A Beginners Knitting Project

My sister in law gave me this pattern the last time I saw her, it's quick and easy, great for beginners:
 I like working on simple projects like these when I'm trying to figure out what bigger project I want to start.

13 Point Washcloth:
Size 7 needles, 1 ball cotton thread
Cast on 16 stitches
Row 1: Knit accross
Row 2: K4, yo, K 10, 2 stitches left on needle, turn
Row 3: Knit
Row 4: K4, yo, K 9, 4 stitches left on needle, turn
Row 5: Knit
Row 6: K4, yo, K8, 6 stitches left on needle, turn
Row 7: Knit
Row 8: K4, yo, K7, 8 stitches left on needle, turn
Row 9: Knit
Row 10: Bind off 4 sts, Knit across remaining sts
Row 11: Knit across the 16 sts left on needle.
Repeat from  Row 2 until you have 13 points, if cloth doesn't lay flat, and one more point for 14 ( I made 14)
After the 13th or 14th point, don't bind off, sew first and last rows together, then draw center sts together tightly.

Ice Storm of 2012

When I was a kid I remember hearing my folks talk about "The big flood of 1960" or "The wind storm of 1965", it goes on and on.  We'll I have one for them now......The Ice Storm of 2012.  Boy did we get hit!  I think there was over an inch of ice on my car that day, work was postponed until 10am, but I called and said I was not driving 40 minutes on ice, wasn't going to happen.  The huge trees in our yard and all around us were covered in ice. During the day you could hear random branches snap and then fall. That evening is when ours couldn't take the weight of the ice any longer and started snapping and breaking. The first one to fall made a huge snap, just like gun fire, my husband and I were in the living room, looked
at each other and braced for the hit.  That one landed right by the front door,
missing the house by inches. 

I think we had a total of 4 huge branches fall that any one of them would have put a hole in the house had they hit, all missed us by inches.  The big event was the branch that fell over the power line to the shop and my moms new place. My mom said it looked like fire works from her house.  The hit knocked the line from the breaker box so it was jumping with live electricity between the shop and the bumper of my car! Then the line heated up and caught the  transformer at the road on fire!

The shop and my mom were without power for a week.  We had partial power that night and found that another branch had fallen on our power line.  We got that cut off, but a crew had to come out and fix the live wire that was hanging from the pole that night, I think we got full power around midnight. We are so thankful to have had no fires or roof damage. I believe our Guardian Angels were working overtime that night! Now all we have left to do is pick up sticks.....

Crazy Weather

Yesterday was 52 degrees out, warm, sunny................

 Today we work up to SNOW and 32 degrees.............

Looks like January has finally arrived, and we are in for winter now.....at least this week!

2012!

Where did the year go? I had such good intentions to keep up with this blog, and my Etsy shop. I have been crocheting like made and posting-nothing..............It was crazy just trying to keep up with Christmas presents and craft shows this winter.

 My daughter wanted me to make a Monkey Hat, so this is what I came up with....simple pattern, easy to make, but now I think I am all Monkeyed out! 

I'm looking for inspiration this new year, hoping to make a few sweaters, and to knit more, but these little hats and mittens are so darn cute, it will be hard not to add them to my Etsy Shop......

So here's to a Happy New Year, I hope yours is full of yarn, grandkids, chickens and a huge garden!

We are truly blessed.......................

A blankie for a great nephew

 This blanket seems so small after the crib size blankets I've been making, but this one really is newborn size.

 I love these colors, and would even make an afghan for myself out of these colors and even this pattern.  I started with just thinking I would do the smaller granny squares, and then decided to add the larger square with both colors. I think that really added to this blanket.

You would think with brown being such a popular color with babies now (pink and brown, blue and brown, green and brown, etc) that you would see a bigger selection of browns in the baby line of yarns. A softer yarn would have been the only thing I would have liked better with this blanket.

Potato Harvest

 Frank had a great idea to plant the lower field in purple potatoes this spring. He planted a couple of rows along with some onions, and corn, with intentions of putting up a deer fence before it all started to grow.  The fence never happened and the deer loved the garden!

 They ate all the tops out of the potato plants, along with nibbles on the corn too.  They don't seem to like onions, so they were fine.

 I don't think we'll be hosting a "corn maze" at our place this fall! But the small little ears that had some kernels was sugar sweet.....

We did end up with enough potatoes for us and friends to eat, plus some to keep for planting next year, in the fenced in garden area.

The purple potato is really purple, all the way through.  I can't tell the difference in the taste, but they are supposed to be more nutritious then a white potato.

New Hat for "The Shop"

I got this hat done in time to enter in the fair, brought me a first place........not bad.  One thing about entering items in the fair is the constructive criticism you get when it's returned to you.  Sometimes you get so caught up in your projects you forget the little things that make it more better.  This hat was made with Lyons Brand Chunky Yarn, I think it's fairly new, and it's so soft and cushy.  

 There's no pattern to this hat. I just sat down with my new yarn and started crocheting, sometimes it's best just to let things flow.

I got this loaded into my Etsy Shop finally.  I've really been neglecting that shop since going back to work, moving my mom, getting ready for the fair, I could go on and on!  There's so many things I want to make and so little time!!!!