Quiet

This is what I do when my mind is racing. And it has been, recently.

I can't seem to find a better way to quiet my mind while the rest of me feels like being silent.

In related news this quote that I spotted on my Kat's blog has been speaking to me lately:

Some periods of our growth are so confusing that we don’t even recognize that growth is happening. We may feel hostile or angry or weepy and hysterical, or we may feel depressed. It would never occur to us, unless we stumbled on a book or a person who explained to us, that we in fact in the process of change, of actually becoming larger, spiritually, than we were before. Whenever we grow, we tend to feel it, as a young seed must feel the weight and inertia of the earth as it seeks to break out of its shell on its way to becoming a plant. Often the feeling is anything but pleasant. But what is most unpleasant is the not knowing what is happening[…]Those long periods when something inside ourselves seems to be waiting, holding its breath, unsure about what the next step should be, eventually become the periods we wait for, for it is in those periods that we realize that we are being prepared for the next phase of our life and that, in all probability, a new level of the personality is about to be revealed.

- Alice Walker

Amazing, right? Right.

(Apologies for the unreadability of that quote. I can't seem to figure out what is going on with the type and I have embroidery to get back to)

Made

This Christmas definitely helped nudge me out of the crafting slump I've been in for, what, a year now? My handmade gifts weren't as varied as previous years and I'm okay with that. Perhaps I'll narrow my focus and start to actually excel in one or two crafts rather than doing a bazillion sub par crafts? Yeah, you're right. Probably not.

I started the month by adding to my needle felted ornament collection after I panicked thinking we didn't have enough ornaments for our tree. Update: We had plenty. Anyway, the fox and mushroom are the new guys and only took me an evening. Ah needle felted animals, you would think I would make more of you considering how much I love you.

Also for the tree, super duper glittery ornaments. I made these while Nate was not home (nor did I mention to him that they had been made...he found the glitter trail all by himself) and nobody was allowed to touch them. Their sparkliness was totally worth the mess.

I decided to make tent for Z-cakes to replace a completely unacceptable pup tent I made for her this summer. I made this decision around the time that a rational person would decide that there wasn't time before Christmas. Pshaw. I used the pattern from Meg's Growing Up Sew Liberated. I made it with the giant roll of canvas that I had tucked away in my basement. What's that? You don't have a giant roll of canvas in your basement? Huh. Weird.

It turns out that tents were a super hip gift this year. Ahem. I mean, I totally knew tents were the raddest so I made one because I'm hip like that. Also, Z-cakes loves it.

And now: The Knits.

An adorable hat for my sister-in-law. This is the kind of hat that I would only make for a fellow knitter, which she is.

{details on Ravelry}

I also made these fingerless gloves for the same sister-in-law, because she lives in Portland and it can get cold there.

{details on Ravelry}

I made a hat for my Nate. I figured after watching me knit for nearly seven years, he probably deserves something hand knit for himself, right?

{details on Ravelry}

P.S. I recently updated my Ravelry project page with photos and words and everything. It took a lot longer than I wanted it to so if you're a Ravelry user you should probably check it out if only to make me feel better.

Basically

{photo by Z-cakes}

Here's what's been happening lately when I sit down to blog. I log in to blogger. I write a title. I write a couple of sentences. I erase them. I write new sentences. I erase them. I write three sentences in a row that are all related to each other. I take a break to sing the intro song to Super Why! with Z-cakes. I reread the sentences. I hate the sentences. I wonder if I have a picture to post. I realize I don't. I decide that I don't feel like blogging. I close the laptop. I knit.

Later in the day I post a picture on Instagram and decide that totally counts as blogging.

And that, my friends, is my in-depth explanation of why I haven't been blogging lately. It's pretty much the best I can do especially since I hate writing blogs about blogging. It feels redundant. Meta? And just downright awkward.

Whew. Glad that's out of the way. Now I can tell you that, no, I am not dead. I have not quit blogging. I don't know if I'll ever go back to blogging every day but I do know I'll be blogging more frequently. I don't have a blog series planned, no big ideas, no Friday features. Just me. And some Instagram pictures. And my family. And lots of narration.

So basically, I'm back. Get excited.

xxoo

December 01 (aka: Yesterday)

Hello friends! Happy December to you. Did you remember to say Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit yesterday? Woe be unto you if you didn't! (I'm just kidding.) (I think.)

Last night I declared our December 1st to be one of the best ones yet. Here's what went down:

Since I had to work the first half of the day was pretty uneventful. Just me sitting in the coldest corner of our basement talking to a computer. Glamorous? Yes. Of course when Nate (did I mention I'm sick of calling him N8tr0n on here? Because I am. His name is Nate. Actually, Nathan. But I call him Nate.) and Z-cakes got home the party started.

Z whipped up a quick dinner for us. I must say she is becoming quite the help in the kitchen these days. After that it was off to....

buy a Christmas tree!

This is the first time we've purchased a real tree. The first time! I'm sure you can imagine that I was soaking up every second. The man at the tree lot gave Z-cakes a candy cane which basically made her life.

