to everyone for their well wishes and comments so far, we love reading them and apologize in advance for (potentially) dropping off the face of the earth while we drink in our new addition.

Sproglet-less

Yup, I could blog and bemoan the fact that I'm 3 days past the estimated due date and I'm about ready to burst - but I've managed to do that to anyone who'll listen, so you lucky guys don't have to endure that too.

Instead I will show you the finished Sunrise Sunset blanket (ravelry link). I finally completed it last night, the carpel tunnel slowed down my crochet, and the sc, dc border certainly killed my mojo a little. According to Ravelry, this project took a little over 3 months to complete, but as Mr. B. said (and I totally agree), it seemed a LOT longer than that.

It was a perfect project to carry around, since you are just crocheting 4.5" squares. However, if you're not a fan of seaming, you might want to give it a miss, or find a really good friend who can stand it - I'm okay with seaming, esp. now that I've actually got my own chibi needles, wow! what a difference that bent end makes, how did it take me so long to own some? I love how the blanket turned out, and we're all just going to pretend that it's had it's final wash and block (c'mon, you can't make a 9+ month preggers woman get on the floor and pin the bugger down can ya?)


As for the log cabin blanket, it's complete except for the border (again), I did a whip stitch border as the pattern suggests and it looked awful. Now I'm halfway through a single crochet border, but just realized that the hook I was using is a tad too big. Tonight I try again. In the meantime, I started another project. I wanted to use the noro sock yarn I bought on vacation in PA, but actually didn't want to make socks [gasp!] so started the chevron scarf (rav link) instead. I think the colours are cheerful, Mr B is unimpressed. I promised I wouldn't make him wear it :)

No! No Baby yet.

So I'm officially playing the waiting game, as are tons of anxious friends and relatives who's emails, calls and facebook contacts are sure to increase as the due date rolls nearer (which is Sunday btw). In the meantime, I finished work on Friday, I decided I could no longer handle the NY arseholes commute and heat, well, naturally it cools to the low 80's this week, but that wasn't going to encourage me to change my mind about work.

Before I update you one what I've been up to, I should show you once again, how wonderful people are out there. Sharon, not content with being super-busy with the birth of her second daughter (having just moved apartment, of course), she had to go ahead and send me this package of adorable goodies:

I believe I may have made even some girlie noise when I opened this package, the booties, the hat, the adorable little bunny, wow this bean is spoiled already :) Thank you Sharon!!

So inbetween watching the crappy NBC daytime version of the Olympics (which basically consists of beach volleyball and the swimming I saw last night) and finishing off projects I thought I better blog. I decided that I couldn't really sign up for Ravelympics as I could give birth at any time, but I could give myself some deadlines of my own to try and turn the giant UFO into an FO. You see, according to ravelry, I started the Sunrise Sunset blanket way back on May 10th, I have since distracted myself with numerous other, smaller, cute projects, but I know that I really need to finish this blanket. All the little Sunrise and Sunsets were made, some were finished and blocked, some were still waiting the end weaving (about 8 ends per piece) and blocking. Then there's the seaming together - not an enviable task, and not one that will do itself. If I just suck it up while I have the time at home, it will be done and I'll be wondering what all the fuss was about. As you can see, I made some good headway already.


I also wanted something pretty simple and satisfying, and kept looking at all the yarn that was left over from the amazingly beautiful Spider blanket. It kept bugging me that there is practically enough to make another blanket, and 3 baby blankets have got to be better than 2 right? So I cast on for a log cabin blanket for the bean. I've always wanted to make one, the simplicity of it and the squishiness of the garter stitch was too tempting. So I now have the goal of finishing 2 blankets before the bean arrives.


Good luck to me eh?

