Day 3: Build-a-Bear

Day 3 of birthday festivities consisted of cupcakes in the mall food court followed by a Build-a-Bear party.  This year's birthday party was on a much smaller scale versus previous years.  We decided to invite just a few of the boys' schoolmates.  This was probably the most fun the boys have ever had at a birthday party.  It was really neat to see the kids interacting with each other, to see the excitement in their faces and eyes, the anticipation of each of them as they viewed each others' bear.  They were delighted!  Yes...it can get pricey.  But the joy that a child gets from making every decision to bring his/her bear to life is well worth it!  The store did a really great job with the kids and party, too.  I didn't get a picture of them with their final versions but here they are after the stuffing was added.  (BaB calls all of the animals bears.)

Why yes, that blossom covered bunny does look familiar.  Here...

Day 2: Downtown Aquarium - Denver

Downtown Aquarium - Denver: We were treated to a day at the aquarium.  The boys had a great time.  I just love this place.  It's definitely worth the money if you've got the time.  We ran into some friends while we were there which made the experience even more fun for the boys.  Then...drama ensued!  At the end of the tour, there's a pool for viewing, petting, and feeding the sting rays.  My father-in-law was bit by one of the sting rays and bleeding pretty good!  He was escorted down to first-aid and his wound attended to by a medic.  Talk about excitement!  Word to the wise (aka - tip)...keep your hand against the wall when feeding the sting rays.  This prevents the sting ray from being able to wrap their body/mouth around your hand to get a better grip. A ton of pics and video on flickr!

Let the festivities begin!

Day 1...typically marked by their actual birthday or school birthday party...depending on which comes first.  And depending on which day of the week their birthday falls, it could go on for almost a week.  I feel like it will this year, though it's only day one.  So the next few blogs will probably be full of birthday festivities.  Today, their actual birthday, started with a birthday party at school.  Then presents at home tonight, then almost two hours of assembling Playmobil, then dinner, then bed.  I'm tired...and it's only day one.  Along with a lot of birthday blogging, you're also going to get a lot of pictures of the boys.  (Can you blame me?)  :-)

Eve

Today is the eve of Ronan and Seamus's five year birthday.

Going to bed as four year olds for the last time.

Brothers?

Unequivocally.

Seamus and Ronan - their new haircuts make them look so much alike!

Today...

You've seen this picture, or I should say, a picture of this spot many times this "Spring".  The forecast for Tuesday night, into Wednesday, is up to two feet of snow.  Seriously?  It's almost the middle of May!

Look...the trees are starting to bloom...the grass is green.  This is really going to wreak havoc on all of our plants! If this snow does happen, that will be my next post! 

Catch up...

Time for a little catch up.  It seems that I've been lax in blogging since Malabrigo March, but really, it was just that I had a lot more to share during that month.  So, you may see a few posts from me today.

First and foremost, I have finally finished my Gansey Girl socks by Debbie O'Neill!  I've had these on the needles since December.  This was a test knit for the designer.  Lucky for me both socks were the same so I only needed to test the pattern for the first sock.  These were knit ShibuiKnits Sock, Wasabi colorway.  I don't know why these took me so long to finish...it's not like I didn't enjoy knitting them...second sock syndrome.  In fact, I finished the leg and foot of the second sock in less than 2 days.  I love this pattern but am really disappointed with how the yarn striped and pooled.  I totally expected this colorway to be semisolid but looking at Ravelry reviews, it seems to be the norm. Oh - and though the dye lots were the same, you can see that one sock is lighter than the other.

Now my next FO was my first attempt at an all crochet project.  For the past two years I have knit my mother-in-law slippers for her birthday.  I didn't this year.  Not because she doesn't appreciate them...but quite the opposite.  She wears the out so quickly!  And it really disappointed me that the slippers that I've knit her have not held up well.  And with recent blow outs on my hand knit socks, I've become a bit disenchanted with hand knit foot wear.  (Note: I started the socks above before the aforementioned blow outs.)  What to do?  When I was browsing slipper patterns, I saw several crochet patterns that I really liked...but alas, I did not know how to crochet.  But the idea of crocheted slippers really excited me!  My rationale was that crocheted slippers would be thicker than knitted slippers and therefore last longer (?).  We'll see.  I found a pattern that consisted of single and double crochet stitches, only, and decided to give it go.  SO!  My first (real) crochet attempt, Mary Jane Slippers by Lisa Gutierrez knit in Shelridge Farm - Soft Touch W4, Wedgewood and Pink Lemonade colorways.  Granted they aren't exactly symmetrical but I think they turned out pretty cute, nonetheless.  These were gifted for Mother's Day and she loved them!

Happy Mother's Day

Mother's day among the Healy clan.

Top: kelly (sil), shannon (sil), me, cathy (sil)

Bottom:  kelly, shannon, Grandma (mil), cathy, me

Spring!!!

It's finally spring!  And it's finally feeling like it...lot's of rain and sunshine.   I love it!  I've had my eye on this shrug for a while but was waiting for my local yarn store to get the right color of Malabrigo Chunky in stock.  Finally!  It came in last week.  But once I got it home, I realized it was Worsted instead of Chunky.  Ugh!  I was dying to start this shrug...what was I going to do?    :-)   I broke down and decided to knit it in Malabrigo Twist.  I know I've said this (twice) before, but I LOVE this yarn!   It's so soft and I love the drape of everything I've knit with it.  Here it is, Quick Shawl-Collared Shrug by SweaterBabe. 

