Bear’s work party was last night, so I whipped up some sugar cookies and just had to try this new icing recipe – Glace Icing – to decorate them. Can I just say I love my new sugar cookie recipe and this icing!!! It’s super easy to work with, dries very hard, so you can stack cookies for parties, bag them up for gift giving, freeze some, all without having to work about the icing smearing and making a huge mess!
Oh, and apparently you can substitute the butter – we use Smart Balance 50/50 blend with Omega-3, and I must say I love that butter!! It tastes so yummy, but is a little healthier than butter.


You can see some other plain cookies poking out on the plate, that’s because I had to make 3 batches of cookies, so I didn’t decorate them all – just sprinkled some colored sugar on some of them. And apparently, some crazy people out there don’t even like them with icing, must be something wrong with them – the more sugar the better! Hehe!!

Oh, and to top off this wonderful week before Christmas – we’re supposed to get up to 12 inches of snow tomorrow!!! That’s unheard of ’round these parts (at least before Christmas) How exciting! I’m thrilled, except The Bub has a yucky cold and if she doesn’t get over it soon there will be no sledding, no snowmen, no snowballs, nothing….oh poo. Pray that she gets over it, she’s 2, she NEEDS to be playing in the snow!! Can you imagine how much fun that will be!!

Congrats to Carrie! She won the beautiful Bunchy Scarf from Brassy Apple!!

Thanks to everyone who entered! I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas!

In the spirit of Christmas I thought I would have a little giveaway! I won 2 Brassy Apple Bunchy Scarves a few weeks ago during the 12 Days of Christmas over at Portabellopixie and I wanted to give one away! These scarves are absolutely beautiful and since they so generously sent me two, I’m trying to pass on the generosity!
Here is a picture of the scarf you can win, the only difference is that it’s a teal blue/green – sorry, I’m not very good with pictures and the only model I have is taking a nap right now!

Photo courtesy of the Brassy Apple website.
All you need to do to win is leave a comment – make sure I have a way to contact you!
And if you want an extra entry, I guess you can tweet about it, I’m not a big tweeter, but I know everyone else is!
I will pick a random winner Wednesday at noon (EST), so get your entries in by then! I’m hoping to get it to the winner by Christmas, in case they have the perfect recipient in mind!

I received this in an email this morning – it’s definitely pretty hilarious!

“Good news is that I truly out did myself this year with my Christmas decorations. The bad news is that I had to take him down after 2 days. I had more people come screaming up to my house than ever. Great stories….but two things made me take it down.
First, the cops advised me that it would cause traffic accidents as they almost wrecked when they drove by.
Second, a 55 year old lady grabbed the 75 pound ladder almost killed herself putting it against my house and didn’t realize it was fake until she climbed to the top (she was not happy). By the way, she was one of many people who attempted to do that. My yard couldn’t take it either. I have more than a few tire tracks where people literally drove up my yard.”

In other news… I can’t believe it’s been 2 months since I posted, okay, I take that back. I can. I’ve been remiss about posting, but maybe I’ll start up again. It will never be an everyday thing around here, but maybe more often will be nice. I was shocked to see all the traffic I got from posting the Woven Cables Scarf pattern yesterday – then I felt bad about neglecting the blog. I will definitely have some handmade Christmas gifts and baked goods to post soon and hopefully some knitting as well. You can see the Norwegian Sweet Baby Cap picture on the sidebar over there – very cute pattern, but not for my daughter at all, as my gauge was off and the hat was too small and it really wasn’t that flattering. Hoping to have a new hat on the needles soon for her – same yarn, new pattern.

Yep, that’s right, I have a new full-time job….I’m a stay at home mom! I “left” my old job last Wednesday and have yet to look back. I say “left” because there’s more involved, but one thing is for certain….no more yucky-traffic-light-filled-stop-at-dunkin-donuts-drop-the-bub-off-at-the-babysitters-commute! Woo woo!

There’s been a lot going on since my last post, so I’ll give you some quick snippets of September…

We threw Bear’s mom a surprise birthday party on Labor Day – it turned out so well and she was so surprised! I didn’t get many pictures, but I thought this one was cute. This is our friend’s son, Zach and his little toy car. Lila hoped on and Zach pushed her around for quite a while, but you could tell he was straining pretty hard! Later she put her feet up, sat back and relaxed while he pushed! Too cute! It’s not the best picture…it was an overcast, rainy day.

