Gloves from self striping sock yarn

Hooray! I finally finished a pair of gloves with ample pinky room space. I always mess up the little guy, but this time it was a success! A student of mine requested I make him a pair of gloves this summer and I had this yarn laying around from a Joanne's mark down (97 cents a skein). It only took one, so I can make another set like this. I think one of my brothers might like them.

NICU Tips

As a mom with Mo-Mo twins, I really have wanted to post the three signs to look for when children are ready to be discharged from the NICU. My girls were only 6 weeks early and didn't need oxygen and were born with healthy lungs and healthy hearts. They just needed time, time that seemed unbearable then and like a short stressful time a million years ago now (it's only been 16 months)! Twin A spent 13 days and twin B spent 18 days in a level two NICU.

So the three things to wait for:

1. They lose the IVs

2. They don't need to be in an isolette- they can regulate their own body temperature

3. Ad-lib feeding- the babies cry to be fed and there is no longer a need for the nasal gavage

When you start seeing one of these accomplishments met, the rest come quickly. It feels like forever, and I know I thought they would never 'ad-lib' feed if they had a gavage in but they do and it's great. My children were funny, once their umbilical cords fell off, they'd start ad-lib feeding- the same exact day!

Also, if someone reading this is expecting momo twins, just know that statistics can be discouraging but I had no bed rest prior to the planned C-section and the girls were born healthy and without any delays. God is good.

Packages and a Simple Gift

These are all the packages to send out today. A summer's worth of work! I cannot sew at all, but I needed to sew up a gift. I found this great tutorial and used some canvas I had purchased when a Joanne's near my house was going out of business. I love this fabric and was going to make curtains for my brother Andrew (don't worry Andrew, I still have enough for curtains)!

I've gone Posting Mad!!

I knit in traffic. Confession, my morning commute during the school year yields socks and scarves. ONLY when we are completely stopped, which is often- my 26 mile commute takes one hour each way. I am stopped quite a bit. So these socks...the green pair are gorgeous and I've knit three pairs already- old Aracuna stash. The grey with pink toe are Christmas gifts for my girls- stockings for their stockings!! It's alpaca from the owner of Canvas Works little hobby farm. I love them. And the fraternal twins are Noro scrap. I am debating whether I should give them as a gift since they're quite mismatched. I love them, I'd put them on my baby but you never know.

The scarf was a gift for a friend of mine that moved to Prague- it's cold there. It's the Rivulet Scarf from IK. It is the second scarf I've ever knit. I hate making scarves- they are really boring in my opinion, but again- it was well suited for the driving conditions!!

Trying to Feel at Home

Living in Southern California has been really hard for me. It has been a way more difficult transition than I thought it would be. I grew up here and lived here until I was twenty-five so you'd think I'd be at home with all the driving, fast-food restaurants and sunny mild weather. One would think...but this summer off I've been trying to make the best of it. We've visited Idyllwild and Sequoia, spent a lot of time with family and been to the beach a couple times. The girls really like seeing people and getting to take long evening walks nearly every night.

So we have a little hands-off garden in the front and two tomato bushes in the back and a lemon tree. For the girls birthday I canned lemon curd to feel a little more connected with our land base. This week I oven-dried (we axed the dehydrator when we moved down) and canned some strawberry jam from the strawberries that are grown about two miles from our home. It felt nice, a little more like home and hopefully I will remember to engage in more activities like this while we are here.

My fall hands-off garden will include potatoes, garlic, and greens. They are easy and like the cool. I will still have my glorious broccoli plants (shrubs now) and resilient chard!!

Rebecca's Little Sweater- Green Mountain Spinnery

Okay, so I have a niece coming soon and we are very excited about the event. When I heard the news I immediately started knitting the Debbie Bliss Teddy Bear All-In-One and was really enjoying the pattern. However, the yarn I chose was a sort of blue tweed (very pretty and I bought the yarn to make a sweater for my girls), but it was something that would be considered for a boy. Anyway, when I found out the beautiful baby would be a girl I knit this little number using Cotton Comfort in Violet. I think it turned out great. I need to wash it and block it today and get it in the mail tomorrow.

Oh, if you are making this pattern, beware- with all the decreases it gets fiddley (wd?sp?). I hope I did it right, I just mathematically calculated how many stitch repetitions I could do and how many stockinette stitches along the side I'd need.

I didn't style the photo because I had to charge my camera so I was stuck to the kitchen wall and I figure I'm not a designer or artist so this is a straightforward shot!

Birthday Gifts

These are two aprons I made for two adorable little ladies that are having birthdays. Packaging them was a blast. The aprons were so simple and I followed a couple tutorials online on making ruffles and the rest just sort of came together.

Enjoy!

New Project!!

So today I was feeding the girls and trying to figure out what to work on next. I want to make a couple gifts for children that are fun and quick to sew up. Aprons came to mind and I looked over a couple patterns online.

I made this apron while the girls napped and it was super quick and easy. I think it looks cute and it was a great use for some random fabric I had around the house. I like the pockets along the bottom and I sewed up the middle so they're divided.

Next time I'll cut the arm holes longer and use less fabric on the ties. I wish I had a child to try it on so I'd have a better idea of how it fits.

