Long Time No See

I was looking for something the other day, a pattern to a project I once did and was hoping to do again. I looked for it on my trusty blog, and there it was right where I thought it would be. Then I began to look back at older posts. I miss blogging. I also miss that it was my own little yearbook of what was going on, what Amelia looked like, what Alyssa looked like. So I think I'll kick myself in the butt and kick off again. I just haven't had the energy to do it lately but doesn't mean I don't think about it.


With two little rambunctious girls its easy to see where my energies go. Now that Alyssa is talking and has a mind of her own there are more fights and timeouts than I care to admit. But they do love each other.


Whenever Alyssa gets something before Amelia does she always asks for one for her big sister. It's the cutest thing. Amelia will go to preschool in the spring I think and I'm not sure how poor Alyssa will far without her. Though, now when Alyssa is an only child for a few hours here and there she's golden and sweet, hardly without fussing. But that's only for a few hours.


But they are both amazing little people and I can't get over how wonderful they are, mostly. Somedays I just want to rip my hair out and hide in the bathroom with the doors locked, other days I watch them sleep because I miss them.


Anyway, I've been doing a ton of crafting. I designed this hat for my aunt who is a breast cancer survivor.


I even taught myself to knit. I mean I've known how to do the garter stitch but I could never grasp more than that. Some ladies through Instagram suggested continental style knitting and practice. One day the purl stitch just clicked in my head, then everything else made sense to me too! I felt like a flood of knowledge knocked open the block I had about knitting and my confidence for knitting is as strong as my crochet one... Almost anyway.


I crochet some things for my cousin's new baby due in December.


The shower was on the 5th of this month. I finished the blanket in early September and punished myself and finished the hat in the parking lot of where the shower was held.


Finished a quilt for my nephew a week before the birthday party. I meander quilted it and I absolutely love how it turned out. And there have been other crafts too, a ton more but I don't want to overwhelm anyone, least of all myself with trying to tell you all of them.


I do want to talk briefly on Mabel, our female corgi. Mabel had something called IVDD or Intervertebral disc disease. It was one of the scariest things I've ever experienced. One day she was perfectly normal, then the next day something was wrong and got worse as the day wore on. She couldn't control her back legs at first and couldn't jump on the couch when we called her and almost fell down the stairs. Then the next day she lost all function in her back legs. We called the emergency vet and they told us to bring her in. I feared the worse and that they would have to put her down, but thank goodness that wasn't the case at all. It's very common in corgis and other low laying dogs. The emergency vet guessed it was IVDD even before the MRI and told us she would have to have surgery to fix her back.
The next day they did the MRI and found exactly what they thought they would find. She had surgery and spent some time at in the care of the nurses and doctors.


We visited her while she was there and she was on some pain killers, if you can't tell by her eyes. The doctor said she was doing better than most dogs do when they get this, which made me happy. All the nurses loved Mabel, and I'm not surprised, Mabel is a very likable and friendly dog, she's everyone's friend!


Tonka was very happy to have is sister home. As were the girls, Amelia kept asking what happened to Mabel's back and I can't tell you how many times we had to explain it.


I treated Mabel extra special and let her lay in bed with me once while she took a nap.


And today she is doing much better, she walks mostly normal and can still run but more hoping like a rabbit rather than a corgi, and she's accepting her new limitations; no climbing the stairs, jumping furniture, not crawling under the bed, jumping up on people, or sitting up to beg for treats. But she doesn't mind being carried up and down the stairs or having her back rubbed when she looks like her back is bothering her. Her fur is starting to grow back, I just hope most of it comes back before it gets really cold out. The people at our emergency vet were amazing and didn't mind that we called before we went to bed to see how she was doing and first thing in the morning. She was my first baby, what can I say? We're all so thrilled her story ended so happily.


I'm sure she's happy about it too.

P.C.P part III

Good lovely day to you! I hope you are having a wonderful day, we've had a busy week so far filled with appointments and running around of the town. I have a something to show you!


I don't remember if I mentioned this project before. It's actually way old, I started it last year sometime so long ago I don't even remember when it was started. But it was for Amelia. I know when I first started it I told her it was for her but over time she forgot and I stopped reminding her. I was finally able to pick it back up and finish it.