We headed to the beach- Assateague Island to go camping, didn’t work out quite as we planned, but we made the best of it. If you look close, you can see all the water in the background, most of the campsites were flooded and it was quite windy and chilly. The campsites were so flooded that most didn’t have a spot to put a tent, we got lucky and found a semi-dry one.

So we came home and went to a local beach instead – Lila doesn’t know the difference, she just likes to play in the water.

We had our county fair – I won 3 ribbons! A first place for her strawberry dress – and second place ribbons for her Boheme and Sheep Sweater (pictures of each project are on my sidebar). Pretty exciting! Lila was too thrilled this year with the sheep or goats, but she was quite fond of the cows and piggies!

I attended two Cookie A. knitting classes. One was Traveling Stitches held at the very beautiful Maples in Solomons and hosted by Marie, who is so lovely! And the other was hosted by my LYS Crazy for Ewe and was absolutely wonderful as well. We had a fantastic lunch at Cafe des Artistes and following was the Intuitive Charts Reading class. Whew – that was a lot of info at one time, but I think it all sank in and I was quite impressed with the amount of new knowledge I took home – not to mention I learned how to quickly (and safely!) cable without a cable needed! I didn’t take any pictures, but if you hop on over to the Crazy for Ewe blog, Ellen took a few that day.

And as for this week….busy so far as well. We headed to the National Zoo on Monday. What a blast! Lila loved the aminals as she calls them, but we definitely missed the hippo. She asked for him all day, but I guess he was inside because we never saw him.

They are a doing a lot of renovations, but we still go to see most of the animals. There was a baby gorilla born in January who was absolutely precious! I wanted to take her home to be a playmate for Lila!

The weather was perfect, she was a great kid, and other than one wrong turn in DC (totally taking credit for that mishap) we made out okay! But a side note…flamingos stink, bad!

And coming up Thursday is Leprechaun Lilly’s. One of my favorite days of the year. I did my volunteer hours yesterday so I could shop early and I’m so excited! This was by far the best idea anyone has had a in a long time, and it makes so much sense! Everything I’ve gotten from there has been name brand, quality clothing that has been either brand new with tags, or barely worn. It’s fantastic! They are even doing one this year for women’s clothes, called Elly’s Closet. Unfortunately, I will be out of town this year and unable to attend…maybe next time!

It’s a cool, rainy day so I’m looking forward to settling down today, getting some of my domestic duties (hehe!) done and enjoying my daughter!

Whew – surprisingly I have been doing a lot of knitting lately! The summer is usually very busy for us, but with frequent trips back to WV, I get 10+ hours of knitting in the car time, plus about 3 hours when my husband is boating, and countless other hours too. It’s a good deal!

So, I’ve finished a few things lately and am chugging away at others. Nothing for me yet though, I’m getting there.

My favorite is her new Boheme. Very cute pattern,but I needed to size it up some to about a 2T. The only thing left is to find some buttons.   I used Cherry Tree Hill Supersock colorway Jewels.  I was so worried I wouldn’t have enough of this gorgeous yarn, but I just knit and knit until I ran out. Apparently this must be a one of a kind skein because I have gone to the end of the internet (and Ravelry) looking for another one, and I cannot find anything even close. I wish I took better pictures, the colors are amazing. It’s very mulberry, dark and light brown and light pink. Whenever I get around to dyeing, I will definitely try to replicate these colors! I was left with about 9 inches of yarn when it was all said and done.  I did the picot edge, but modified it some so I would have enough yarn. I really love how this turned out! She won’t model it though, way too hot around here!

And Lila has two new shrugs / boleros – both for the fall.

Debbie Bliss’s Baby Shrug

Yarn – Joann’s Sensations Tesoro – not a bad yarn, could be softer though. I had it laying around and have been stash busting, so it worked out.

Sizing was way off on this, so I did some measuring and made her the 9-12 month size, and it’s just about right with a little room to grow.

The other one is this pattern from Sirdar. I used Elsebeth Lavold’s Bambool and loved it. This yarn has a great feel and look, just a little bit of sheen, very sophisticated looking. She has a little more room to grow in this one, I made the size 2-3. Hey, I’d much rather it be too big than to small, she’s not shrinking anytime soon!

