=^x^=

Hope everyone had a good weekend! We spent a lot of time relaxing, though we had to take apart our air conditioner and see what the deal was, we were getting mosquitoes coming in through it! Gross! It should be fixed now, we added screens to the vents so that they couldn't get sucked in thru them. We did a lot of other random stuff around the house, and then had a nice relaxing rest of the day. I got to finish the back of the Lucky Clover Wrap!

Its very lovely and drapes so nicely! I wish the edges didn't curl in so you could have a better view. I guess that will all be fixed with blocking. By the way, since this is my first time knitting with cotton, I wanted to know if one goes about blocking it in the same way as wool? Any experiences out there?
I cast on for the right front, so hopefully that one will be done soon.
Then Sunday we got to go dirt jumping, and I did my largest jump yet! I thought it was kind of sweet because Mike built the jump for me! I was really proud of him. I'm not doing tricks off the jumps yet, but at least I can watch him do it!! All I get is a little air!! Then we went to my moms house for a while, threw peanuts at squirrels, and got some fresh produce from her backyard! Yay!
Mike cooked an excellent enchilada dinner last night, too. We use smart ground fake meat, and he added a cut up zucchini, tomato, salsa and seasonings for the filling, and then fried the tortillas, added the sauce and the cheese and baked! They were so tasty! Hope everyone has a good week!

***Update
Go here.

LOOT

As promised, here is all the loot from Suzie.

Woohoo! Ok lets see here, we got a really cute card by Knitterella, cute thingies from Japantown (awesome candies, pocket mirror, notebooks and pouch), a set of double pointed #10's (which i needed), and 2 skeins of Cascade Sierra (which I've never used), in a beautiful dark blue color!! Carrie, I am guessing you think this is ironic, since you mentioned you used Cascade Sierra for your Lelah!! It is definately VERY soft and comfy. The first thing I did was rub the yarn on my cheek like some kind of freak.
As for my Lucky as of today, I have about 12 more rows to finish up the back and then I'll have photos. I don't want to keep taking basically the same picture over and over!!
Everyone have a great weekend, and man, its FRIDAY!

woohoo

Yay!!! I got a package in the mail today from Suzie!! Ill have to get some pictures up later or tomarrow! She held a blogaversary contest and drew my name amongst other people! What a great uplift to my week! I have to say, even though she included fabulous yarn, my favorite thing is some japanese jellybeans that taste incredible! thanks suzie!!
I just got another miscellaneous wedding picture from our friend morgan:

I guess he left this one out for a good reason! What a goofy pair we are.

photos of stuffs

As I promised, here's some photos of the stuff I got from Lizzy Rose.

Belty Goodness


Close up!


Wonderful crocheted hat. Sorry I look so creepy, I was trying to hide from the camera.
And as knitting news go, I have about 3 more inches on the back side of Lucky!

=^-_-^=

I hope everyone had a great weekend! I had planned on going to the air show on sunday, but never made it. We wanted to take the dog and then realized how idiotic it would have been to drive down there. Satuday we had a birthday for mikes gramma, and he made her some beaded earrings! how sweet! i didnt get any pictures, but believe me, they were a lot nicer than anything Ive ever made bead-wise!! We all went out to check out downtown Naperville, and we came across a cute place called Lizzy Rose. It was all handmade things, particularly jewelry and bags. I ended up getting a really cute hat for $10, that was hand crocheted, and is kind of flapperish. It reminded me of Mia Farrows hat in The Purple Rose of Cairo, except not quite! I love it, I'll have to get some pics up. Then I got 2 silk belts that are just gorgeous for $5 each. Ill post pics hopefully later or tomarrow!
I only got a little bit of knitting done, worked on Lucky Wrap. I am 2 rows away from being done with the increases, and will soon be finished with the back! woo hoo!
Then, on Sunday, I stopped at a Joanns that is having a closeout sale, and got 10 yards of a sheer fabric for sooo cheap, that I am going to make curtains with! woo hoo again!

Then in really exciting news, Suzie at Purly Gates had a blogaversary contest and drew names for prizes, and she actually drew my name!! I'm so excited and I'm really happy shes a blogger! I think she had something like 52 or 53 entries!! She is so sweet that she actually drew 10 more people and decided to send them gifts too!! Yay!

Super cute fun

Go make a very cute doll of yourself here! As a forewarning, it doesnt work in Safari if you're on a Mac.
Here's mine:

You can go see Lauren's here!

exciting and new

Ok kiddies, I finally took a pic of what knitting I've been doing as of late.

Woo hoo, its the Lucky Cardigan from Stich and Bitch Nation!! It is such a fun pattern. Its easy at some parts where you can just not pay attention, and other parts you focus a little and its just the right amount. And oh my, is Rowan 4-ply cotton ever fun to knit with! I love this yarn!!
Then I decided to join this last friday:


Here's what we came up with over the weekend. You can check Pixie's site for details and progress!




Then I also did some beading on a necklace. I think I might change this over to a chain instead of stretchy elastic, but I think its pretty cool.

That's about it for now. I hope to get started on a sewing pattern this week, and get some Lucky Cardigan done!