Savory Summer Tart

So today I was home alone with the girls and during their nap time I made a great tart that I adapted from this recipe.
Instead of tomatoes I used eggplant that I sauteed with onions until it was soft. I baked it 45 minutes at 375 and it worked out really well. I added fresh basil and green onion to the top, drizzled it with olive oil and peppered it. I used plain feta for the cheese. I had a ton of eggplant and I used about 1 1/2 lbs of eggplant chopped roughly.

New location. New recipe.

Best Birthday Cake & Quilt Day 2

This is a super cool monster quilt my friend Shawn made me

I made this awesome psychedelic cake for the girls~ they're 2 months today!!

Quilt a Day

So many beautiful quilts were given to the girls that I think I will post one a day for several days just to get back in the swing of things and blogging. I have been marooned on my living room floor for a month and a half (before that I was ship wrecked at the hospital). Quilts and crafts will lift me from the funk.

So can you believe this is a quilt? It's gorgeous and was made for the girls by Marcia Eygabroat
This lives on the wall in their room and is just amazing.

Room Improvements and a Great Trip

Upon returning from California and having a great time, Justin decided that Lily and Lila's room needed more. He took it upon himself to frame this 'love'ly Lewis Carroll poem that Gayle made for the girls and built a beautiful mobile. He also mounted birds in the trees and throughout the room, as well as butterflies, bees and ladybugs. The tree is much fuller and looks wonderful. He bought a new overhead light fixture and just really tied the room together.

This final picture is the cake from my baby shower in California. It's amazing! It looked wonderful and tasted great. Everything was really the best AND I got my baby shower punch!!

The Sweater that took Forever!

So Justin had work today and I was completely off schedule, I talked with my Dad on the phone and missed church. I also got compulsive and FINALLY finished this sweater. I bought the yarn before I knew I was having girls and I thought it was pretty gender neutral. It's aqua with a lime trim. I hated it for many months.
Today, I love it. I still have to do the blocking, but I wanted to post pictures since drying knit wear in the winter in Olympia can take a long time. Everything is damp!

I added the hearts on impulse and decided to use red buttons. I like the contrast, but we'll see how I feel about it tomorrow.

Update on Lily and Lila's Room

The curtain, lamp and part of the tree

The tree, I don't know how I feel about it, but I love the leaves everyone made for me

Ulysses is apprehensive about all the changes. He usually sleeps under the crib when I'm working in the room.

My awesome rug and table

The bumper pad

The hooks in the tree

Lily and Lila's Room

Radical rug

Felt flowers

Many pictures of the tree

So it isn't all put together yet, but the tree is painted and most of the flowers are cut. I also took a picture of the rad rug my friend Danyelle made for us. I'm going to use this by the base of the tree if there is room with the second crib built. Otherwise it will go to the left of the tree by the window. This is just a picture of those things. The bird mobiles made of old jeans aren't pictured, neither are the adorable hooks but that's just because they're not hung yet- due to the impending placement of the second crib.
I still haven't found curtains that I like, so the windows are bare. By Sunday I want the flowers nailed to the wall and the room to look more set up. My mom is making the leaves for the tree and I need to get a couple wall shelves to paint brown and get hung. This is a lot of work, but it's so much fun to have everything handmade.

Christmas Holly

I made these knitted Holly Pins for my BSF co-leaders using the free pattern on a blog titled Little Cotton Rabbits. I've linked to it before and I absolutely love the site. The pin backs are a little fiddly so getting them sewn together and on the card stock was rough. However, these were a lot of fun and I think they came out looking nice.

All packaged up and ready to go!

Proof I Live With a Man

Okay so what I want to know is what happened here?

Did Justin eat three cookies and then that little last lonely one was just WAY too much? Like does he just instinctively know that one more cookie would be trouble?

Boys are crazy. God forbid they just eat that last one!!

Insane Sandwich

This is a recipe from the NY Times. It was rad and totally gross at the same time. So what I did was make a pocket in a slice of challah bread and stuff it with grated swiss cheese- the recipe called for Gruyere but I can't eat raw milk since I'm pregnant. Then I soaked the stuffed bread in an egg, milk and salt and pepper mixture while I slowly fried thinly sliced apple pieces in olive oil. After that you place the bread in the pan, cover the top with more apple slices and cook it through. You've got to flip it a couple times to get everything golden brown.

I kind of liked it, but it was pretty sick. It felt really gluttonous. I've never eaten a Monte Cristo before, but once my brother did before we went looking at houses he wanted to buy and he completely exploded. It's a shame because he was such a nice brother. Needless to say he didn't buy a house and I never ate a Monte Cristo sandwich!

Gifts

This years gifts aren't as silly as last year

So I finished bagging up all the Christmas gifts I'm delivering to my family this week. I am pretty proud of myself, everything is made by me! Well, mostly everything. One brother won't use anything I knit so he got jams and an awesome antique store find. Everyone else- homespun!! When I was washing everything and had it laying out to dry Justin wanted me to take a picture and I never got around to it...arg! Oh well, I'll post pictures of the new stuff I'm working on when I get back from California. I still have four more hedgehogs to make, but those will get done on the drive down.

Fran- you're gift is finally done (yeah)!! It's up to Justin to get it sent out while I'm gone. I hope you enjoy it!

Happy Thanksgiving!!