L is for…

L is for Love.
This post begins with Love, and ends with Lila! How appropriate!

Love is such an overly used word. We use it so many times without even thinking about what we are really saying. I put other things right up there with my husband. I love Bear. I love pizza. Crazy huh. Now granted, there isn’t a whole lot better in the food department than a good pizza, but putting it up there with my hubby? Now that’s a long shot.

I won’t make this long or sappy, but Bear and I have been together for about 4 1/2 years, married for 3. We’ve been through a lot! Excuse some of the image quality, cameras have come and gone since then!

Our first big weekend together, camping trip and Blackwater Falls in Davis, WV

Bear used to be a whitewater guide, now he kayaks, so of course we had to take a whitewater rafting trip in a shredder. This is on the Big Sandy in WV.

We went cross country skiing for my birthday in 2006 at Whitegrass in WV. We always follow up skiing with the best pizza ever, Sirianni’s. We went skiing the next weekend and came back engaged!!

Less than 4 months later we were married - June 25, 2005!

Conditions weren’t right in 2007 to go cross country skiing for my birthday, so we went tubing instead. I was one sick lady on this trip, this is when my asthma was raging full force! The trip even ended early and with me in the hospital the day after my birthday. But we had fun!!

With the asthma cleared up, we took one more pre-life-changing-event trip to the Wildflower Inn in VT. This was me, almost 6 months pregnant, getting ready to go on a mountain bike ride! This was by far the best vacation ever!

And baby makes 3! Lila was less than a week old in this picture!

We definitely have a wonderful life together, and it’s all about LOVE!

Saying Goodbye

Such a sad day, we got rid of Lila’s baby swing today. I admit it, I cried. And pretty hard at that. Ok, fine, so I’m crying as I type. I had no idea how hard it would be, but it was the first thing we got rid of that was hers.

She spent sooo many days and nights in that swing. It was the only thing that would put her to sleep many nights. I got it from a friend at her yard sale, so it wasn’t even new and pretty. But it worked, very well. It had a side to side motion that she liked more than the front to back. So many nights Bear and I fell asleep to the clickity-clack of that old swing.

Here she is at 6 months. She fell asleep not on “in” her swing, but “on” her swing. There was a very large puddle of drool on the toy tray!

And here she is when she woke up, the poor thing had indentations all over her face!

We’ll miss that old swing, but we have some wonderful memories that we’ll never forget. And I am trying to look at it as making room for more memories to come!

K is for…

You guessed it….

is for knitting.

I’m so unoriginal! I’ve been knitting feverishly (when I can of course) on Bub’s Baby Blanket. I’m at about 80% and I cannot wait for this thing to be finished. Mainly because it seems so HUGE and I feel like I’ve been working on it forever. Not to mention, I have lots of WIP’s waiting in the wings to be finished as well. I’m becoming a one project kind of person, but I have to finish up everything else first.

So here’s the progress on the blanket. I love how it looks and feels and everything else about it!

And here’s a close up shot of the pattern.

And here’s my most recent Scout’s Swag Sock Club delivery. It’s called Stocker Pond and I’m much happier with this colorway than the last one. I’m thinking about making these socks with it.

This is the last colorway I received from the sock club. It was called Rowing Home and was based on a painting by Winslow Homer. Not that it was ugly or anything, just not my colors. I knew I would never use it, so I destashed it on Ravelry. Yay for Ravelry!

Socks that Rock Monkeys

I finished these quite a while ago, and I just realized today that I never posted about them! The fit perfect - just a tad snug, which I like, because my Hawaii socks got a little stretched out and slouchy.

The yarn is Socks that Rock Lightweight in Titania, and my horrible photography skills do not do it justice. It’s beautiful! This is the first time I’ve done a heel flap, and although it turned out pretty nice, I like the look of a short row heel better.

J is for….

is for junk.

This table was salvaged from the neighbors trash probably almost a year ago. It was originally a dark green color with no top and a little bit of rust (I always forget to take before pictures!!!)
It was my memorial day project and I did all the work myself (yay for power tools!) I think it turned out pretty well. We were given deck furniture for our wedding, but the set only had one small side table. We’ve eaten on it once and it worked great! I am very happy with my recycling project. And the basket of yarn, that was just as an added touch, Bear told me to put something nice on it so it didn’t look like a plain old table - a basket of yarn was the best thing I could think of!

I is for…

is for I-cord excitement! Lila loved analyzing this thing and it’s furry texture. It was felted out of Lamb’s Pride bulky so the mohair in it makes it pretty fuzzy. It’s for the Fiber Trends Sheep Tote, which is knit, felted, and needlefelted, I just need to redo the lining, the first attempt was too big.

