Up, Up and Awaaaaaaay!

Okay, so maybe that late night Heroes marathon we had last night (not a good idea to stay up until 1am the day before traveling with a 4 year old) is taking its toll. We couldn't stop and go to bed like we should have. The good news is that I got a lot of work done while watching. Shannon's monster now has a whole leg, teeth and one eye. Go me!

I packed a ridiculous amount of yarn and things to take with me. You would be impressed at the things I rearranged to fit my big work case into my bag. I'm not sure if they are letting knitting onto planes these days and I don't want to lose my Addi Turbos at the security point, so I packed everything away to be checked. All I have in my carry on are things that just need finishing: an extra monster and what will hopefully be a pair of little red mushroom shorts by the time I land in Traverse City. I am also dragging the laptop along to work on copy for the new site should I finish all the... finishing. Busy bee, that's me.

Henry still had a fever all day yesterday so I am pretty psyched that he woke up cool as a cucumber. Hopefully travel with be relatively painless.

Well, I have to do some last minute packing and then off to the land of dial up. I brought all of my shipping supplies,. so there is a chance I will be able to go ahead and ship from up there. I'll have to check it out and see.

I hope everyone has a great week!!

Sickies!

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

Today started great! I woke up to an email from Jen of My Perennial who lives in Budapest and has so generously offered to help facilitate a relationship between Crankypants and a local womens' artisan cooperative telling me that they have "Master Artisan" knitters there who can very likely help me out. It is rare to have someone like Jen who is willing to make initial introductions, so I am eternally grateful for that. We spent the morning over at Jess's house. She had some hand work to do, ironing, cutting and piecing, and I got lots of finishing done as well while the boys played. We even had a little baby modeling session with her younger son, Ethan, and a pair of Monkeybum longies.







Then it took a turn for the worse. Henry took a wicked long nap and woke up with a 102.5 fever. He seemed pretty okay, in good spirits and whatnot, until he just started whimpering and crying on the couch. He wouldn't let me retake his temperature but he felt even hotter than the 102.5 so I gave him some Tylenol. He bounced back after the fever broke, but he woke up this morning in that same sad state, whimpering and crying and hot, hot, hot. I am waiting a few hours to see if I need to call his doc or not. Ugh. The timing couldn't be worse, with an all day travel day tomorrow. Poop. Luckily, Jess's kids (so far *knock on wood*) are fine so hopefully they won't get it, too, whatever it is.

Pth.

In knitting news, I am starting the crotch increasing on Shannon's "deep olive" monster longies. With the little man down for the count the chances of me getting them done before we leave are at about.002%.

Coffee please.

Laura's Candy Striped Monster

I just finished Laura's Monster Booty longies and to me they look like a big piece of candy. The colors she picked are awesome. That sage color is one of my new favorites. For some reason it's taking a million years for the pictures to upload to Blogger. Hrm. Oh, here it is:


The past two days have been lazy days at home enjoying the fact that we don't have to go back to work (out of the house) for a while. Henry has been in bliss rolling around in all of his new toys.

An actual smile!


And, that's it for pictures...


We are leaving on Thursday for northern Michigan, where we'll be until late on the 9th. It is a trip that just might kill me. Why?, you might ask. Two little words, my friends : Dial. Up. That's right. For more than a week I will only have access to the internet via dial up. This means it may be a little difficult to get a hold of me until I get back. I will try to check email a couple of times a day, but I won't have any way of uploading new pictures or anything. Bah. I am going to try to get Shannon's longies done before I go, but with an 11" inseam it is a long shot.

I actually bought a new book today. I tend to read a lot up North because there isn't too much going on. Just a gorgeous lake, a huge deck, lots of time to kick back and dial up internet. Since I won't get my blog/Flickr/Etsy fix, I will be actually reading something I can hold in my hands and involves real paper. Crazy. Nope, it isn't Proust or Jung or anything too cerebral. I got Austenland by Shannon Hale, a novel about the obsessive connection women seem to feel with Mr. Darcy (read: Colin Firth) from Pride and Prejudice. I can't wait.

The Day After...

*yawn*

I am the first one up in the house today. That doesn't happen very often. I would love a cup of coffee but I don't want to wake Henry up grinding the beans. I am sure yesterday wore him out. And now the picture madness begins...