We put our tree up as soon as we got home; that is, after we carried a billion pound water softener down our stairs with our new hand truck and I suppressed my severe anxiety that Nate and I were both going to die trying to get it down the stairs. Anyway, we got the tree up and I've been sitting and admiring it ever since. And also breathing in its intoxicating smell.

I also bought a wreath at Costco for our front door because I've wanted one for like SEVEN YEARS.

The end.

30th Birthday Party

Over a month after the fact and I still can't stop thinking about my 30th birthday party. That, to me, is the sign of a great party. I am one very spoiled girl.

The Details:
The party was in Kim's gorgeous backyard which was dressed to the nines (Thank you, Kim!). We started off the evening with a six foot sammie + mingling. Two more of my friends from Denver showed up (Thank you, Ben + Rachel!)—once again, a complete surprise!

As the evening grew chilly we passed out scarves, coats, and hats (we were crazy enough to plan an outdoor party, in Idaho, in October) and we started the entertainment—TRIVIA! Some of you may know that N8tr0n and I loved going to trivia with friends while we were living in Denver. We were able to purchase trivia questions from the same company for our event! The questions were mainly 80's/90's themed (too bad for the 20-25 year old crowd) and my brother in law Kevan was our fantastic quiz master.

As the evening progressed (and got colder!) we broke out the hot chocolate and munched on fried food (think jalapeno poppers, fried pickles, tater tots, you know, bar food).

In lieu of a cake, we ate homemade doughnuts (Thank you, April + Sarah!) which were the perfect end to the night.

At the end of the night we sent everyone home with a homemade caramel apple favor (Thank you, Mom!).

I honestly can't think of a single thing that would have made this party better. Being surrounded by the people I love, eating good food on a chilly October evening in a town that I love. What's better than that? Nothing.

Oops. Been gone a while.

Two weeks? Dudes. I did not mean to be gone for two weeks. I must apologize for that. Although, you should understand that I really don't have time to blog. Because I'm knitting.

No, really. I mean, I'm working. I'm feeding Z-cakes. I'm running the dishwasher. But otherwise? Knitting.

You should also know that I have a bundle of blog posts written in my head and there is a good chance that they'll actually be published in the near future. Fingers crossed. It's just that you can't type and knit at the same time, you know? Unless you have someone to dictate to and N8tr0n is at work right now. And Z-cakes? Well Z-cakes is downright horrible at dictation. Trust me.

Last night we had a family game night. N8tr0n and I sat there marveling at how much we love Z-cakes and how amazing her attention span was and how hilarious it was when she said, "whoa, I am way too fast for you!" And just now I realized that in a few short months that girl will be four years old. And I'm going to put that thought out of my mind just as quickly as it entered.

If all goes according to plan, by the time you read this I will have been to an aerobics class at the gym with Emmylou and will probably be considering a mid-morning nap. I hope your Monday goes according to plan to friends.

XO

Weekending

To say that I had fun at our first ever letterpress class this weekend would be a devastating understatement. I was positively giddy the entire time. I could have spent hours at the Idaho Poster and Letterpress studio searching every drawer and fingering all of the gorgeous type. But since our time was limited, I pulled a few cards and then busied myself with picture taking and question asking. Good luck getting me to shut-up about letterpress from here on out.

But that wasn't all that made our weekend so fantastic. We also went to see Ira Glass speak at BSU! I figured seeing this show was as close as I was going to get to having him over for dinner. Of course I loved every second and wish I had it all on tape so that I could listen to the entire thing again. If he is on his way to your town, I would highly recommend attending. And if you do, let's chat about what it is like to tell people about your weekend plans. For example, I had this conversation several times in the last two weeks:

"Any plans for the weekend?"
"Yeah! We're going to see Ira Glass!"
"Blink...blink. To see what?"
"Oh. He's the host of This American Life. A...radio program?....on...NPR?"
"Ah."
"Yeah. Anyway..."

I hope your weekend was equally as wonderful. Today Z-cakes and I both have coughs so we're going to be wearing flannels and watching a lot of movies. I can't say I'm complaining.

Random Friday

:: Sometimes I like to pretend that I am the kind of person who has personalized stationary for which to write to-do lists on. This leads to me drawing headers on the top of all of my post-it notes. Do you do that too? No? Just me?

:: N8tr0n and I have big plans for the weekend that I have been looking forward to for a few weeks. I can't wait to tell you about it in a Weekending post. What are your plans for the weekend?

:: I just painted my fingernails gold.

:: N8tr0n fixed our water heater (thank you, N8tr0n!) and slightly flooded the basement in the process. Fortunately no damage was done and truthfully I'm kind of glad it happened. I've been meaning to organize that side of the basement for a year and now I have no choice. Wish me luck.

:: We are supposed to get snow this weekend.

:: I can't think of another time in my life when I have been happier.

Reason #2

Sometime between when I dropped Z-cakes off at the babysitter and when I took my lunch break the leaves started falling off of our tree.

If our kitchen was reason #1 for buying this house then this tree in the fall was reason #2.