After I was determined to finish it for her it didn't take all that long. I worked on it at nap times and after the girls went to bed. At nap when Amelia would wake up she would tell me how much she loved the blanket and ask who it was for, the only answer I gave was it was or someone very special. She got really concerned when I bought some new yarn for a new blanket for Alyssa, she sweetly asked when I was going to make a blanket for her. How awful can a mommy feel when her little girl thinks that she would make all this neat stuff for others and not her. And by the way, Amelia has tremendous faith in the fact that I can make anything. Everyday she comes up with something new to add to her list of "mommy, make this for me," I'm up to a mermaid tail, a purse, several princess dresses, a cat possibly two cats actually, and other odds and ends. It's flattering and daunting at the same time, and I hope she always keeps that faith in me.


She loves blankets anyway, not like Alyssa does though, Amelia is my animal baby and Alyssa is the blanket baby. Amelia is constantly stealing my blanket and dragging it around the house and hiding under it.


The closer I got to the end the closer I got to spilling the beans. I'm not very good at keeping secrets of things that I'm making for anyone. I love to make things for others and I love to make others happy. When it was all finished I put it in a bag and gave it to her like a present because, well, it was a present!


She has this weird lack of showing emotion she gets from her dad. She's a serious little girl that sometimes borders on painful! Haha! She was such a serious baby too, she would look at you like you were an idiot if you tried a new thing to make her laugh. She was so serious in fact she didn't do a lot of talking or babbling and being a first time mom I didn't worry about it because I didn't know about it, but comparing the way Alyssa babbles to the way Amelia didn't is mind blowing. Though when Amelia finally did start talking it was still in the normal time range but it was still a relief. Sorry, didn't mean to get sidetracked.


She was excited, don't get me wrong, but there wasn't the fanfare I was imagining and I should have known better thank get my hopes up.


There was the immediate wrapping and twirling around in it. Pulling it over her head and laying down on it.


She even brought her coloring book over and lay down on it, I think that was my favorite part.


She sleeps with it everyday now and I love that she loves it. I have grandiose visions of her using this blanket forever. Taking it alongside her for sleep overs, summer camps and trips, the blanket she needs to watch movies on movie nights, when she goes to college her roommate will ask her where she got that awesome blanket and Amelia will say that her amazing mom made it for her years ago, and then the roommate will be jealous. I had a lot of time to think about the lifetime of this blanket while I was working on it!


But I'm glad it's finished and being loved. It's a huge blanket, it's as long as mine but this one is wider. It's 60x81", I made it giant on purpose because I wanted her to grow into it or if she wanted to cuddle with me or Elliott under it it would be big enough for everyone to use.


It's Lucy's pattern. Except I did my own edging, To straighten out the ripples, on the top of the blanket I worked sc, ch 2, sc in the corner, 2 sc, 2 hdc, 2 dc, dc2tog, 2 dc, 2 hdc, 4 sc, 2 hdc… So on across to the next corner. The dc2tog should fall on the two decreases of the previous/last row. Then sc, ch 2, sc in the corner and sc down the side to the bottom/chain row. Bottom corner: dc, ch 2, dc, 2 dc, 2 hdc, 4 sc, 2 hdc, 2 dc, dc2tog… The dc2tog should fall on the increases from the first row. This will “straighten” out the ripples but I recommend doing more rounds on the border to make it look straighter, and work two dc, ch 2, two dc in the corners with each additional row. I think I will add one more row of gray just to close it all in. It's super soft and cuddly and most importantly, Amelia adores it.




P.s. In case you were curious, I used Hobby Lobby's I Love This Yarn in graybeard and the neons in green, blue, orange, and fuchsia. Washes amazingly!

Where in the world...

Have I been? I dunno, I can't really explain it. I tried to write a post so many times but it didn't feel right and I never got very far. I've just been doing the same thing I always seem to be doing; playing with the two A's, doing yard work with the bearded one, and hooking on my down time. Does one really get down time being a stay at home mom? Sometimes! Until one of the babes wakes up, or one of the dogs throws up, and either seem to happen on the nights that you get everything done early and you get optimistic about ALL the free time you'll enjoy. Want to see some of the things we've been doing?












































(this is one of my favorite pictures because of Alyssa's photo bombing with her white noise machine, playing with the light and Amelia being all model-like)























(she was washing her face, she wasn't getting her mouth washed out!)


There's some more stuff that I've been up to lately, but I feel like this is getting too heavy with pictures and no captions, but I'll save those for another day. I just wanted to stop by for a quick hello and to tell you we're all well and very happy, and I will be back very soon to actually tell you about the things we've been doing.

Happy trails, friends!

P.s. if there's a picture you'd like better explained, let me know! :-)