Early Christmas

Kaylee and I celebrated Christmas early with my family. She was the most wonderful baby to travel with ever!! We even got compliments from other people on the plane about how great she was.

She got to meet her Aunt Val, Uncle George, cousins Devin and Georgie, and Uncle Mike for the first time. And her Aunt Val introduced her to some great songs like 'good garbage' and 'recycle'. Kaylee hasn't stopped singing them!!

Kaylee's Aunt Val made her a few special presents. One was a santa hat, which she made for Kaylee's cousins as well:
And the other was a panda stuffed animal that Devin designed for her:
There were quite a few baby hogs at Grammy's house. The biggest two were her cousin Devin, who grabbed her every second she could:
And her Papa, who just loves holding sleeping babies:
She got special pajamas from her Grammy and Papa to open presents in, we call them her Kaylee Kane PJs:
She also met her first boyfriend, who tried kissing her on the lips a lot, I really don't think she old enough to have a long distance relationship:
She had a great trip and we can't wait to go back to Long Island again. We were left with one question that Kaylee will have to answer on her next trip, who is her favorite Aunt?

Aunt Val:
Or Aunt Glory:

SANTA!

My little princess met Santa. She was very well behaved and just sat in his arms for a bit. Santa was really good, he even had a real beard!!

3 months. . . holy crap!!

How in the world did 3 months go so quick!! Granted those nights where she was up until 3am seemed like they went on forever, but hopefully those days are behind us. We were convinced for a while that the little princess was colicky around 8 weeks cause she would get to 9pm and start screaming her head off and then she was just a big ole ball of fuss until she finally went down, which was usually 2am or so. I finally decided to try sleep training stuff on her and she started sleeping through the night. I think she was just overly tired and it made her so fussy she didn't know what to do with herself. She's a completely different baby since she started sleeping at night. And now at 3 months she's even starting to nap regularly. Not that she has a certain time she goes down, but she does take 3 naps a day. The best part is she even lets me put her down for them now. She starts falling asleep and I put her in her crib and she takes a second to look around, realizes where she is, and conks out. She doesn't sleep long, but any sleep is better than no sleep! Those times that she'll have nothing to do with sleeping in her crib, she's always more than willing to sleep in her swing.

I used to think she was the spitting image of my niece, but she's becoming her own little person now. Here's a few of the latest picture of my big girl.

Now that she can hold her head up with no problem, the jumperoo has become the place to be.

She loves the swing, but she seems to have something against that poor lion, he always get the evil eye from her.

I made a hat, I'm not sure if she'll keep it or if it will go to a friend's baby. It sure it cute on her, but I've got tons of this yarn yet so even if it's gifted, my little princess will get one too!

Thanksgiving

I'm thankful for this:

And this:

And these oh so rare moments:
Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween from my little flower princess!!

She cried through half of the trick or treating, but her costume stayed on so I'm declaring it a successful holiday.
Stay tuned for adventures in cloth diapers, we just got a package with some bum genius diapers!!

2 MONTHS!!

My little princess will be 2 months old tomorrow!! How did that happen? I think it's pretty safe to say that I will never get around to posting her birth story. In a nutshell, it was a c-section, it was very quick and it hurt a lot.

Well, we've survived the first 2 months. It's been lots of fun and very, very difficult. She's definitely not one of those "easy" babies that just cries when they need something. She's a difficult baby that just cries. But on occasion she does seem to have fun and those fun times are coming more and more often. If only we could convince her that taking naps is fun.

Here are some of her fun times:

6 weeks

Baby girl is 6 weeks and 3 days old today! I know I still have a big long birth story/first 6 weeks of her life story to post and I promise I will one of these days. But right now the little princess is boycotting naps so I don't have all that much time to myself right now. Anyway, here's a picture of the princess wearing the bolero I made her:
And here's a picture of her with her Aunt Glory, who came to visit last week:

4 Weeks

Today my baby girl is 4 weeks old! It's been the longest and yet somehow the fastest 4 weeks of my life. She's doing great and so are me and her daddy. Although I could always use a few more hours of sleep. I'm still only getting a few minutes here and there to be online, but I promise once we get our monitor back from the warranty repair place then I'll have a real post about my girl. For now, some baby eye candy. This is her first successful time in the bouncy seat where she didn't just slump over into a little mush:

A short update

Things are going well here with the new addition. She's just perfect!! She had her first doctor's visit and she got a clean bill of health. My sweetie and I are very slowly adjusting to being parents. It's so weird that we're parents!! Monday my sweetie has to go back to work and I'm definitely not looking forward to that. It's been so nice having him home all week. But my parents are coming into town to help out for the next week so I'm not on my own yet. I'm recovering pretty well from the surgery, I'm up and about much more than I thought I would be. I thought I'd be laid out on the couch for at least a week, but I've been able to get around and up and down the stairs with very few problems. Now, if only I could get out of bed easily then I'd be all set. Stay tuned for the official birth story, until then, here's a picture from her first bath:

A New Addition

Kaylee Beatrice
Born 29 August 2008
8lbs 7oz

A Baby on the Way

We've got one and a half days of normalcy left around here and then our lives will be turned upside down! I got the word from the doctor yesterday that I'll be having a c-section on Friday. The little one is breech and making no effort to flip. While a c-section is not how I pictured this delivery, I just want her to be safe and healthy. I'm a ball of nerves thinking about exactly what happens after the delivery. Do I get to hold her right away? If not can my sweetie hold her the whole time I'm getting stitched up? Is she gonna be swept away to the nursery and I won't see her again until I'm in the recovery room? Will she even be allowed in the recovery room? And most importantly, are they going to give her formula out of a bottle? I'm really gung ho about breastfeeding and I know that just one bottle feeding can really mess the whole thing up. I guess I'll know everything soon enough. In the meantime I can't seem to sleep. I think it's just nerves and anxiety. I tried really hard last night to not think about anything and it seemed to help. I think I upped my total nights sleep from 4 hours to 6.

Of course there are a million things I want to do before she gets here and a whole house that could use cleaning, but I can't seem to bring myself to do much. I really wanted to get that olympic goal sweater blocked and seamed. I managed to get half of it pinned out on my new knitter's blocks 2 days ago but I don't have an empty spray bottle so I can wet it down. I know it's just a trip to the store, but I haven't gotten around to it.

So, there will probably be a bit of a blogging hiatus. Not only will I have a new person I'll be responsible for and a new life to adjust to, but we're also sending out our monitor to get fixed and have no idea how long it will take. I've got a backup computer, but I don't want to load pictures onto it and then have to go through transferring them when we get the monitor back. So, sorry, but everyone is just gonna have to wait a little bit for pictures of the little one.

Baby Update

Here is a baby update for all you great people who actually read my blog but I don't get to call everyday!

She's doing great! No I haven't had her yet, but she's the perfect size and moving just as much as she should be and has a nice strong heartbeat. BUT, she's breech. This little girl just doesn't want to flip! I'm thinking at this point I would probably feel it if she does flip, I mean she isn't just this thing floating in me anymore, she's pretty well packing in there. Apparently she wants to take after her Daddy though, who I was told was breech with his butt down and legs crossed, I guess he really didn't want out!

I did have high hopes of getting to meet her sometime this week, but it doesn't look like it's going to happen. I went to the Dr. on Tuesday for my weekly appt. I was told that "my cervix hasn't been invited to the party yet", meaning don't count on labor anytime soon! But, my blood pressure had spiked a bit and was borderline the last few appts. They did some blood work to make sure it was just gestational hypertension and that it hasn't developed into preeclampsia. I was told at the appt that I would get a call the next day and that if the results were bad that we'd be having a c-section in the next 2 to 3 days. I got a little nervous about the whole c-section thing, but I was also pretty excited to finally meet her. But, everything came back fine and no c-section this week.

The next appt is on Tuesday where I will be 38 weeks and 3 days along. I'll keep everyone updated but keep your fingers crossed for some flipping and for that invitation to my cervix, otherwise a c-section is still looming on the horizon.

