Baby Blankets

At the baby shower two weeks ago, we received several beautiful handmade blankets. Two were crocheted and two were quilted, and I was really happy to get them as I love giving handmade blankets to people. 

By my mom

By a lady from church

By my good friend Akkina

By my sister Katie

I'm sure they'll all be well used before too long, thank you to all who took the time to create these for the baby.

It's September!

And just like that, fall is here. September brought with is a 10 degree drop in temperature, making it a cool 54 degrees F on my way to work this morning. August was already very mild so I'm hoping this is not indicative of another unbelievably snowy bitterly cold winter like the one was had a few years ago.

I promised a crafty update and so you shall have a crafty update.

I've been working a bit here and there on my C2C blanket and I hope to finish the main part of the blanket soon. I also found something called Shawl in a Ball by Lion Brand in the Prism colorway on clearance at Walmart and scooped them up. With this yarn, I started another lightweight blanket this past Sunday for something a little different. I'm using Motif #118 from Beyond the Square Crochet Motifs with a 4.0mm hook and I'm attempting to do it as a Join as You Go.

Between the crochet and the thank you notes I wrote this weekend, my wrists started hurting again, so I had to set it aside before I wanted to which means I've been working on a cross stitch project instead.

Mini Innocence made its appearance back on my cross stitch stand this week. I was happy to get to discover that the first page isn't entirely background. I'll be stitching some of her wing soon, you can see the beginning of the outline of it in the lower left hand corner.

I hope you are having a great holiday weekend. I had the offer from a family member of help with house stuff tomorrow but I turned it down in favor of a mental health day. I plan to do many crafty things and a few necessary chores here and there and generally keep things quiet and relaxed.

The Third Annual Deepwood Ascension Festival Prizes

We've had an insanely busy couple of weeks around here, with last Saturday being the baby shower (my mom popped in last minute as a surprise!) and just yesterday was the Deepwood Ascension Festival, our major Dagorhir event of the year. My To-Do list keeps growing longer instead of shorter as I only have five weeks before the baby is due.

I spent the last week writing thank you notes and working on the prizes and cooking for the event.

I put together two grand prize belt flags for the tourney awards and three water bottle carriers for the gold raffle at the end.

Akkina arranged a menu of roast beef, potatoes, carrots, rolls, and a vegetarian dish and did a fabulous job coordinating the whole thing.

Jack and Morric put together four laser engraved leather belt flags for tourney prizes.

I didn't get a chance to take any photos as I was short on sleep and really only stayed long enough to help with serving food and clean up but I know people took photos

Today was a day OFF! After the insanity of the last few weeks, Jack and I both needed a day to sleep and recharge. I did some crochet, some cross stitch, a couple minor chores, and took a nap. I'll post again soon with crafty & baby shower updates (I received some beautiful handmade blankets that I'm dying to share) and with some photos of the event when I acquire them.

World Cross Stitch Day

I found out yesterday that we now have an official World Cross Stitch Day and it took place TODAY! I celebrated by neglecting my to do list after work today and settling in for an evening of stitchy goodness.

Before World Cross Stitch Day

At the end of World Cross Stitch Day

I was able to cross off about 700 stitches today, which means my needle was really smoking. I also somehow managed to throw together a quick lasagna for dinner. Pro Tip: Use leftover spaghetti sauce and no boil noodles for the easiest lasagna ever.

All in all it was a pretty relaxing evening. I might turn it into World Cross Stitch Weekend :) :) :)

A Weekend Away and a Weekend at Home

Last weekend was Rivendell's Third Siege of Imladris. Jack was originally going without me but I had a rough week at work and was going to take Friday off anyway to get our garbage disposal installed, so I decided last minute to join him. It was a weekend camping event but we stayed in a hotel in deference to my doctor's request, as she didn't want me sleeping on an air mattress at seven months pregnant.

I'm afraid that I didn't think to take pictures, but if you check out Elsea's Photography on Facebook,  there are close to a thousand photos from Siege available to view. This is one of Elsea's and is posted with permission.

Copyright Elsea's Photography, used with permission

Along the way, I finished off the most recent scarf and hat combo. This was a bulky yarn that is super soft and kind of curly and hard to crochet because the stitches are so hard to see.

I spent the weekend crocheting, cross stitching, and relaxing. It was really nice to get away. We didn't get any souvenirs from the vendors but I found this t-shirt set online while we were gone and couldn't resist ordering it for Jack and Baby. Its a sixth month sized onsie, so it will be a little while before they can wear them. 

Today was spent at home. I had planned to spend the day in my sewing room relaxing but somehow that just didn't pan out. I worked on editing embroidery files we'll need for our Deepwoods III event coming up at the end of August, so I'll be sharing some finished sewing projects soon. I did some easy chores around the house that needed to get done, a little crochet, and a little cross stitch.

Tomorrow the plan is church and a little laundry and on Monday I'll finally get my new garbage disposal installed. Finally. It was supposed to be installed last Friday as scheduled, but the basics is the plumbing company showed up a day before they said they would and didn't bother to call me to ask why I wasn't home. So I waited for four hours for them to show up last Friday before calling them and reading them the riot act. Their answer was "We'll reschedule you, just take another vacation day because we only schedule this between 8 am an noon." Ummm...nope. I hired a different company to come out after work on Monday and I'll be thrilled to finally get this recalled garbage disposal thing finished up.