Thursday, March 31, 2011

I Love a Good Waffle

Here's another pair of fingerless mitts. Yup. Another one. They are fun to knit and go quickly, so therefore I knit them. This one was a test knit of "Waffle Mitts". The pattern was easy to follow and they turned out cute. I went through my waffle hat phase a while back. These mitts would go well with one of those. Hummm...note to self...hat + mitts.

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Proud of My Girl

Tonight was the induction for the National Junior Honor Society. Cara was one of the inductees. Phillip and I are so proud of her. She was not too happy about needing to dress up a bit, but she looked beautiful and grown up. I kept remembering when Robyn was inducted and thinking about how quickly time had passed. It didn't seem like it was 5 years ago. The ceremony went very quickly and soon the kids were free to mingle with their friends and leave.

Bravo, baby girl, bravo.

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Azaleas



The weather has gotten warmer and the AC is now on. The flowers outside say it is spring, but the temperatures say summer is close at hand. Ok, pollen. I have had enough of you now!

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

In Flower



I don't like knitting from charts. I don't think in symbols as well as in words. I know it makes the pattern longer having to write it all out, but it is how I need it to be. I have been wanting to make this pattern, Lotus Hat, for a while. The way the stitches are designed to decrease down to the wonderful pattern at the top is genius to me. That design took some mad skills. I put the hat in my queue and every time a looked for a project to start, I would go back to it to see if anyone had posted they had written out the chart stitches. Nope. Lotus Hat kept getting pushed back further and further down in the queue. A couple of days ago, something just clicked. I was ready to give charts a shot and this was the project I wanted to try them on. I don't know why I was so bunched up about this. It turned out to be easy. The charts were simple and well written. I think charts are like math. I have a built in negative response to them and kinda shut down instead of giving them a try. I am eager to give charts another chance now. This hat pattern made me a believer.

Saturday, March 19, 2011

Sweetling



I have a queue of fingerless mitts to keep me busy for a year. I love all of the different stitch pattern and looks each one offers. They are a quick and addictive kind of knit. Those who knit socks say the same thing about that passion. I don't have the desire to knit a huge project like a blanket or a sweater. Give me these fast and lovely knits like hats and fingerless mitts and I will be happy.

This pattern, "Sweet Life" was fun to knit. I love how the honeycomb pattern doesn't show itself right away and then there it is. It is the type of stitch pattern that looks complicated, but isn't. I modified the pattern a bit be making the palm area stockinette instead of ribbed. I love how they turned out.

These are #11 in my 11 fingerless mitts in 2011 challenge. I made it!

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Pancake Day


I was reading on one of my message boards that Mardi Gras is also known as Pancake Day in some places. It is a day to use up all of your rich foodstuffs because tomorrow begins Lent. Pancakes are a great way to use up your mild, eggs, sugar and other yummy treats. Cara had a couple of friends spend the night, so making pancakes the next morning was a great breakfast idea. I made some plain and some with chocolate chips. You can guess which ones went first. My plan was to take a picture of of the pancakes cooking, on the plate ready to eat, or of the girls enjoying their breakfast. I didn't have the time since I was like the Little Red Hen around here and no one showed up until it was time to eat. I forgot to take a picture after that and only remembered when it was time to do the dishes. They were good and were quickly done. We might need to do Pancake Day around here more often.

Sunday, March 6, 2011

Hold That Tiger


Phillip and I drove up to Baton Rouge to watch the Tigers take on Princeton. My Tigers were 11-0 and I was looking forward to making it an even dozen wins. We had great seats we found on Stub Hub and we invited Danny and Marie Jane to watch the game with us. I brought this hat to work on during the game in hopes of knitting in team colors would add some mojo for our players. It didn't work. My boys lost by a point. I think Phillip put the kabosh on it by saying the "If we played Princeton 20 times we would win all 20." Yup. Let's blame it on that.

Friday, March 4, 2011

I'd Rather Have Tea


Well now I am back to knitting fingerless gloves. I truly have no one to give them to at this point. I will keep them and use them as a jump on my Christmas knitting. This pattern is called "Cafe au Lait Mitts". They have a great texture to them and are very fun to knit. The yarn, Simply Soft Shadows, has been discontinued. I love this yarn. It is so soft and has wonderful color changes. I bought all they had at Hobby Lobby when it was on clearance. I will be sad when it is all gone.

These are fingerless mitts #10 in the 11 fingerless mitts in 2011 challenge.