Henry was very specific about what he wanted done with his cake. We have friends who own a local bakery so we usually get cakes from them, but he didn't want that. He wanted "White cake, vanilla frosting, sprinkles". And he wanted to do it himself. After putting a jillion sprinkles on he shook his head and said "There are too many". Then, he took 2 sprinkles off, popped them in his mouth and declared it perfect.

Here he is showing off his masterpiece.


He didn't want me to write on it with that icing stuff, so I made him some little cake decorations that wouldn't goop up his perfect sprinkle design out of construction paper and toothpicks.


My friend Melissa and her son (Henry's friend McKai) stopped by early to say hi. Her husband just got ordained in an online church so he could marry some friends having a "Roaring '20s" theme wedding, taking place the same time as our shindig. Her hair was all set for her flapper 'do. I can't wait to see pictures of it after the scarf and pins came out.


We decided at the last minute that the cake wouldn't feed everyone (we ended up being right, too) so Henry and Kyle got to work on a batch of chocolate cupcakes.


As I was getting the back porch ready, a praying mantis stopped by to say hello and wish Henry a Happy Birthday.


I don't really know what was happening here, I just think this picture is really cool. It almost looks like I cut Henry out and pasted him in front of the lily background.


Tommy is ready to eat cake!


The bouncy house at low occupancy. I think we squished about 10 kids in there at the peak of use. Nope, no one got hurt. Yay! This bouncy house showed up on our doorstep one morning, a gift from Kyle's folks who had seen some other grandkids jumping in theirs and had to get Henry one. It is awesome to have at times like this.


I made this banner to decorate the back porch. I wish I got a better picture of it, it came out really cool. Maybe I'll try again today when the light is better out there.


Oooooh, a Spiderman alarm clock. I only wish he slept late enough where an alarm clock would be necessary. Someday... until then, it will just be a cool decoration.


Kyle's present- a skateboard. Oy.


Luke and his papa, Brian, just chillin. Luke has to be the most laid back, easy going baby on the planet. I am going to have to use him as a model someday.

Making a call on his spankin' new Spiderman phone.


What's better than a bouncy house? A bouncy house with balls!


Going over the wall!

And the pictures end there. I think I am going to go to the bakery this morning and then try to sit down and work for a chunk of time. I am down to the mouth of Laura's girly monster and I'd like them to be finished tomorrow.

I hope everyone is well.

The Birthday Photo Onslaught Begins...

Well, I cleaned the house and now it's a mess again. So I won't be posting any pictures of the house. BUT...

Kyle made some kick booty vegetarian tamales. I tied all the little ties. Go me!


I also made a big box o' paper pinwheels:


I made them out of funky scrapbooking paper I found at Target and then got big round tacks and pushed the tacks way down into the erasers of sparkly pencils. That way they can play with it until they get bored and then have mom or dad take it apart and they'll have a beautiful glittery pencil to write with. If they were old enough to write. Hm. Henry loves pencils, so I'm hoping the other kids do, too.



And while I'm posting pictures... What could be finer than my new and wonderful Crankypants monster designed by Voz of Fishcakes? 150 of my Crankypants monster designed by Voz of Fishcakes! She just sent me this ginormous batch of awesome stickers to give out to you guys with your orders! I am in love.


I'll probably post a million more times before the party because I am nervous, so prepare yourselves...

Party Prep and Kristal's Monster

Well, things are a buzz here as we try to get the house in order for Henry's birthday party tomorrow. We've been here a few months, but this will be the first time a lot of our friends will see the place. This place has already seen more cleaning in the past 2 days than it has in months. So just a quickie update before I run to the grocery store, post office, Target, party store, craft store and a drive by haircut for Henry. Whew.

I finished Kristal's monster shorts last night:



They'll go in the mail today, mama!

Prepare for the onslaught of party pictures you will no doubt be forced to look at (or scroll past) tomorrow!

More Knitting Curiousness...

SO I was thinking about Joyce's knitting meme that she posted on her blog the other day. The one thing I am always curious about is what kind of knitting gear other folks use. I know people that are happy with a ziplock baggie and an old purse to store/carry their gear and I know people who have spent hundred on gorgeous hand made knitting gear.

I am a big tightwad by nature. I can't shell out money for anything for myself, pretty much. A while back (years??) my awesome sister in law, Kirstin (call her KiKi, she loooves that), got me a gift certificate to her local (at the time, they've since moved away) yarn store-the very drool worthy Webb's. I spent it on this needle roll:

Wow, those are bad pictures.