3 Year Coopiversary!!!

3 years ago today my sweetie and I drove from southeastern Virginia to Maryland to meet a dog named Dewey and see if we wanted to adopt him. He was just perfect. Everything we wanted in a dog, so we loaded him into a crate and drove home with him. But first things first, he needed a new name, Dewey was out and Cooper was in!
We quickly found out that he was quite the handful. We had some bad times, like when he would try to bite us every time we put him in the crate and when he dug a hole through a plaster wall and when he ate the arm of a chair, but we've had many, many more good times. He's now a great little guy.
Very well behaved and a great big brother to Trapper. He loves being outside and going for walks. He's a true hunter at heart. But most of all he's a little daddy's boy. He loves his Joshua and is never far from him.
Now if only we could get him to stop jumping on the windows whenever the mailman, fedex, or ups drives by the house!!

Ravelympics - day 9

Wow, it's day 9 already and I'm not halfway done, oh no!!!! I had a major mess up 2 nights ago that I realized at 10:30. I thought about waiting until the morning to fix it so I would be fresh but there were still hours left of olympic knitting. So, I frogged about 5 inches of the left front and reknit following the actual directions (you think I would have done that from the beginning!) I was able to make it to just about where I started frogging by the end of the women's all around. Last night I finished the left front and cast on for the right front. I'm not too far on that yet:
In other knitting news, look what came in the mail today:
I will probably wait until Monday to try them out so I don't have to explain this purchase to my sweetie. But I don't know if I'll be able to wait that long! I really want to get the back and the left front of the sweater blocking.

Now for some non-knitting randomness. My sweetie and I went raspberry picking today!
Unfortunately the owners had just picked most of the berries to bring to farmers markets, but there was still enough for us to get 2 pints. My sweetie was a bit cranky at first, thinking we were not going to get many berries, and he felt weird cause it was basically just someone's house. But he cheered up quickly and we had a great time. The best part was these little guys popping out of the bushes:
They almost made me want a kitten, then I remembered how allergic I am and that my dogs would probably eat it! After berry picking, we stopped by the farmer's market and picked up 2 pints of blackberries and I'll be making blackberry/raspberry cobbler today and my sweetie is making some berries and cream thing!!

On the baby front, no baby yet. But her room is complete! Every thing I could possibly think she might need is in there, clothes are folded and put away, shelves are hung, and diapers are stacked and ready to go. This is my favorite part of the room, the nursing area. I'll be spending plenty of time in that glider. I'm definitely gonna have to work out how to nurse and knit at the same time!!
OK, off to make some cobbler and do some knitting!!

Ravelympics - Day 4

OK, here's my progress so far:
Sorry about the washed out look of the photo, I didn't realize it until I downloaded the picture and I'm far too lazy to try again. The cable pattern isn't showing up good in the photo and it's a little hard to tell it's leaves in person unless it's stretched a bit. I know blocking will help though. There will probably be even more knitting done by the end of the day. There's not much interesting on right now but I think tonight's broadcast should be pretty good. I have about 4 inches left on the back and I really want to finish the back.

I'm still enjoying working on this and loving the way it's coming out. I think I've got a good pace going and, as long as I don't burn out on the pattern, I think I may actually complete this by the end of the olympics.

I'm basically knitting on this exclusively, although with the decreases encroaching on the cable pattern, it's getting a bit complicated to work on too late at night. I busted out my english garden socks and knit a few rows on that last night but not many.

Oh, and a bit of a yarn review for you. I'm using Knit Picks Cadena to knit this it's 70% wool, 30% alpaca. It's soft and sturdy and really nice to knit with. And it's bulky so it works up really quick. The only problem I'm having is knots. I hate when there are knots in my skeins of yarn. These skeins are only 110 yards long, in my opinion that's pretty short for bulky weight and there is no need to knots in skeins so small. Well, skein 1 went fine, no knots. Skein 2 was a disaster with 2 knots in it! They're tied up so tight and so close to the ends of the yarn that I thought the yarn had just knotted a bit and went to untie it when I realized that the yarn was broken. I had almost knit right through the knot thinking it wasn't a big deal, but I'm glad I didn't! I'm about halfway through skein 3 right now and I've had 1 knot already. I'm very disappointed with this. I spit spliced it back together so I won't have any extra ends to weave in, but this is just unacceptable to me! I think I'll have to do a bit more research next time I buy another large quantity of knit picks yarn.

