margotinto’s Neighborhood

Getting Ready for Christmas....

Hi Everybody! Sorry for disappearing for awhile, but since my sweet baby sleeps 9-10 hours a night, she rarely naps and I can never seem to type well while wearing her in her Baby Bjorn unless she's sleeping. And when I can put her down to sleep in her bassinet, blogging usually isn't the first thing on my list - it's washing my face!
Her personality's really starting to emerge now - what a little character! She laughs now, and seems to have a mischievous streak. Last night I was irked and scolding the dog for something, and Chiyo started to laugh at the poor dog's torment. Today she is three months old, and weighs about 15 lbs. I can't believe how fast she's growing. Here she is in her newest set of photos!

Chiyo1

Chiyo3

Chiyo2

I'm really enjoying being a mom, especially since she started sleeping through the night! It's weird how much I've changed since her birth though. I used to be self-conscious and a bit of a prude, but now I just whip out my boob in a crowded Starbucks to feed her without feeling the slightest hint of shame. At that moment, we were having coffee with a couple of our childless friends who nearly swallowed their tongues with shock, but I really didn't care. Very strange.
We are spending Christmas at home this year with my mom. It's going to be quiet, as my brother and his wife are in Mexico waiting for her Permanent Residence to be approved, my sister, brother-in-law and little nephew will be with BIL's family and not arrive at our house until Boxing Day, and mom's partner is in Trinidad. I'm hoping to make some new traditions for my little Chiyo.

We started going to church for the first time since we moved to the new city, and we're really enjoying it. It's a very small Japanese United Church with a median age of probably 70, so when we slunk in 43 minutes late last week, everyone was so excited to see a young family with a baby, they welcomed us heartily, put our names in the newsletter, and brought us plates of sushi and manju. We loved it, and can't wait to go back! Nearly everyone is nisei or sansei, with only one other ijyusha like my husband, so people were enjoying practicing their Japanese with Dog too.
Oh, someone's little hazel eyes just popped open! Better run!

Feliz Navidad!

My little Angel, Josh

Last night was Josh's Spanish Schoolhouse Christmas show- and what a show it was! It was so well done. Every bit of it was done in Spanish and to see the kids understand what was being said and perform all in spanish just made me smile! Every classroom wore a costume, provided by the school and every classroom said a prayer/poem (in Spanish of course) and sang a song. The thing I enjoyed about it was the culture they are introducing. We didn't just hear "Frosty the snowman" or "Jingle Bells"...we heard traditional spanish songs from Mexico and Colombia and Venezuela. (which is something that Spanish Schoolhouse does well- they are always introducing Spanish culture into the class and I just love that!). Josh's group dressed as angels and they sang a song called "Estrella con Campanita" (Star with Bell) and it was SOOOO great! Josh sang the whole thing (The video is too long to post) and he seemed so proud to be up there.

I am so happy that we found the Spanish Schoolhouse- it is just a pleasure to have Josh got here.

gifts, warping, house projects

abigailvr
Yesterday
1 comment

My gift projects are progressing. The leg warmers are done but need the ends woven in. I think they're nice. I hope they work. I'm also working on a few small crochet gift projects. After Friday I will be able to post about them. They're nice, though, trust me.

I warped the Beka looms again but am sparing you the photos. The nice thing about having them done is that I was able to return my friend Victoria's warping mill which did make the warping much much easier but took up a significant chunk of space in the living room. I am also looking forward to not having warped and unwarped looms hanging around. They were a challenge to store. I hope to cut the projects off tomorrow at the end of class and leave the Beka looms in our storage space at school. My Cricket will, of course, come home. I would like to warp it and let Stefan and Niels give it a try over break. I always have lots of plans for break, though, and not much ends up getting done.

Speaking of my living room (in the middle of that last paragraph) I have had an ongoing living room project for about a week. It's making serious progress though. We had a fireplace stove thing in the corner of the living room which I originally considered replacing with a gas stove. The cost of running the gas line was a barrier and then our kitchen remodel was so traumatic that it turned me off from home improvement projects involving workmen for a while. In the meantime I decided that I didn't want a hot metal object in the corner of the living room and decided to just have it taken out. I finally got it together to get someone to come and do that last week.

I knew I would want to cover the tile but the ring of rust and the fact that the tiles under the stove were a totally different color confirmed it. I ordered some Flor tiles (from the outlet, actually) and they came yesterday. Erik put them in which required a lot of kneeling on the hard floor to trim them. Yay Erik.

flor tiles

When my parents were here over the weekend Erik and rushed off to Ikea for the fastest, most efficient trip to Ikea in history for an Expedit bookcase. In. Out. Boom. There was a small moment of panic when Victoria asked me the next day what color I got and I realized that I hadn't checked that on the box. Luckily, the bookcase I had used to get the bin location was the same color as the one I wanted. I'm pretty sure they divide them that way. Or I got lucky. Anyway, it was light birch.

erik and niels assemble the expedit

Niels was very excited to be involved in the process and helped Erik by using his new LEGO Power MIners claw car to deliver the bolts and such that Erik needed.

niels is excited

He stayed up for the whole process. Oops, that wasn't my intention. He was pleased, though. After he finally went to sleep, I started filling it.

filing the expedit

Click over to Flickr if you want to know what's what. I emptied the thing that had been sitting in the corner (seen behind the brown chair in this photo) and some of the entertainment center that you can see on the right. It's falling apart and will hopefully be replaced with an Expedit TV storage unit to match this piece once we're ready to upgrade the TV. The Expedit TV storage unit only holds flat TVs and we have an old school Big Ass (tm) TV.