And then of course, there was the taste test!

H is for…

is for horsey!

Okay, so maybe one day I’ll stop making all of my ABC Along posts about Bubby Girl, but I can’t help it! There’s not a whole lot of other stuff going on right now (yes, the 6 month old has consumed our lives!) and she’s just so darn cute!
This recycled tire horse was a gift from Troy, a friend of Bear’s. He was the photographer at our wedding, and him and Kris have boated together for years. Funny thing is, I saw this horse in Tractor Supply Co. back in WV and thought it was just too cute and I even said “Bubby girl needs one of these”. The next day, Troy stopped by while we were out and left it hanging under the porch! Perfect! Although Bubby girl is a bit young for it right now, but I’m sure she’ll love it in the future!

G is for…

is for Girl!! (I even found a pink G!) My brother and his wife are having a baby girl! Her due date is Sept 5th, so that will put her and Bubby Girl (formally known as Lila!) almost a year apart! I’m so excited for them! My brother has wanted kids forever! And as tough as they can be sometimes, they are amazing! We love our little BG! But they grow up so fast!
Now that I know what she’s having, the knitting can begin! I have an amazing blanket planned and I’m leaving it at that for now, because I know it will take me a while to finish. I’m using Blue Sky Alpacas Dyed Cotton in Shell. I got the pattern from one of the girls at our Friday Knitting Group, but she actually adapted it for a blanket from some type of shawl pattern. Hard to describe, but it’s beautiful and the Dyed Cotton is just perfect for it! I’ll post pictures as soon as I get into the pattern a little bit.
Since my “G” post didn’t have any corresponding pictures - here’s some recent shots of my Bubby Girl!
Sweet little daddy’s girl

Bubby’s Cute little hat and matching jacket

So serious!

F is for….

is for Finished!!
My new goal is to finish all of my outstanding projects and (mostly) finish projects before starting new ones. So that’s what I’ve been doing lately, although it’s going slow. But here’s what I’ve finished recently.

My So Called Scarf in Manos color 115 - Flame. I started this late for a scarf, but once I started, I made myself finish. It’ll be something new to wear next fall! The color is a little pinkish in this picture, it’s more of a deep red with some brightness to it.

My first Monkey in Socks that Rock Lightweight color Titania. The second one is on the needles now and the cuff is finished, just have to move on to the heel and foot!

This picture is a bit bright (sorry, I’m not that good with a flash!) but I wanted to show the detail of the cuff. This yarn is perfect for Monkey’s!

My first quilt. I’ve been taking sewing classes through some ladies in my church, and this was one of our projects. I definitely learned a lot while doing this quilt, and I can’t wait to try another one, something other than plain squares! But that’ll have to wait for a while, because I have tons of other stuff I need to finish up first!

This is a close up of the front border fabric, I loved it as soon as I saw it on the shelf!!

Here’s a picture of the back - again, I fell in LOVE with this fabric! Since Vera Bradley came out with her Java Blue bags, I’ve gravitated towards flowery blues and browns!

E is for….

I’m late. I hate being late, but oh well!

is for Easter! Amongst all the bunnies and candy and pretty dresses, it’s easy to forget the whole reason behind this day.  About 2000 years ago, this is the day our Savior Jesus Christ rose from the dead, to fulfill the promise that God would send his perfect Son to cover the sins of every single person on this world.  Just like Christmas, the birthday of this perfect Son, it’s so easy to get caught up in all the hoop-lah that this world uses to cover the truth behind these holidays. For those that have already accepted Christ as their personal Savior, pause, and take a minute to thank God for what he’s given you. For those that have yet to accept this precious gift, I hope you realize how simple it can be to be 100% sure you are going to heaven when you die.  Leave me a comment if you would like to know how you can know Christ as your personal Savior.

On the knitting front, I’m stalling myself on My So Called Scarf, because I’m waiting until my sister-in-law finds out the sex of her baby before starting a baby blanket for them. I’m trying my best to finish projects lately, and it’s working so far. I finished 1/2 a pair of Monkey socks in STR Titania, and I’ve finished my first quilt, it’s small and simple, but I’m very happy with how it turned out, and I learned so much I can’t wait to try something else. Maybe I’ll get some pictures tomorrow.

Bubby Girl is sleeping now, so I’m going to try to get some knitting in, poor little baby has some serious congestion and a fever….off to the pediatrician tomorrow.