Ravelympics, day 2

Last night and today have been somewhat productive knitting days. Last night I knit through the whole opening ceremonies, although it was so cool that I wound up watching a lot more than knitting!! I did some stuff around the house this morning while my sweetie played on his xbox. But then he decided he needed to go fix our front steps that are coming a little loose. It was perfect timing. . . right as the olympic coverage was starting!! So I sat and watched rowing, beach volleyball, swimming, and cycling while knitting away on my sweater. It was a nice relaxing day. Then my sweetie came back in and wanted to play his xbox again, oh well, it was nice while it lasted. Now I'm trying to wrangle the pups, who are just uncontrollable the last few days. But, I did manage to take some pictures of my latest WIPs.

First the english garden socks. They are just plain stockinette and I'm hoping they'll fit since I just guessed on the # of stitches I need. The color changes are just too wild to make anything with a pattern, I think this shows off the yarn nicely though. Oh, and it's so soft!!! They are getting put by the wayside for the next 17 days though.
Then, my second sweater attempt, what I'm calling my olympic goal sweater. I love it so far. If it turns out as good as I hope then it will be good motivation to lose weight!!
This is about 8 inches of the back. It's going pretty fast. Gotta love bulky yarn!! I'm hoping my sweetie will let me watch tonight's olympic coverage and I'll get even more done. He doesn't understand the whole olympics thing though so I don't want to force him to watch it and we only have one TV in the house (usually not a problem, but it just may be a big problem tonight!)

9 months down!

I'm now nine months preggers!! Only one month left, hopefully less. She was breech at the last appt and I'm really hoping she flips or has flipped already. The next appt is Tuesday and I think if she doesn't flip by then we may be scheduling a c-section (ouch!). Her room is just about ready for her. I'm waiting to get the cushions for the glider back from the cleaners and then it will be all decked out. The only real think I have left to do is pack my hospital bag. I've got most everything I need gathered together, I just have to actually put it in a bag.

Today is also the kickoff of Ravelympics! I'm going to try to knit a sweater in 18 days, unless the baby comes before those 18 days are over, then I think I have a pretty good excuse for not finishing. It's knit on size 10 needles, so I have a good chance of finishing. I haven't knit anything on such large needles in a long long time.

In knitting news, I've been working on my nursing shawl and a pair of socks. I'll post pictures later, along with some pictures of the spinning I did while Val and the kids were visiting. I've been really lazy lately, but I'm hoping to have some FOs to post one of these days too!

A little of this and a little of that

I've been up to quite a bit lately. My sweetie and I decided to make maple sugar candy the other day. It was much more successful than our first attempt where it didn't set up. This time we beat it for a bit too long and it set up too quickly to get it into the molds. We had to put it in a glass pan then cut it apart later. Not the neatest looking candy, but it tastes pretty good!
My next endeavor was to make a sling for the baby. I was going to order one on etsy but they depend on your size and I didn't want to spend all that money then (hopefully) loose weight and have to buy another one. So I went to Walmart and got some inexpensive fabric. I wanted something heavier than quilters cotton and my only choice was camouflage, great for a boy, not so great for my little girl. But I did find this camo fabric:
It's camo butterflies, a bit more girly. After 2 hours or so of sewing and trying to figure out the instructions, I had this:
My baby sling. I've got my great babyhawk mei tai carrier for outings, but this will be nice for around the house while I'm trying to get stuff done. It's basically a slightly shaped piece of fabric that is folded in half. My body goes where the chair is and she'll go in the fold of the fabric at first and when she gets bigger she sits on the fabric. We'll see how it works and for $8 worth of fabric and 2 hours of my life I can make another one if I loose weight.