This is what happens when I post on a schedule, I end up talking about anything but knitting!

QotD: My Favorite Movie Quote

What’s your favorite movie quote of all time?

Have fun storming the castle!

"Have fun stormin' the castle!"
Honestly though....the Princess Bride is chock FULL of amazing quotes that I use every day...."Inconceivable! You keep using that word. I don not think it means what you think it means"....or "Rodents of Unusual Size?! I dont think they exist".....or "STOP IT! I mean it!"- "Anyone want a peanut?!"
Now I have to go watch the thing again!

Its a wrap!

I think Im DONE Christmas shopping.......I honestly felt like I was so far behind but now I think Im done! That doesn't mean that I have all my presents in the house and wrapped though. I still have gifts to be delivered, and I still have to pick a few ordered things in at Walmart (site to store is an amazing invention!) and I am WAY behind on wrapping.....but for now Im considering myself DONE.....Im sure Ill pick up a few more stocking stuffers.....but its feeling good right now!

The part that isn't feeling good is when I look at the mound I still have to wrap.....sighhhhhh

Cookies!

This was a very low key weekend.....we didn't really do much at all....but on Saturday afternoon we had a friend in and the boys and E played all afternoon while E's Mom and I visited (and drank!).....so it was quite nice......and in the process of it all, we decided to make gingerbread cookies. I just love watching kids make cookies- or any kind of cooking really. We divided the dough into 3 balls and each kid rolled it out, and cut out shapes. I didn't have any cookie cutters so I cheated and used our play doh shape cutters as cookie cutters- and I have to say that they really worked well.....after we baked the cookies, and ate supper, the kids decorated 3 cookies each with frosting and they ate em up......The cookies weren't bad either I have to say....gingerbread isn't my favorite, but they were tasty- at least the ones that weren't rolled too thin.....those were super crunchy!

Anyways, here are some pics......

gift knitting and hkf

abigailvr
6 days ago
2 comments

So it's no longer Friday and I should be asleep but I'm going to call this my scheduled Friday blog post. (You're welcome.)

Yesterday and today felt like crazy hectic days where I had hardly a minute to sit down, let alone knit. The evenings were slightly more relaxing, I went to BobaKnit last night and got very hungry talking to my fellow BobaKnitters about things like potato lasagne (genius) and learned about crazy solutions to leg cramping issues like soap in the bed. Be careful, though, apparently the cat might make off with the soap and you'll need to keep buying a new bar. Don't ask me, it wasn't my idea but apparently it works for Jen's mom! The topic came up because I am knitting leg warmers to help someone in my family keep from getting leg cramps. I actually think I might knit myself a pair too. My legs don't cramp but they get achy if they're too cold at night. By the time I finish them, of course, it will be back to being 70 degrees outside, just watch. I am slacking in a major way on holiday knitting this year. I'm working on those leg warmers and perhaps a couple other small things but most people are getting purchased gifts. I feel guilty about it but then I remember that I hardly got to sit down today.

Janice posted on Facebook today that December 11th is the second anniversary of Hand Knit Friday, a tradition she started that I keep forgetting to keep. I tried for a while and then it gets warm and I flake and by the time it's cold again, I forgot. But today! I wore my cowl-o-tis and my Sugnim socks.

gorgeous colors

finished socks!

3 comments

Happy Hand Knit Friday-aversary, everyone!

Spectacular! Spectacular!

Spectacular, Spectacular

The Moulin Rouge has LONG been one of my favorite movies of all times.....and the music is phenomenal in it. And now the kids think so too.....no- I didn't let them watch it- I think its a little too much for a 4 and 5 year old...but I did play them "The Pitch/Spectacular! Spectacular!".....it started with me singing "so exciting, the audience will stop and cheer! So exciting, it will run for 50 years" and the kids asked to hear the real verison (apparently I don't do it justice!). They have now been dancing to this song for 6 times.....and still going strong.....you have to admit that its catchy right?

it's that time again

Well, we see how well my posting schedule is working. I haven't posted in a week! Of course, I was sick as a dog last week adn not knitting much and then I started on a gift knitting project that I think I will be abandoning. My "November" sweater has one sleeve and I started the second one, so there is progress being made but not much. We have Arts Focus at school this week so I had to warp the looms again.

warped, again

I might venture to say that I'm getting good at it. In the last class the other mom who is sitting at the weaving table with me and I decided that something between the warp and the two pieces of wood that hold it tight might help with said tightness. We opted for paper towel since we had that on hand. It seemed to work so I used those same pieces again. Fabric might be a better permanent option but I can't decide if the fabric should be attached to the bars or if it needs just sit between like the paper is. I'm not sure I'll get a chance to find out. We have one more class after tomorrow's class and in the spring we go back to our old class format which includes a smaller individual weaving project where each child weaves on an improvised weaving frame. In the past we used plastic lids from file boxes that we could get cheaply at RAFT (Resource Area for Teachers) but we are going to try paper plate weaving this time. It looks easier to tie off and remove than the plastic lid ones, which usually stayed on the lid.

So there you have it: warping, not knitting. It's a lot like November, except it's not daily.