I Baptize you...

So it's Wed and I"m still recovering from this weekend. What a great Big Party Day! I'm still floored when I think about all of the people who came and where they all came from. Our son is one lucky little dude to have so much love in his life. Some of the highlights:

Us with the Godparents:


Just the Godparents:


Our little family. It's an equally terrible picture of all of us but whatever. We're all there and dressed up so we'll go with it:


My favorite Ladies. Many, many miles were traveled to get this photo. I appreciate every one. Best friends ever:


Immediate family. By this point the toddler had sat through both a mass and a baptism so everything was starting to come unraveled:


My grandparents. Have I mentioned how lucky my kids are?


The ceremony went well. There were 3 other kids baptized that day so it was kindof hectic...


The priest commented on how cool his hair was several times. Even called him "little dude" which is our nickname for him. Awesome.



The party went well, too.  We were so worried about the heat that we had my dad bring over the industrial fans from his shop.  It worked great and noone ended up too melty.



Our little dude got pretty melty in his suit though:


It was originally worn by my father.  But a little too hot to keep on all day.  So he changed into something a little cooler:



My uncle said he looks like a bookie. Heh.


I think that any party that ends with a pile of kids and dogs running crazy is funtimes.



There's even more pictures over on Flickr but I think that's enough for the blog.  One more for the road:

Overall it was a really great day!

Wait. That's THIS weekend?!

So. I would love to show you lots of pictures of my show at the fabulous River Colors... but by the time I had a chance to step back and take any pictures most of the yarn was gone! It was kindof a feeding frenzy at one point. Which, Awesome.

Thank you so, so much to everyone who came!!!

Then on Monday I realized that this weekend is my son's Baptism. And the giant party AT MY HOUSE to celebrate it. And I've done NOTHING to prepare for or even think about it. And our house is trashed from the build up to the trunk show. And our yard is trashed from building a fence and ripping apart our garden. Right now I really should be cleaning / weeding / cooking / preparing.  So instead of a thoughtful blog post with content how about I just give you 30 seconds of a happy baby:

Yup.  That'll work.

PS there's a few more happy baby cell phone videos up on flickr.  In case you're into that sortof thing.

Ohio Fiber Day!

So I am super excited about the Ohio Fiber Day tomorrow from 12-4 at River Colors. It's so fun to be a part of a day all about local fiber arts. The Ohio Fiber Network is going to be there:

The Ohio Fiber Network is dedicated to supporting Ohio fiber producers and artists, and to developing awareness of the diversity and beauty of Ohio farm yarns and fleeces

Yes. Please. Sign me right up. I can't wait to oogle all of the locally raised goodness. And Ohio fleeces? Might motivate me to actually dust off my spinning wheel. They are also doing dying and spinning demonstrations. Funtimes, indeed. And if that wasn't enough motivation to check it out how about this:

That would be a basket of my brand spanking new base yarn Silk Road:

Silk Road Sock
This luxurious blend of 50% silk and 50% superwash merino wool is incredibly soft. It is perfect for lace shawls and scarves or anything else worn close to the skin.

YUM. I actually tried out this base so that my mom could knit herself a ridiculously luxurious shawl for my brother's wedding:

Yeah. It's that nice.

Alhambra pattern by Anne Hanson knit w 2 strands of Destination Yarn Silk Road and one of Blue Heron Yarns held together.

I only have a few skeins of it in a few select semi-solid colorways:




So get it while you can because I have a feeling it's going to go quick!

I'm also going to do a drawing for one of these rare and luxurious skeins. To enter all you have to do is wear (or if it's a million degrees out like it's supposed to be bring) a finished object knit out of Destination Yarn.

Hope to see you there!!!

PS I have ONE skein of America the Beautiful that I reserved for this show. Just sayin'

Citizen Shawl and Girl Scout Camp

Just a quick reminder that Destination Yarn will be at River Colors Studio this Saturday for the Ohio Fiber Day!!!

So I was a Girl Scout for many, many years. I went on the field trips, did the crafts, sold cookies to everyone I knew, and can still recite the pledge* I even went to camp several years in a row:

My cousin Angela and I at Camp Crowell Hilaka**. Judging by my glasses, fannypack, and the prevalence of neon I'm guessing this was taken somewhere right around 1990.

Most of the songs I sing to my children are songs from Girl Scout Camp. Even if now that I'm an adult I realize how wildly inappropriate some of them are.** I credit at least part of my interest in travel, camping, and adventure to the time I spent at camp.

So when I dyed up my most recent batch of Girl Scout Camp I snagged a skein for myself before it could sell out again. By the way this colorway sells I'm guessing quite a few of you out there had great big Brownie Smiles.

That or it's just pretty. One of the two.

