Day 4

Today I am thankful for my mom. She is a bit crazy and over the top but in short she will stop at nothing to make my son happy and feel loved. Thanks mom.

I am also thankful for my knitting partner in crime. In short, she makes me feel normal, loved and reminds me of the light at the end of the tunnel!

Day 3

Today I am thankful for the polar express movie and book! It reminded me of the magic Christmas has when a child believes! I am looking forward to having Nolan be excited for Santa.

Day 2

I am so thankful for my husband. He is my rock! I love you!

Day 1

I am going to try something new. Each day in November, I would like to post about something that I am thankful for. Here goes:

Today I am thankful for my friends! Without them I would not make it this far. Your support and love is amazing! Thanks for all you good people out there! Love to you all.

A special treat:

My own superhero BATMAN!

Hello all. Its been far too long since my last post. I hope the past month has been good to you. We have been pretty busy like normal. Last weekend, we headed up to La Crosse, Wi for Oktoberfest! We had a great time and even had some friends from Madison join us. The Maple leaf parade on Sat morning was particularly fun. The whole family went to this 4 hour long parade with many many floats. Nolan loved listening to the school bands. My favorite was seeing some beautiful horses.

 It was so nice to be back in La Crosse. We saw so many friends from high school and college. It was a great way to see everyone in one weekend! We even topped the weekend off with some of the best pizza ever from Big Al's too. If you have never had a the Big's Al's special, trust me you are missing out :)

http://www.bigalstoo.com/

On the ride home we pasted the cutest farm on Hwy 12. Green thumb farms has a place called pumpkin land where kids can play and run around. We stopped and let Nolan run around and pick out a pumpkin. We also got some apple cider, which is perfect for this cooler fall weather. 

As for knitting, I had somewhat of a knitting funk. My projects are long and I am not getting anywhere fast. I needed something that was a quick and easy project. My friend made these awesome mittens for a donation. I loved them plus she finished them in a weekend! Perfect for a quick project and for Christmas gifts. I am so excited to make a bunch of these and put them under the tree!

I also finished another mitten but I am not sure I like it. I made it with the idea of Badger mittens to match the badger socks for my mother-in-law. But I think they are a bit ugly!

 Maybe its just me. As for this past week, we had a lot going on. Work is overwhelming and Nolan is not feeling well. Campus was a zoo due to the President visiting campus. I think its amazing we had a chance to host the President of the United States here in Madison, Wi. Awesome! Tuesday night, my husband and I attended the Hirschfelder Award Dinner at Maple Bluff Country Club. The meal was amazing, 5 course meal from heaven. We had a wonderful time and I even got to show off the citron shawl.

As for this weekend, it will be fulled with knitting, relaxing, and just hanging out with the family. We have not sat at home with nothing to do in forever. We have pumpkin spice candles lit and knitting out while Nolan is running around playing the guitar. Enjoy the fall, its almost over here in Madison. Until next time, keep knitting.

Hello knitters. I am just so excited and coming down from an amazing weekend. Yesterday we had a work picnic, hung out with friends for the afternoon and headed to another friends house for dinner. It was so relaxing and fun. I love how close we have become with people here. The move was a lot easier now that we have close friends :)


As for knitting, I have started quite a few projects and even picked up some old ones. I started working on the Ridged Ripples Scarf again. I really like knitting it up this time around. Basically, over the past year my knitting skills have improved and this time around its not so bad. I am on the second half of the scarf. The colors are so pretty. I cannot wait to wrap this up and give it to my mother-in-law. She has been waiting a while for it!

I also started a little something for her for this holiday! I had two skeins of the badger sock yarn so I am going to make her some mittens. I started knitting the first mitten on two circular needles as suggested by a friend and I really like it over the double pointed method. Of course I am not very far yet so we will see how I like me as time goes on :) This is the first attempt at mittens but I am sure they are pretty similar to socks. I am excited to see the finished product but it will be a while :)

Finally, I started my first knit-a-long (KAL) today. What a great way to knit something! I am knitting the Quaker Ridge Shawl by Susan B. Anderson. My best friend bought me the yarn for the project because she is super sweet! (Side note, I totally miss her and the family :) ).  I am knitting this pattern up in Malabrigo Rio yarn. I got a nice start today when I was at the park with my little man. I checked the thread on Ravelry and there are a lot of very talented knitters with great ideas, colors and beads for this project. I never thought of some of the ideas they had! Its also fun to show off your work and have people comment on your project. A complement from a fellow knitter is always fun! I was surprised so many people loved my stitch markers :) They are all home  made! The pattern has an option for adding beads. I am going to do this but I am going to wait until more the the shawl is complete to decide what exactly I want. I think cute blue pearls would be awesome. Not sure though... Any suggestions?

I would love to hear how your weekend went. I hope you got to enjoy this fall weather! My husband is so excited for pumpkin pies, fall colors and Halloween! Well here is an updated picture of my little man. I am off to watch some batman cartoons and serious snuggle time! Until next time, keep knitting!

The family had an amazing weekend. It was filled with relaxing times, knitting, dyeing yarn and great food. I absolutely love spending time at the M's house. I love their family. I hope that one day my son turns out as amazing and the two big C's.

For a treat, my knitting partner and I visited some over her favorite knitting shops! Silver Creek Cabin was a very big store, not in size but the amount of yarn. This place was packed with yarn. It was almost overwhelming yet very fun! We also visited the Coldwater Collaborative in Excelsior MN. This yarn shop was in a cute town and was very nice. I loved all of the different yarn. Next we spent some time dyeing yarn. Here is my fav from the whole weekend

We also had amazing food thanks to Vic all weekend. In addition, C and I had an idea to make pretzel wrapped hotdogs which turned out amazing! As a side we grilled veggies, pineapple and bacon wrapped/cream cheese stuffed peppers! All of the food was great.

I have so much to post about this weekend and the fun I had but I am exhausted. Check out my friends page for more details about our adventures and fun! I hope you had a great holiday weekend as well. Until next time, keep knitting.