You might notice a difference in my bubby girl, she got her first hair cut on the 15th.  It was hard on me, but it’s super cute now!

I’ve casted on for a new pair of socks too. The Faceted Rib Socks from Little Box of Socks. I’m trying to use up some of my stash, so I picked this one. The name “Colorful” is so appropriate, very short color repeats – with lots of different colors! I think this pattern is perfect for it. I’ve just about got one cuff finished, but it’s been on hold for a while now.

My Coraline has also come out of the bag recently and I now have 2 completed sleeves and a body, now to join the sleeves and start the fun part, the yoke! I really hope to have it done by the time the weather turns cooler. I guess that all depends on how the smocking pattern goes!

I’m become obsessed – okay, not really, but all I can think about lately is sewing! I’ve got tons of things in mind, and just not enough time to even get started!

It started with having a daughter who is now wearing 24 month clothes – apparently, they stop making clothes with diaper covers somewhere around 18 months. Yet, not very many kids are potty trained and in big-girl panties at this age. So, alas, the need for diaper covers arose.

4 pairs later….

The pattern is McCalls M5367 which is now out of print. I don’t plan on making any of the little dresses, just the diaper covers. I had to modify the pattern a bit after the first two pair, which is why the bottom two look a little smaller. This was my first time working with bias tape – on the inside cuff of the legs. I thought it was a smart design, and it turned out pretty well.

Three of these are for everyday wear under skirts and dresses that didn’t come with covers, the red polka dot one goes with this dress….


(I need to tack that ribbon down – I thought it needed more stitching, but the pattern didn’t call for it, but it keeps riding up)
I absolutely love how this turned out. A friend gave me the pattern, Simplicity 4246, I think it’s out of print now, but interestingly enough, the print on the front of the pattern was almost identical to this fabric! You can see it really well on the link if you zoom in on it. I must admit, the bodice lining almost got me, and it was my first time gathering, but all in all, I’m so happy with it!
And, to top it all off, we had recently ordered this strawberry barrette from etsy, prior to the dress, but it goes so perfectly!

I also finished a simple little skirt for her, two fat quarters, cut into 2″ strips, and sewn together vertically, hemmed at the bottom, elastic at the top. Simple as pie! And oh so cute – it’s her bedroom now and she’s sleeping, so no photo op’s for that one!

Okay, so not only did I win during Sew Mama Sew giveaway day a while back, but I also won another giveaway over at BabyKDesigns! (And I’m just now getting around to blogging about it – I’m terrible!) The amazing all-things-baby-hair-accessories maker, Veronica, was hosting a giveaway for one of her Personalized Initial Hair Clips. And of course I had to enter, I had just purchased one and loved it!!! What little girl doesn’t need more gorgeous barrettes in her hair?! Anyways, I found out about BabyKDesigns from January One and hopped over and made a few purchases myself. I got Lila one of the personalized clips, and then these adorable little butterflies. And I must say, I love these barrettes, and Lila must to because she never bothers them. I keep promising Veronica a picture of her with them in, but she’s 20 months old, there’s no keeping that kiddo still – everything is an action shot!
See – I almost cut her head off!

This is as still as she would sit for me. But you can tell, that barrette is holding on to that super thin and fine hair very well!

I definitely would win the cutest kid award – I mean seriously, look at that face!! (I know every mom thinks that, so don’t slam me – just let me adore my little darling!) By the way, that’s Ted Bear and blankie she’s got the death grip on…she loves her Ted Bear.

And it doesn’t hurt that she is sleeping in BIG TIME today! It’s 10:30 and she’s still not up – so mama got lots done this morning, but I am so ready for her to be awake – it’s playtime! I even made her blueberry muffins for breakfast!

My blueberries were HUGE, so they are so gooey and yummy! Some have a crumbly topping, but not all, and now there’s one missing!

Make that two!

Can you believe I actually won something during the Sew Mama Sew giveaway day? I entered over at Little Blue Cottage for her beautiful fat quarters and a copy of Stitched in Time.

And can you believe, out of 575 comments – I win!!! And it’s funny because I was so bummed that week because I was way too busy to enter in a lot of giveaways. I got to maybe 15-20, but all it took was one! And truthfully, I really had my eye on this one! And I must say, rightfully so, Stitched in Time is an amazing book and I cannot wait to start on so many of the projects (one at a time though!!)