As IHA and I were both nursing colds and achey backs today, we also had to entertain 3 children home on a snow day.  Apparently, the dreariness of our weather (as it was an “ice” day rather than a true go-out-and-make-snowman snow day) has forced us to find other ways to keep warm and cheery.  Here you can see us “cooking” up our own tropical island:

Can you see all the little sculpey trees we were making last night for Dr. Franklin’s Island?  They needed to bake at 275 degrees for 15 minutes.

It didn’t really help all that much as when we looked out the window we still saw this:

What else to get through a dreary snow day?  An American Girl tea party of course!

Felicity and her lamb await their tea and crumpets (in this case the crumpets were actually bananas and kiwi). Below, you can see Agent B and Kit posing while J sets the table.

We also watched Mama Mia today.  It was a great movie for a dreary day; happy and uplifting and it takes place somewhere tropical even.  I hadn’t realized this movie was a romance. I had just thought it was about a girl trying to get a dancing part in a Broadway play.  That was way off-base!  I think the girls liked it too though at one point K said “I wish they would just stop the singing so we can find out what happens.”

Last night, I cast on for my 2-at-time Socks using my hand-dyed flat sock blank from Knitpicks.  It is quite miraculous the way this all works and I’m sort of following the pattern blindly in hopes that it will soon click and just all of a sudden make sense to me.  I was knitting during the movie in some pretty dim lighting, so I think I may have a couple of mistakes that may need to be fixed before I proceed.  I’m using the pattern called Twilight on page 80, but I only cast-on 60 stitches instead of the 64 called for in the pattern.  I’m probably going to regret this, but I just thought that 64 would be too big.

Sorry for the poor quality photo – very low lighting here today. The colors are much nicer in real life, I promise.  I didn’t do any precast-on research on these socks. Usually before I start a project, I scour the internet and Ravelry looking for any helpful information.  This time, I decided to just go for it and I can always google later if I need to.

What is up for the rest of tonight?  More homework help — J needs to paint some water for her island and her written part still needs some proofreading…  Also, I will have to go into each girl’s room tonight and make sure there are no spoons under their pillows. I really need them to go to school tomorrow!  Cross your fingers!

So today was the day that I decided to start listing things on Etsy again.  After the Fiber Event, I took a sort of break for a bit to catch up on things around my house.  Yesterday I started washing windows.  I washed 12 and then figured out that I have 27 left to wash.  Now, I have decided that it is time to take a break from doing things around my house and starting putting things up on Etsy again.   So in case anyone noticed my little Etsy leave, I’m back and please feel free to visit me over there.

A few weeks ago, I bought this cute little box bag on Etsy:

I haven’t used it yet, but it is really cute and I think it is going to be perfect for carrying around my sock projects. It is made by Jess from JessaLu Knits (and Spins). I really love little knitting bags and I think that you can never have too many!  My favorite thing about the bag is her signature bead work on the zipper pull.  Oh, and I also like the poke-a-dot fabric lining too.   Ok, I just went to her Etsy shop and now I see that she has a box bag in the exact fabric that would match my purse!   Oh my…. I better move along now, but really just one more quick plug — Jess is a very talented seamstress and very attentive to detail and these bags would make awesome handmade Christmas gifts.  Really — you don’t even need to be a knitter to have one of these – they would be great for travel or for carrying around your cross stitch (well, I think, I don’t know what you really need to carry around cross stitch as I don’t do cross stitch myself but I know many of you do). You can use them for toys or for tissues in your car.  And what about just for a lunch bag? They are washable and very pretty!

Also a few weeks ago, we had a Mad Knitter sock blank dyeing day in my basement and it was just mad fun!  I didn’t get to dye my own sock blank that day, but I loved watching everyone else choose their colors and their patterns.  I dyed mine a few days later and this is how it turned out (although the purples are really more purplely).  I don’t know when it is going to become socks, but I think it is going to be a lot of fun to knit. I’m actually having a hard time not pulling it apart and rolling it into balls. Snickerdoodle is really going to love me and my yarn isn’t he?

Well, this is a great segue way — going from sock blank to Sock Blankie!  Yes, I’ve been working on sock blankie and he is growing. Slowly but surely…

Such a great project to work on when you really just need to knit and need not to think too much.

Tomorrow, IHA and I are going to go buy all our kitten supplies and pick up Snickerdoodle and bring him home with us.  My mom thinks that it is so funny that the two of us are going together.  I think that it is really sweet that IHA wants to come with me.  When we were first married and bought our first house we went to the store together to find kittens and I think he is so sweet that after being married for 18 years, he still wants to get kittens with me. (I should scan in some of those photos from when our first cats were kittens and we both looked so young!)  Plus anyway, I need his help because I can’t decide on which kitten food and kitten litter to buy.  I just want to get the best so that everything will go smoothly, you know?

Have a great evening everyone!  I’m sure the next time I post it will be the start of my gratuitous kitten photo series!