Starting new family traditions

 family, food  1 Response »
Oct 252012
 

When I started dating my husband in 2000 (wow), we started a family tradition of both of our families sharing Christmas Eve dinner together.  My mother in law is Polish, so the meal consists mostly of pierogi! We usually get them from the local Orthodox church up the road from their house but this year I’m going to try my hand at making them.

 

We’ll be following one of the recipes in this book that she’s had for years.  We even have the tart-master thing and everything else. I think we’ll be making potato & cheese, some cheese filled, and some sauerkraut ones (DH’s favorite).  The dry run will be the day after Thanksgiving and then we’ll make a bunch I think the weekend of Christmas. I am really looking forward to this – DH said he’d help too!

Friday the 13th!

 family, knitting, life, new york  2 Responses »
Apr 132012
 

So what have I been up to?

Some Bruce:
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Some BodyJam:
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Some dyeing:
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Some fundraising:
IMG_6490**This colorway: Fade Out Ovarian Cancer is available in the shop as a pre-order. There will be yarn too.

Some more Bruce:
IMAG0614.jpgApologies for the crappy photo – Madison Square Garden is not as forgiving as the Wells Fargo Center. In other news, our next Bruce show is 9/2/2012 ;)

Some kitty belly:
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And some knitting:
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How about you?

Rosebuddie in progress

 family, knitting  3 Responses »
May 142011
 

I’m back to working on my niece’s shawl which hopefully I’ll have done by her first birthday, if not, by the end of June.  I’m 4 rows away from the 1212 row edging. But here are some pics of the white blob in progress.

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Originally I had wanted to finish this for her christening but that just did not happen. Then my goal was Christmas, didn’t happen either. Now her first birthday is my goal and this is the only thing on my needles at the moment.

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But it’s getting there, one row at a time. I’m on the last chart before the edging:

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And I love how it is looking. I’m using Cascade Heritage 150 Solids in “Snow” and have switched over to my Addi lace clicks – the previous needle, just a regular brass Addi lace turbo was reacting with my hands and the yarn and making it look dingy. I can’t wait to wet block this in some Perwoll and see how it comes out once blocked. And hopefully M can use this for her first holy communion … in 7 years.

Blur of activity

 family, knitting, life, spinning  4 Responses »
Jul 162010
 

Almost a month again. Sheesh. I haven’t been purposely ignoring the blog, honest, just running around like a maniac.

First, I got to meet my new niece, Marisa. She took a nap on my chest while we were visiting for nephew #4′s birthday:

Marisa

Marisa takes a nap

I finished my cousin’s shawl and my own shawl.  Erika’s shower was on 7/10 and she really enjoyed herself.  I got to spend most of the day with her which is nice since she lives in Pittsburgh and we don’t see each other very often.

Pattern: Haruni (ravelry link – it’s a free pdf download!)

Yarn: Wollmeise 100% superwash merino in Frühling

Cast on: 6/20/2010

Cast off: 7/2/2010

haruni

haruni in eye searing acid green wollmeise

and my lovely blocking assistant:

blocking assistant

my ever helpful blocking assistant

I’ve also been busy doing some test knitting for Heather (over at Crafty Detour and for her personal designs, at digitalnabi) which has involved another sock pattern and a shawlette pattern.  I’m now completely addicted to lace, thanks to Haruni and the new shawlette which I believe is being called Strawberry.

And since it’s July and the tour de france is going on, we spinners have the tour de fleece at the same time! Here’s what I’ve managed to spin up since the start:

superwash merino in cheshire cat

135 yards, navajo plied superwash merino in the Cheshire cat colorway

pigeonroofstudios superwash merino230 yards of 2 ply superwash merino from Pigeonroof Studios in the exit song colorway – this was a club shipment from Krista’s regular fiber club.

And finally,

the professor225 yards of 2 ply Falkland that I dyed, the colorway name is Professor Von Buren (JC came up with it, don’t ask).

I’m trying to get better with measuring the yardage I’ve been ending up with. So far so good. On the wheel currently is more superwash merino from PigeonRoof, I’m trying to spin down my stash!

forestI’m almost done the singles and hope to finish this up by the end of this weekend if I don’t completely get sucked into my test knitting which has been the case lately.