Showered

I've been busy, but there's no excuse for not sharing the wonderful handmade gifts bestowed upon me and the bean a couple of weeks ago at our baby shower. The shower was a beautiful affair, held in a Manhattan garden of a good friend, the cupcakes were delish, sandwiches tasty, sangria plentiful (lemonade with mint for me) and company delightful. I have no pictures of the event, although Virginia has some, less-than-flattering pics of me opening gifts (I think I need to work on my "ahhh that's cute" face). Nevertheless, I was thrilled with all the amazing and adorable gifts, the spider blanket, which is amazing! I can't imagine the behind-the-scenes knitting and passing around that went on - but I have to say a big and public THANK YOU to all the spiders that worked so hard on the beautiful blanket, I'm so lucky to know such a wonderful group of knitting pals.

And here's a flickr montage of the handmade goodies from the spiders (click on the image to get more info from flickr).

Cuteness, and a Thank You

I hope everyone has been enjoying their weekends - for many of you this is a long weekend, and I hope you're loving that as much as I am. I've been pretty busy since I last posted, almost all of it surrounds the impending arrival of the bean, which I'm pleasantly surprised at how excited I am about it all. First of all, my weekend began wonderfully with an unexpected package in the mail from Oiyi.

How can anyone resist a fabric book on Care Bears? Oiyi, you blow my mind, I'm always inspired by the crafting and cooking that you do, despite the adorable new distraction addition to your family. Thank you so much for finding the time to make this book for the bean, who will adore it.

Next up, the nursery has evolved into an actual *gasp* nursery. We had a lot of difficulty picking the paint colour, well, until we had the curtain fabric picked out that is - then it was a cinch.


That Echino fabric is fabulous isn't it? So cute with the little dragonflies and spiders.


Mr B has been busy drawing some classic Pooh for the walls, all the pictures are great, but my fave is of Pooh climbing the tree.


I've still been knitting, although it's mostly been train knitting recently, but that hasn't mean that there's been zero productivity. First up, I made some cute socks (if they look familiar, that's because they are).


And, last weekend I managed to finish this adorable seamless kimono -deets (as usual) are on ravelry.


Some people have noted that I haven't updated the shop in over a month, I used to find this situation stressful, but I just can't let it get to me anymore - sorry to anyone who's been patiently waiting for some more fabrics. I'm really hoping to make a few more bags before I pop, but I'm going to have to see if I can enlist the help of Mr B, since the cutting of fabric needs to be done on the floor - we have no other surface that is big enough.

Meet Elijah (too)

Ever since I finished the first Elijah for one of our newest spider mites, Mr B was pretty certain that we needed an Elijah for himself our growing bean. I have to admit that knitting this a second time was not twice the fun, far from it. I didn't really enjoy stuffing as I go since that took away the portability of this adorable project.

Mr B. chose the yarn (Lion-brand cotton-ease) and color from a limited selection of baby friendly yarn in the stash. I think he chose well, and I have to admit that I think he's adorable. More info on this Elijah can be found on ravelry.



Sad thing is that I would love to Sophie, but I'm not sure I have the mojo, I will continue with the sweaters and socks for now.

Still ticking away

So it's been a while, with many of lifes distractions keeping me away from the blog. All good stuff though, and the good news is that I get to have a few things to show you. First up, some WIPS.

I started the baby surprise jacket oops, February Baby Sweater [ravelry link] for the bean just before we went away on our babymoon. Yes, it was wonderful, we went to Lancaster, PA - Amish Country, and I strongly recommend the B&B we stayed at for the wonderful hosts and the delicious 3 course breakfasts. Here's a shot of it in progress while away, more is knit now, but I'll save further progress shots until it's finished.

It's being knit with Socks that Rock in Amber - I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the one skein will do it...

The sunset blanket is coming along. I have over 20 squares crocheted so far, I've blocked about half of them. The seaming won't be fun, but I can already tell that the end result will be worth it.


I managed to finish some stuff too though, first up is a gift for Amanda and her little one:


These better-than-booties socks [rav again] needed a matching hat, so I made this one up as I went along, I have no idea how I did it, and I'm just hoping that the little thing fits.

The biggest accomplishment this month is the quilt. Yes! I had a goal of making a quilt for the bean, and I DID IT! And I have to admit that I'm really happy with it.