It has 3 sections: a zippered pocket for notions, a center panel for circulars and a third panel with pockets for straights. I never use straights, so that section is always empty. I put my double points in the notions pocket because I don't like it when they slide out of the open topped straights pockets.

For my stitch markers I use this little tin that I couldn't resist at JoAnne's one day:



It used to have mints in it. I don't even like mints, but I am a complete sucker for cute tin packaging. I would probably buy a crusty toenail if you packaged it right. It's sad, really. But this tin comes in really handy for the markers. My absolute favorite stitch markers are those little green plastic split ring kinds, but I have a hard time finding them. The split ring kind are cool, too, but they pop off all the time and that bugs. I adore my little Buddha and mushroom markers (the only ones I kept for myself) but they aren't split, so I can only use them on projects where I don't have to move them around too much or it gets tedious.

I don't have a project bag. I fondled and fell in love with my local customer and yarn mama's knitting bag that she got from an HC mama. I want to say Ah May/Nurturing Threads, but I could be wrong. I'm hoping she'll do this meme and post a picture so you can see it. It's gorgeous. I use a handled Rubbermaid tub if I am going somewhere for a long time (like vacation) or any ole bag if I'm just going to the playground or something. I have used Trader Joe's Bags, Earth Fare bags, old purses or, in a pinch, throw everything into my messenger bag.

Oh, and as far as actual needles, I am a complete snob and only use Addi Turbos. I know a lot of people love bamboo, and I use bamboo dpns, but for regular knitting I find them impossibly slow.

But I want to know what YOU use! What kind of cool gear do you have? I wanna see! And if you have some swank stuff, tell me where you got it. If you post pictures in your blog, leave me the link in the comments.

And that is all for today. I promise.

New Boxer Prints! Yay!

While Henry was sleeping ("I'm not tiiiiiiiiired" *konk*) I had the chance to snap a couple of quick pictures of the new boxer prints.

Astronaut Numbers:



Blue Green Monsters:

While I was doing that, Kyle ran to the grocery store. He came back with a big, fat smile. "I'm making grilled chicken" (my favorite) he said. "And grilling some zucchini" (also my favorite). I thought to myself what a wonderful husband I have and wondered why he was going back out to the car. "Annnnnd", he said as he came back inside with a rather large bag, "Look what I found!". A Wii. To go next to our Playstation 2, our Game Cube and the X Box that he bought me for my birthday 3 years ago (No, I'm not kidding, he really bought me an XBox for my birthday. Homer Simpson much?). Thanks Mom and Dad! This is what he bought with the birthday money you sent. Next time give me the money and I'll buy him the present. I'm kidding (sort of). He's wanted this thing forever. And I continue to bide my time until I find the world's perfect laptop... Or maybe I can get one of those aMAZing knitting bags that Kelly got from... Kelly, who did you get that bag from, Ah May??? Yummy.

Home Sweet Home...

Whew! We are back, and what a fabulous adventure we had! There was excitement! Peril! Marshmallows! All the makings of a fine story.

Kyle had a very grown up appointment on Monday morning to get us some very grown up life insurance now that Henry is 4 and it has finally set in that we need to think ahead for more than just ourselves. What? It only took 4 years! After he got back, we piled everything we own (or maybe it just seemed that way) into the car and headed off to Damascus, VA. It was a pretty uneventful ride and we got there in the early afternoon. We camped at the Beartree Recreation Area, a name which conjured up images of a KOA nightmare for me, but it was actually an amazingly well maintained and private place. We had a secluded little site with vacant spots on every side of us, which is always nice.

We started setting up out gear right away.


Henry was a huge help.

Blue Monster just sat on his butt the whole time and let us do all of the work.

Henry's sleeping bag laid on the ground looking menacing. Until...


Well, I told Henry to thrash about and look like he was getting gobbled up, but all I got were a few giggles and a "That's silly, Mommy".

After everything was set up we decided to check out the beach we had heard about down by the front entrance. This is us driving. Aren't I soooooo arty?

The beach was really nice and quiet and there were barely any other people there. I am really not as antisocial as I am coming off here, always talking about how I loved the fact that no one was around. It is just... I don't know. It was nice and relaxing.