More tomorrow!

FO: Baby Chalice Blanket, some other knitting, and family stuff

 family, knitting, life  4 Responses »
Apr 292010
 

So the baby chalice blanket has been completed with time to spare!!! Yay! I’m finally at the tail end of the baby knitting marathon. I do have some sweaters I want to knit for my niece to be, but those are going to be sized 6 months and larger and will most likely be xmas presents. So without further ado . . .

Pattern: baby chalice blanket

Yarn: Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Worsted Multi in Clara’s Garden

Cast on: 4/4/2010

Cast off: 4/27/2010

Needles: US 10 40″ Addi Turbo

Techniques: used Jeny’s Surprisingly Stretchy Bind off

blanket after binding off

blanket after binding off

And of course I had a blocking assistant:

blocking baby blanket

what do you mean I'm sitting on pins?

And after blocking, I am in love with the finished project!

blocked baby blanket

Ready for snuggling

And a close up of the lace:

lace close up

lace detail

My sister-in-law is due in early June but I will deliver this next weekend when I’m home next.

I’m still working away on the Empoisonnée socks from the fall 2008 Twist Collective. I’m using Wollmeise 100% superwash merino sock in the Single Malt colorway and I am in love.

empoisonnee progress

poisonous malt sock

Detail:

cable detail

cable detail

I simply love all of Marjan (or Yarnissima‘s) patterns. I am fortunate enough to be one of her many test knitters, and really, her patterns are the perfect match for the beautiful yarn that Claudia (or the Wollmeise) dyes.

Okay, so that’s all that I’ve finished/been working on. This weekend is Maryland Sheep & Wool, and I’ll be attending with Sharon, and it’s our first visit to MDS&W.  I was sick last year, and it was right before Our Jessica’s surgery, so I ended up skipping, and then the other two halves of my brain, Sharon and Jessica, ended up not going. So sad. We will only be there on Saturday and may not stay the entire day. But first! We are staying at my parents’ house in PA tomorrow evening so it takes a bit of time off of our trip and we will be avoiding the I-95 corridor completely. YAY.

And now for the family stuff, my grandmother in law, Mom-Mom, the original Sarah P (she and I have the same initials, she is Sarah Matilda where I am Sarah Maria), at age 81, was diagnosed with breast cancer this month. She will be undergoing a mastectomy on May 5, so we will be trekking back home to visit with her.  We were pleased to find out that it is not the same type of cancer that my mother-in-law had (inflammatory breast cancer), but it may have spread to her skin. So any and all good thoughts, prayers, mojo, juju, etc, is greatly appreciated at this time.  I adopted John’s grandparents when we started dating (over 10 years ago), and refer to them as Grandmom, Mom-Mom and Pop-pop, since I lost all of my grandparents before the age of 10 (and my mom’s parents passed before I was born). I love them all dearly, but Mom-Mom and I are both Sarah’s with an H.

That’s it for now, I hope to have a post after MDS&W on Sunday so stay tuned!

A Massive undertaking

 family, knitting, life  2 Responses »
Apr 092010
 

I’m not a proficient lace knitter (unlike someone I know :) ) but when my cousin announced she was getting married this year, I felt the urge to knit her a shawl.

When we were kids we fought constantly.  Erika is younger by 10 months, but is really my first cousin Beth’s daughter. We went to college together at Pitt (I was one year ahead) and while I was in grad school she was applying for programs to be a Physician’s Assistant. She graduated last May and begun working at a hospital in Pittsburgh.  I could not be more proud of her. She worked very hard for her degree and deserves all the success in the world.

So I decided on something plain, classic, simple. This is Erika’s style. I chose Purity from Rowan 43.  Sharon gave me the yarn, it’s a cone of alpaca laceweight in an off white color. I’m 30 rows into the main part of the shawl, and hope to finish the first Ruffle by June.

Having been down the road of prepping for a wedding recently, I am thrilled and excited for Erika.  Her hubby to be, Rob, is wonderful.  I am very happy that they found each other.

Wedding shawl in progress

Wedding shawl in progress