It took some debate, but I finally decided on an orange binding for the edging, with a decorative stitch in yellow, pretty huh?



On the baby front, everything continues to go very well. I feel, surprisingly, healthy and happy - albeit a little tired - and we are told that all is developing well. Mr B and I have been doing some of the usual nesting stuff (decorating, buying and putting together furniture). I have a ton of projects in my head that I want to get done, but I'm being realistic and recognizing my time and energy limitations, one step at a time.

(more) News and Knitting

The next step with beany baby was to find out whether the predominant color in my knitting (and other stuff) would be:

Pink*

OR


Blue*

Now the rather grumpy technician was quite adamant that we will be focusing on....

Nah, I'll wait until the end of the post before I tell ya (of course it's just a simple matter of scrolling to the bottom to find out).

So in practically one evening I used up the handspun I'd made a little while back, with it I made Ysolda's Urchin [rav link for details].


I haven't worn the hat outside among the "real" people yet, I don't feel I have the guts, and am not sure about me in a beret, but I'm happy with the pattern itself, the simplicity of the short-rows and the loveliness of garter stitch.


Mr B got his wish last week, a Munkee all his own for the bean. As I wasn't sure I'd have enough yarn to finish this monkey, I offered to make a shirt. Mr B. requested orange, his fave color, which also happens to be a Mets color.



While my embroidery skills are a little scant, at least you get the idea, and just in time for the opener too. Details about this Munkee are here [more rav].



Oh yeah, and about the sex:



The tech was very sure we are going to have a GIRL!! Exciting stuff.

* Buttons coming to an etsy shop near you soon.

More catching up/stuff

There's a few things that I really need to catch up on.


First of all, both earthchick and aquaknits (and some spiders if you count the collective awards given out) gave me for the "you make my day award". And I was so happy to read that, I love both their blogs and have been reading them both for such a long time, they certainly both make my day (aqua, it's great to see you post again!). I have thought long and hard about which blogs I would nominate, and just. could. not. narrow it down to 10 blogs - how is that possible? So I'm taking the cowards way out and saying that I love all the blogs I read, each and every one of you - I love to see what's going on with little sneaky looks into people's lives. Thank you all of you for making my day!!

Second order of business is that, it occurred to me that this month brings about my 3rd anniversary of the blog!! This is actually more of an honorable mention than anything else, because I don't have it in me to do anything big and celebratory right now. But I did want to say a big thank you to each and every one of you who pops by to say hi, I appreciate each and every comment I get and love reading them, even if I've been a slacker at responding to them recently.


Third, this sock (which has been a royal pain the in my arse) is finally finished. And today it will be going to one of my spider buddies in our little valentine's single sock swap. It's actually a really great idea, where we each get a person to knit for (through this cute site called 'elfster') and knit them just one sock. You then give them this single sock, the pattern and enough yarn to make it's partner, while someone else will give you the sock they knit for you, etc. etc. It gave me a chance to knit a sock that I'm VERY sure I would not want to knit 2 of because of the concentration required.


The pattern is cablenet from knitty. Yarn is Regia silk is this beautiful burgandy/red - perfect for a valentines swap methinks, and all other deets will show up soon enough on ravelry. Not right now though, I have to get to a party at Marie's place.

Hope you're still here because this is where things get really interesting in todays post.

I have to admit to all of you that I've been holding out on you with one particular WIP. It's actually been in progress for about 3 months now.


Yup, the Schrodingers' Baby Bean!

I've gotta say that this particular project has taken more out of me than any other. I have never felt more like crap in my life - you know I'm not well when I don't even want to think about knitting. Good news is that I'm starting to feel much better now, and believe that I will actually be able to do more of the sewing and knitting I want to do. My big plan is to make a quilt for the bambino. Something that I've always wanted to do. However, it is more because I love the look of quilts, so I'm not sure I'm going to like the actual process.... Any advice from quilters out there will be gratefully received.

Now I really have to go, because this is what happens when you try to rush the cooling process of a banana, nut loaf, sigh! I'm off to buy a cake.