That little speck off to the left is Henry.

He kept digging in the mud and talking about how he was making "strudel". I honestly have no idea where that came from. I am fairly certain that there has been no strudel making in my house. So bizarre.

I think he saw a little blue gill in the water.

He had a blast splashing around with his Daddy, who has a far higher tolerance for lake swimming than I do. We went back to the site and cooked dinner and made s'mores and all of that good stuff and then we all turned in at around 9ish. Henry insisted on being zipped into my sleeping bag with me which didn't make for the best night's sleep, but whatever.

Yesterday morning we got up and headed into town in search of a cup of coffee. After Kyle and I got our caffeine fix and Henry licked a pat of butter off a bagel he claimed to be eating, we went next door to pick up the bikes we rented to ride the Virginia Creeper Trail. The place we rented the bikes from was called SunDogs. If you decide to go to Damascus, VA to ride the creeper trail, I would suggest trying a different place. They just weren't very friendly. Having a little one with us (and using him as an excuse for not having to actually exercise on our vacation) we took a shuttle to the top of the mountain. It was awesome, except for the woman sitting behind us who got carsick and threw up into a bag for the last ten minutes of the ride. Ew.


A mere 20 minutes after getting there, we had the straps on the little trailer figured out and we were ready to go.

The ride was awesome. It is 17 miles back to town, most of which is slightly downhill. This is a good thing, because Kyle's bike lost its chain 3 times (every time he switched gears) so he was stuck in first gear the whole time. This meant that every time he did have to pedal it took about 55 pedals to make the wheel go around once. I thought it was hysterical and kept humming the song from The Wizard of Oz, you know when the Wicked Witch lady is riding her bike? I don't think that helped the situation.

We stopped for lunch by a creek:


The Creeper Trail is an old abandoned railway (which you would know if you followed the link above, tsk, tsk) so it goes over a lot of really cool wooden bridges.

At about mile 14 Henry took a little snooze.

Here's another one of those really cool restored railway bridges. There were tons of picture taking opportunities, but to stop and take a photo every time would have kind of ruined the momentum of the trip. Things kind of went pear shaped after the bike ride- starting with every single restaurant in Damascus, VA closing at 5pm except for one pizza buffet. What's up with that? On our way back from the luscious pizza buffet, it started raining. Hard. I started patting myself on the back for being such an awesome and prepared mom and bringing a DVD player in case we got stuck in the tent. That lasted about 15 minutes into Chicken Little when the battery died because I forgot to charge it up. Oops. Kyle saved the day by spinning tales about not-slimy-but-dry-flying-pirate-worms (per Henry's request) until the little beastie fell asleep in the tent and we all konked out. We woke up, hopped in the car and raced back home (getting a speeding ticket on the way-DOH!) to find some great mail waiting for us. A huge package of undies from Sonya at Sublime Threads (including 2 new prints which I'll post pictures of later) and reprints of my soap ingredient labels that Moo! messed up the first time around. WooHoo! Now I need my package of goodies from Fishcakes and my mail week will be complete.

As far as knitting goes, I got next to none done. I am almost done with the waistband of Kristal's shorties. Kinda sad. We will be gearing up for Henry's 4th birthday party on Saturday for the rest of the week,but I hope to get cranking soon.

Hope everyone is well.

One for the Road...

Before I head out to run some last minute errands and head out to our Great Camping Excursion of 2007, I thought I'd pop in and post pictures of Little Miss Monkey's little sister, Little Miss Monster:

This is in early morning light, so pardon the glare...

I also remembered that I didn't post a picture of what I got Kyle for Fathers Day:


For those of you who haven't seen it yet, it is chock full of everything a boy needs to know growing up: how to play marbles, how to tie any knot you can possibly imagine, Morse Code, Naval flags, how to make a rocket, marble paper and identify bogs and trees... the list goes on. Henry has taken to calling it (with no coaching from me, mind you) The Dangerous Book for Boys and Girls so that I can get in on the action. Yeah, he can be pretty awesome sometimes. I also got Kyle (what he really wanted for Fathers Day) an AV cord so that he can hook up the IPod to the TV. Super exciting!

Well, I am off to the grocery store, the post office and then back home to pack the last bits up before we head off on our trip. I am going to take Kristal's monster materials with me, but I don't see much knitting getting done while camping.

Have a good couple of days!!