For the next one I knit, I will do a provisional cast on to get rid of the seam in the back.  It doesn't really bother me but I'd rather pick out the provisional cast on than pick up stitches and make sure the pattern lines up correctly.  That's the only thing I would change about this pattern.  I really enjoyed knitting it and I absolutely LOVE the results.  The tank top I'm wearing under this shrug I purchased three years ago and have never worn because I just wasn't comfortable with all that skin showing.  But now, this shrug has changed all that.  Don't the two just look so cute together?  :-)  The ribbed stitch pattern makes the resulting fabric very stretchy so it's very comfortable to wear.  I don't understand why this pattern hasn't been knit by more people on Ravelry.  This is my first shrug and I am now in love with them!

Denver Roller Dolls

This posting is a little late as all of this happened on Saturday night. I'm a bit technically challenged when it comes to all this fancy "posting" stuff.  I didn't know I could send a pic from my phone to my email.  I just needed to push that little button that changed the type from symbol/numeric to alpha.  Anyway...I'm here now.  :-)

Denver Roller Dolls!  Awesome!  These women rock!  Roller derby is not for the faint of heart...at least not for participants.  But watching?  That's another story.  I thought roller derby would be totally hard core.  There are two things that really surprised me.  First, I totally expected these women to be out for blood!  Not true.  There are three teams in the Denver Roller Dolls league and they all practice and travel together so there's a strong camaraderie out there on the track.  It's actually pretty tame and very family friendly.  Though one woman blew out her knee and another, Disco, landed really hard on her face.  And yes, I saw her later that night, it did leave a mark.  Second...that track is small!  I thought it would be a lot bigger.  All those skaters have to whip around that track at a pretty high rpm.  All in all, it was a really fun night.  We arrivede early enough to get seats on the floor so we were pretty close to the action...but not close enough to smell sweat like the people on the floor in front of us.  People watching at the derby is almost as fun as watching the derby itself! 

Malabrigo March: FO #10

It's done!  My final Malabrigo March project is done!  I finally went by my LYS and picked out some buttons.  It feels so good to have this in the FO bucket and out of the WIPs category!  I really do love this cardigan.  It's the Shalom Cardigan by Meghan McFarlane.  I made quite a few modifications to my version.  For starters, I knit mine in a worsted weight yarn versus the pattern's chunky.  All my notes are on my Ravelry project page.  This is knit in Malabrigo Twist, Terron colorway.  I mentioned in an earlier post that Twist is my new favorite base for Malabrigo and this cardigan only reinforces that sentiment.  I don't have a great picture as I had my four year old taking shots of me again.  :-) (Oh!  I had mentioned in an earlier post that this would be my 7th sweater of the year but I was mistaken...it's only my 6th.)

I'm new at this...

I'm not a big fan of cooking blogs and I don't typically enjoy reading about cooking.  Maybe because I don't cook and I'm not good at it.  But since my recent unemployed status, I've been testing the waters.  My first attempt was pretty mediocre, not even worthy enough to mention.  My second attempt the week before last was a big hit.  Tonight, I decided to try a little something that I read on JCasa *handmade.  My local market didn't have yukon golds so I went with new potatoes.  I think I would have liked the yukon golds better but the new potatoes worked out just fine.  Don't they look almost as pretty as Jennifer's?  Oh!  Jennifer's tip to rest the potato on a wooden spoon before slicing...genius!!  Works like a charm.

::sigh::

It snowed again last night and this morning.  Nothing major...just a dusting...but enough to make the start of our day very unwelcoming.  Hopefully that will be it for spring snow.  ::sigh::

I wanted to post a pic of the boys from Easter morning.  We went to Build a Bear for the first time over the weekend.  It was quite a treat for all of us.  Fun to see the boys choosing their pets and then the accessories.  Seamus went with a floral covered bunny and named her Blossom.  Ronan went with an owl and name him Moon Flash.  Quite original...I'm actually very proud of the name Ronan chose because it means he knows that owls are nocturnal and often times seen as a silhouette against the moon.  He is my deep one.  The kicker!  The outfits/costumes.  Seamus - for his Blossom...Obi-Wan-Kenobi.  Ronan - Darth Vader for his owl.  :-)  Very cute!

I can (almost) finally breath a sigh of relief.  ::sigh::  Malabrigo March is now over and I think I churned out more FOs in one month, ever!  I have yet to post my 10th but I'm hoping I can get that done this week.  And my 10th FO will also mark my seventh (!) sweater of the year.  I know!  I'm really excited about that.  I'm having a hard time storing all these sweaters (yet another reminder that I need to go through my closets and purge).  I have one more deadline and then I can dive in to my Apres Surf Hoodie that I'm working on with the Boulder Knitting Collective KAL.

Aaahhh...this is the life!

Spring is finally here...

Malabrigo March: FO #8 & #9

After I finished the shawl I was going through Malabrigo March withdrawals.  I needed a Mal March project on the needles.  With three more days left I had to knit something!

I had been planning to knit another Phoebe Hat and had yarn for it but I just wasn't sure about the colorway.  In my moment of need I caved...wound the yarn and started knitting.  This is The Phoebe Hat by Terri Kruse using Malabrigo Worsted in the Noviembre colorway.  Here's a picture as knitted.  This hat is shallow so I think I'm going to frog down to below the first garter section and add one more four row bee stitch pattern repeat to each section.

My next project came out of sheer desperation to have Mal March project on the needles.  I decided to browse my Ravelry favorites and found Sweaters for Purse Sized Tissue Packets by kmkat.  This is a really quick project and uses up all those sock yarn remnants.  I knitted mine from leftover Malabrigo Sock yarn that I had from my War of the Roses Shawl.  And...I think I may have enough to knit a second one!

My Shalom is done and I think it's big.  ::sigh::  I do still need to find buttons for it.  I think I'm just gonna sew on buttons and suck it up.