Finished for Friday: Not a Dishcloth

There's a running joke in the knitting group I'm part of, the Frog Pond, that the only thing I ever knit is dishcloths. What can I say, I do like my dishcloths! Actually though I think the main reason I've been drawn to them is that I make one pattern, I've memorized the pattern, and I can do it pretty mindlessy. If I put down the project for a few days or weeks or even months, I'm still able to pick it right back up again whenever it is that I get back to it. 

At our summer frolic, however, one of our most experienced members convinced me to try a scarf pattern from one of One Skein Wonders series.  It was cute. It was easy. It did not involve circular needles, double pointed needles, or scary decrease/increases. (We tried all of this and more with a baby sweater last summer. Fail is the only word that describes this.)

And perhaps the most exciting news..... it's finished! And so with a triumphant flourish I join Lit and Laundry for Finished for Friday with a finished scarf!

The excitement will continue as it turns out that I've now memorized this pattern and have even begun a second scarf! I took both projects to our club gathering on Wednesday night and was very proud to be showing my new skill of making Not a Dishcloth.

Finished for Friday: Chloe's Quilt

The parentals came to visit about a week ago and the Momcat and I finished up the Clothesline Quilt for baby Chloe! The pattern we used is by Elizabeth Hartman and can be found on blog Oh, Fransson! It's a supercute patten that uses 9 pieces of fabric to make nine-patches, which are formed into a nine-patch, which are then formed into an even bigger nine-patch which is the quilt!

For the quilting we used a squiggly stitch on the seams. This added a little bit more dimension to the front of the quilt.

Here's a shot of the back. It ended up being fairly heavily quilted; I'm happy we decided to skip some of the lines going one direction or I think it would have been too much.

The quilt was a present for my cousin and his wife (and for their baby girl, of course!) and they seemed to like it! The Momcat and I are also working on a quilt for their 3 year old with dinosaurs! It was a challenge to have the two of us work on a quilt when we're 10 hours apart, but it was fun too. And we got it done and out the door, so woohoo for that!

Be sure to check out what others have finished over at Lit and Laundry's blog!

My little helper

This last week I've been busy working on quilting the Clothesline baby quilt. I'm really rather pleased with how the quilt has turned out, and can't wait to get it to the baby! 

My little buddy-boo has been trying very hard to be helpful. 

Not very successfully, but I do appreciate his efforts. And he's just so cute when he's tired himself out. 

Hopefully I'll get the quilting finished up within a week or so!

The vegetables have arrived!!!

I think it's fitting that my first blog post after a small (ok longish) hiatus is the result of the previous post. 

WE HAVE VEGETABLES!!!! 

So despite the fact that I failed to follow the instructions on the seed packets that very clearly indicated the zucchini need 3 feet of space EACH, we have harvested our first eggplants and zucchini. 

Now I admit, the garden is a bit....crowded. I used tomato cages to somewhat corral the zucchini and the acorn squash, which I really do think helped. The N-boy, however, felt that a dramatic gesture was necessary to show just how crazy the garden has become. 

Our first harvest yielded three zucchinis and three eggplants. And we also picked two cute little flowers to put in the kitchen. 

Even Catcat is benefiting from the garden action with fresh picked catnip!

We can't wait to see how much more we get from our first gardening attempt. 

First weekend of Summer.

Even though Memorial Day weekend isn't until next weekend, it seems like Summer has officially kicked off here in Northern Indiana. The humidity started in on Saturday, with Sunday bringing high temperatures and bright sunshine to make it altogether rather sticky outside. 

Saturday we rode our bikes down to the Farmer's Market, where we got a LOT of meat, fresh veggies and some shade plants for the garden. 

We spent the majority of Saturday afternoon outside putting in these plants, and our first ever vegetable garden. 

We're growing acorn squash, beets, zucchini, bell peppers, eggplant, chives and basil. We're using the marigolds as a natural version of pesticide.

It's not a huge garden, but we're very excited for our first year growing our own produce. We restrained ourselves, otherwise we would have gone WAY overboard for this first year.

Saturday night we cooked out on our patio (some of the newly acquired meat) on our brand new Weber grill that the Momcat and Daddo got us for our fourth wedding anniversary. It was SO much easier to use than our old travel grill!

Thanks, parents!

We've spend a lot of time outside in the last week, so I really haven't done much (any) crafting. But I leave you with the N-boy's artistic contribution to our landscaping design. He's been taking the bricks (we live on the edge of an old railroad embankment) and rocks we've found in the yard to create festive piles and designs. 

Hopefully I'll get some crafting done so that I, too, have a creative contribution next week. 

Scrapbooking with Jane...again!

Jane and I went scrapbooking again last night, and again were super productive. 

We'd ordered pizza the last couple of times we were here, so this time we decided to be healthy and get take out salads from the salad bar at the grocery store on the way there. 

Yum!

It was a pretty full house last night, and one of the women showed me a new product that I'd never seen before: the Snapload system from Pioneer. 

The instructions aren't particularly clear, so luckily I she helped me set it up. 

Basically, this system replaces the posts (and the post extensions) in post bound scrapbooks in a way that allowed you to MUCH more easily add, take out and re-arrange pages. You put 3M holders on each side of the scrapbook, and then use the binding thingy (which are just similar to zip ties) to go through the pages in the holes, tighten the pages together, and then snap into place. 

I'd been wanted to add some more pages to the wedding scrapbook, so I could include pictures of the rehearsal dinner and the honeymoon, but hadn't yet because I'd dreaded messing around with the posts. Now I can add pages whenever I want without anxiety. 

Here are the five pages I got done last night:

The N-boy and I right before the ceremony. 

The Gerth Family!

Some pictures of my dress, shoes and flowers.

The N-boy and I with our best-woman and maid of honor. 

And my FAVORITE picture of last night!

Madison, WI and the Cutest Baby in the World

A non-crafty blog entry again today, but we do have pictures of the current most cutest baby in the world. Really, given the baby bug that has bit me, I should be applauded for not having EVERY blog entry chock full of adorable baby pictures. Of course, I think if I blogged only about other peoples babies it would be a little creepy. 

But a few occasional babies seem ok to me!

Last weekend the N-boy and I went to Madison to celebrate our fourth wedding anniversary. The big day isn't actually until May 26, but last weekend was the only time when the planets aligned and we were both able to get away at the same time. Madison is a special city to as, as the N-boy lived there when we were dating, and we got engaged there. That means when we visit, we also get to see friends. Reproducing friends! 

This is the latest baby in my Cutest Baby Collection: he's just six months old: 

I think this pictures shows what I'll be getting into when we finally pop a child of our own. 

We stayed at a bed and breakfast called The Arbor House, which is located right across fro the Arboretum, and is on the bike trail. 

They're an ecologically friendly inn, with the BEST home cooked breakfast on the weekends, wine and snacks and dessert each night. They have a sauna, a full kitchen for guest use, whirlpool tubs and Burt's Bee's shampoo! 

We are definitely planning a return trip there, and maybe even before anniversary number five!