Lelah Strap Info

Someone asked me to post the directions to my strapped Lelah on my blog. So here is my stab at writing down what I did:

Ok I did everything as usual, and then when you are about 3/4" away from being completely done with the top, just start knitting seed stitch. Remember it's seed stitch in the round, so be sure to count your stitches so you don't end up with some kind of funky ribbing. You want a little border going of about .5" to .75". Once you've got that, you want to have 2 sets of 9 stitches on stitch markers that go across the front to form the straps. Plan out where that is going to be, and then just start binding off stitches to those points, slip the stitches on markers, and then continue binding off until the only live stitches are the 2 sets of 9. Then just knit those stitches up with seed stitch for about 3". Then decrease 1 stitch at the beginning and end of the next row. Then continue on with the seed stitch strap until you have enough fabric to stretch over your shoulder and be sewn to the other side. You can just bring them straight over, or even cross them to form an 'x'. Be sure to not make too much strap, the material will stretch eventually, about 1"-2". Bind off your stitches in pattern, and then just sew them onto the other side.
**edit- the yarn I used was Caron Simply Soft-- i know, sooo fancy :)
Sorry if these are confusing! Let me know if anything needs to be cleared up!

Dear Chicago

Dear Chicago,

Stop spraying for stupid mosquitoes already. There is a vast collection of dead bugs all over the spray areas. These are just the ones found at work. These bugs help curb the mosquito problem within a cycle. Dammit.

Tagged again!

I got tagged by Christine!


5 CDs in your Player
1. Blacksheep's Blazing Arrow
2. Dianogah's Old Material New Format EP
3. June of 44's Four Great Points
4. Rachel's Systems/Layers
5. The Lounge Ax Defense & Relocation Compact Disc


5 Movies You've watched Recently:
This ones gonna be hard, I dont see to many movies..
1. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
2. umm... I think thats it like within the last year.


5 Nice Things That Happened To You Lately
1. I got a good review at work
2. Mike got a good review at work
3. I met a member of Shellac
4. I thought someone didn't know I existed, but it turns out they actually know I exist. That's always nice.
5. I kept up with boys on my last bike ride. woot.


5 MP3s on your playlist
1. Arms over Arteries by June of 44
2. Shoe Song by Shellac
3. Cyanide Breath Mint by Beck
4. The Little Acorn by Fruit Bats
5. Mittens by Califone


Im Tagging:
1. Megan
2. Eastern White
3. Tatiana
4. Suzie
5. Erika

weekendy

Quite a productive weekend. Friday we went out to eat with our friends at Zen Noodle on North Avenue. Just a little secret for everyone, they USED to be Hi Ricky, one of the best Thai places in Chicago. Luckily we found out one of the chefs purchased the place and kept the excellent menu going. woo hoo. Saturday was spent doing TONS of housework. We had to refinish a lot of wood surfaces, and then spent the rest of the day doing tons of cleaning. After you sand down wood, it just gets EVERYWHERE. Then sunday we woke up really early and went for a ride at Palos, where I seemed to have boundless energy and actually kept up with the boys this time. I was proud. Then we got home and my mom came over, where we spent the day eating, talking, and letting my mom have her first visit to Trader Joes. She loved it. Anyways, I decided to give her the Lelah I made for her. Here are some pics:

Front view with Slammer contemplating a yawn.


Hilarious back view with Slammer finishing up a yawn. She looks so demonic!


On the table shot.

I started a new and exciting project! I will have some pictures up later in the week!

Chile' hood memories

Tagged by LisaB from oliphauntknits!

5 things I miss from childhood. Im going to make this short and sweet.

1. Running around like crazy and never being tired or hot or cold. Never having aches or pains from doing so.

2. Summer nights on the porch with my mom and her friends and the porch swing, and the way things smelled on those nights.

3. The break dancin kids across the street from us, who provided me with hours of entertainment.

4. How good everything tasted. Seriously, I think that tastebuds in child form are something we should be able to get transplants of.

5. People and pets. My dog Boomer and my cat Chaka, my grampa, and being in the backyard with everyone together and happy.

I'm not going to tag anyone, but if you would like to fill it out, just drop me a comment and Ill tag you!

Pictures

Yay! One of our friends sent us a link to his pictures from this weekend! You can see them here.
Here are some highlights! Be sure to read the post below for a full depth account of the weekend!

Mike in his skidding contest.


Me being happy that NightRider fixed my light! FOR FREE!


After ride shot.


Around the fire. Theres a shot of slammer in there with her towel-coat that we made on the spot!


Craig's special helmet.

Weekend fun

The weekend went really good! We got there Friday morning and set up camp, and helped unload the stuff from Mikes work. Once everyone got there, we ate, and went off for a night ride! It was a good course, rocky, unpredictable, and fun. There were some slow grassy doubletrack climbs though, but only short spurts of them. The rest of the time was spent sitting around, and knitting Lelah and sitting in the sun. Im almost done, I just have to sew in the elastic. Ill have pictures up soon. Slammer seemed to really enjoy it too. We got a cheap cabana sun shelter type thing from Target and it worked perfectly for her. It was netted too so we could zip it up and keep the bugs away from her. It was really funny, a bumble bee got trapped in there and she tried to eat it! We stopped her though. There werent very many mosquitoes out either which adds to the fun. I really really hate mosquitoes. One of the companies there hosted a skidding contest, because it is so dry and dusty and sandy out there. They set up a little course, and held the contest. The minute Mike said he was entering, I knew he was going to win. So everyone went out there. There were a few really impressive skids, but once Mike went, there was no question as to who was going to win. Some people cheated and forced their bikes forward, but Mike just sprinted, jammed on the brakes, and went about 250 yards down the course. It was hilarious. He won a little gift bag from Mavic. The guy who was runner up kept demanding a rematch. Oh well. That pretty much sums up the weekend. Hope to have some pictures up soon!