And I used it to knit a Citizen Shawl:


I love it when the yarn matches the pattern name like that. For example Sunshine socks in the Florida colorway. So a Citizen Shawl out of Girl Scout Camp? Makes me unreasonably happy.

So did ending with only 10 grams of yarn left. I love one skein projects that use the entire skein of yarn.

I wasn't happy with the 6 rows at the end, though. I wish the pattern had said that the sample shawl did not include those rows. The edging just seems really bulky to me with all that going on. One or 2 rows would have been plenty.

I do love how the lace pattern makes the plain part scallop, though. So we'll call the pattern a win overall.

While I was blocking it I went ahead and reblocked my Traveling Jeanne shawl for the 3rd (!!!) time. It's ridiculous how much I wear that shawl.

Seeing the two of them together reminded me of perhaps the most ubiquitous song of my Girl Scout Career:

Make New Friends


But Keep the Old


One is Silver and the other Gold.

I think I'm going to enjoy my new friend as much as I do the old one.

STATS:
On Ravelry: Girl Scouts are good Citizens Shawl
Pattern: Citizen Shawl
Yarn: Destination Yarn Sock Yarn Postcard – a super-soft blend of Merino and Nylon.
Colorway: “Girl Scout Camp”
Mods: None
If I could do it again: Wouldn't knit the 6 rows at the end.
Verdict: I see myself wearing this one all the time so WIN.

*On my honor I will try to Serve God and my country to help people at all times and to live by the Girl Scout Code. I totally typed that w/o the google. Hells Yeah.

**I recently learned that Crowell Hilaka is closing. Completely bummed me out. Felt like an old friend had passed away. I'm hoping that there are other Girl Scout Camp options available when my daughter is old enough to go.

*** WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIRST! You can reward yourself with a sleeve of Thin Mints if you can tell me what song that's from.

Brave

So the other day Matt sent me an email and all it said was Jeanne!!! with this link:

Pixar's New Movie.

Yeah. I'm not sure if they planned it this way but Pixar's next movie is about my child:

Blue-eyed little girl with crazy, curly red hair who is BRAVE? Yup.  That's her!

Her name is even insanely close - Merida.

 Dancing with her BLACK LEEOW ONKEY to her current favorite movie:  NIGHT NIGHT GIRL.

And Brave is a word that is very important to her. Throughout the whole purple leg ordeal she was so, SO brave. Braver that I was that's for sure. She would tell me "BRAVE STICKERS XRAY." Meaning I got these stickers for being brave during my xray. So we've already planned that this will be her first theater movie. I can't wait!

Independence Weekend

Right.  So I haven't been very good at doing the recap thing.  It's not that we haven't been doing stuff.  We're always doing stuff.  It's just that once the stuff is over I'm completely over it and don't want to talk about it anymore.  But this weekend?  Was the Best. Weekend. Ever.  We kicked it Old School Fourth of July style (2006, 2007, and 2008 are old school for me).  Friends, booze, and Funfettt.

What more could you ask for?  About 10 min after our out of town friends got here we were doing this:

Same goes for the next morning.

Some laziness was required what with the mojitos and wine from the night before.  And nothing is more lazy than chilling with your feet in a wading pool.  Of course eventually I had to go inside to make this:

4 bottles of peach Riesling Sangria to bring to a BBQ.  That's just how I roll.

Yeah.  I mean it's not a drunken watermelon (or a pineapple.  Holy God.  The time someone brought one of those - Sarah was that you? - was FUZZY.) but it was equally delicious and perhaps a bit more adult. 

Yes.  We drank it out of Fairview Hospital Birthing Center Sippy Cups.  Insulated and good for the environment.  Flawless.

And my kid got to play with sparklers which are about her favorite thing EVER right now.

The next day there is quite the gap in photos.  We went to Melt.  Finally.  Our friends have been trying to go there every time they come to Cleveland for years now with no luck.  We even scored an outside table with no wait!

The Dude Abides

Once the kids were down for their naps Michele and I took off for the pool.  We floated around for 2 hours and when we got back nothing had changed.  Both kids were still out.  The guys were still playing a video game, and I think even the dog hadn't moved.  It was that kind of a day.  But since we hadn't done much Matt got into Vigelante Mode and forced us all to go to the beach for dinner.  It was a great plan even if he had to drag our tired butts there:




The next morning our out of town friends said goodbye and we headed off to another BBQ:

Matt getting schooled in Bocce by my grandpa.  You don't beat someone at their own game.

Before catching the Lakewood fireworks from my parents' lawn.

My daughter described the fireworks as a cross between the MOON and SPARKLERS.   In other words she liked them.

Even the little dude seemed to enjoy the bright colors.  Glad we ignored bedtime (again. omfg) to catch them.  Although I've been paying this week.  Both kids are tired, crabby, off schedule, and a mess in general.

Worth. It.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY, EVERYONE!