My last crafting project was a rag quilt for the little girl. There's a quilt shop hop going on this week and I went to the 2 local quilt shops (that's probably all I'll get to because I really don't have the money to spend on stuff and I feel like I have to buy something at every store, plus all the other stores are about an hour away). Anyway one shop was selling a rag quilt kit. I had this grand idea of making a beautiful, labor-intensive, appliqué quilt for her, but I haven't worked on the thing in months so I thought I'd make her a rag quilt in the meantime so she at least had one blankee from her mama! Here's a picture of the back:
And one with a bit more fabric detail:
I just washed it today but I haven't gotten a picture of the ragginess yet. It's absolutely adorable though!

And just for the fun of it, here's a picture of Cooper protecting the house from his lookout on the deck:
One of these days I may actually have a knitting FO, but don't hold your breath!!

Today's Haul

I don't go shopping all that often anymore. Everything is just too far away, so I combine my shopping trips into massive shopping trips. Today was no exception! I had a gift card to spend at Babies R Us so I invited my friend to take a trip with me to go use it up. She's a mom so I figured she'd have some good advice on final baby preparation things that I didn't think of. And she sure did. My one big purchase at the baby store was a temporal scan thermometer. I know a few people with them and they all say it's the best thing ever. My sweetie thought it was pretty stupid, but he's a boy so what do you expect! Other than that I got wipes and newborn diapers, diaper rash cream, some essential breastfeeding items, and a few cloth books.

After that it was off to Whole Foods where I stocked up on biodegradable plastic bags to use in the diaper pail. What's the point of using biodegradable, plastic free diapers if you're just gonna throw them in a plastic bag? Then was lunch at Olive Garden and a trip to Toys R Us. I actually didn't buy anything there, my friend was shopping for her son's birthday.

I got home and realized that the quilt shop hop started today and I got back in the car and went to the 2 close shops. The other 9 shops are about an hour or so away so they will have to wait til another day (I'm thinking tomorrow!) I got a kit to make a crib size rag quilt, a penny rug kit to make a small thing to put a votive candle on, a new thimble, and a new marking pencil (it's like a mechanical pencil but with chalk!) All in all it was a very successful day of shopping. I tried to nap when I got home but the dogs would have none of that, after all I did leave them alone all day and they deserved some play time!

Hopefully tomorrow I will manage to spend less when I go to all the quilt stores! The shop hop goes on through the weekend and most of next week. I would love to spread it out a little, but with gas over $4 a gallon here, I'm not about to make that many trips to Columbus if I don't have to. I'm going to try to hit the remaining 9 shops tomorrow, but I'm not counting on that actually happening!

The Baby Dropped!

I'm pretty sure the baby dropped this weekend. It seems a little early since I'm just in my 33rd week, but according to everything I've been reading, it's not unheard of. It's kinda nice cause I can eat a full meal again and chocolate without getting heartburn. I can see this as being a big weight gain month for me!!! But, the bad points are it hurts to stand for long periods of time and I have to pee every 5 minutes. I'm also thinking she's coming early. I've read plenty online about people who had the baby drop at 32 weeks and still didn't deliver until 40 weeks, but I've also read on just about every pregnancy site that the baby drops 2 to 4 weeks before birth (Val, you just may be here for the birth!). She'd be term by then so it's fine, but I still feel like I have so much more to do before she gets here. I've been making lists of everything I need to do and it seems a bit overwhelming. I did get pre-registered at the hospital today so that's one thing off the list and about 50 more to go. A lot of the list is buying things and I think I'm going to babies r us tomorrow with a friend so I'll be able to get a lot of that stuff crossed off the list.

8 months down!

Yesterday officially ended my 8th month of pregnancy and started month # 9! I'm getting kinda tired of being preggers. I still enjoy feeling her kick, but I don't enjoy the sigh that I can't help when I need to bend over to pick up the dog bowls! I'm getting so big even my pajama pants are getting uncomfortable. I'm in my 33rd week and the baby will be "term" when she's 36 weeks. I'd be completely fine with her coming then!! I think I'm all ready for her. Her bedroom is all set up. Just waiting for the last few things my sister is bringing out in a couple weeks, the bassinet and the glider.

The baby took a few days off from moving, which warranted a trip to the doctor for a non-stress test that turned out normal. Since then she's stopped kicking me with any real force and now just twists and turns and leans. The doc said she's running out of room in there. Our next appt is the final ultrasound to make sure everything is ok and that she's in a good position. I can't wait, I love ultrasounds!!

We took the first childbirth class, which was pretty pointless if you've ever watched a baby story on TLC, but it did help to calm some fears and I'm not so freaked out about getting to the hospital on time and my sweetie having to deliver the baby in a corn field on the side of the road! I'm also considering more and more the idea of natural childbirth. The plan right now is to go natural for as long as I can. I really want to option of walking around and don't want to be stuck in a bed for hours, but I also don't want to be disappointed if I get an epidural so I'm being very open and flexible to everything.

OK, well, that's it for now, I just felt like writing a bit since my sweetie is off watching Book TV. Yes, Book TV. It's about some feminist stuff, which normally is good for guys to watch but he's getting all the wrong ideas and now thinks I should walk 2 paces behind him at all times!! What a boy he is!

SPINNING!!

I've got the spinning bug big time! This weekend I created yarn, isn't that just the most amazing thing ever!!!

First some details on my holiday weekend. Friday we had some friends and their 2 yo over for a bbq. Then we went to this mini carnival thing in town. (There was a lady there with a llama and she told me where to go in town for fiber!) Of course I forgot to bring my camera.

Saturday was going to be yardwork day for my sweetie, but the lawnmower broke. The lawnmower that we bought the end of April broke! We were both pretty pissed off and I now have to drive the thing to a town an hour away to get it repaired. Well, my sweetie was really really pissed off so I looked online for things to do to get his mind off of it and found a canal boat ride about 40 minutes from the house. It was pretty cool. The boat ride is all of 2.5 miles and lasts about 40 minutes. But the boat is pulled by Percheron horses that walk next to the canal, that's the cool part! I liked just watching the horses, my sweetie was much more into listening to the history of canals in Ohio. And the 40 minute drive each way was a nice, relaxing, country drive. Lots of baby cows and horses in the pastures and lots of Amish clothes hanging out to dry. Again, I really wish I had my camera, it's staying in my purse from now on.

Sunday was a wash of a day. We weren't planning on doing much and good thing we weren't cause I got caught up in Wimbledon fever! I started watching the men's final and it went on all day long. While I was watching, I plied some yarn and did some knitting.

So, onto the spinning. First up we have my first official handspun:
My mom had given me some small amounts of fiber one time. I have no idea what kind of wool it is so I figured it's good practice yarn. Since there was so little fiber I decided to ply 2 of the colors together. I'm thinking I just may knit some squares and felt them into coasters or something. I want my first handspun to go to good use. I've got about 50 yards and it's DK weight.

The next handspun was from the same batch of fiber, but I managed to spin this quite a bit thinner and there was more of it, so I plied it with itself. Here it is just after spinning as a single:
And plied:
It's fingering weight and I've got about 100 yards of it. No idea what it will become. But both mini skeins are going to sit on my coffee table until I knit them up because I don't want to lose them to the stash.

I ordered some dyed roving the other day from Meghan of the Stitch It! Podcast. I'm not going to spin that yet though cause it's too nice to be another practice yarn. I've got this other stuff though that I got years ago at a quilt festival. It's horrendous and some unknown wool content, so it will make a good practice yarn. I've got 8 oz of it so I can try lots of stuff with it. I'm calling it the Green Monster!
Pretty ugly huh? And I think with all the moving at what not since I got it, it seems to have felted a bit so I don't know how well it will actually spin. I'll give it a shot though.

OK, I'm off to enter the Barn n Knit contest. You should too!

Two year anniversary

Two years ago today we welcomed a hyper, skiddish, tennis-ball-crazed, monster into our house. We had a few rough months where he almost went back to the rescue organization. But he's become quite a good little snuggler, a great puppy pillow, an entertaining little brother, and the best mama's boy ever.
Happy anniversary Mr. Trapper Too!!

The sewing machine sees some action

With all the knitting (and spinning) I do these days, the sewing machine has been feeling a little neglected. So I decided to do a quick little project for the house. I'm making cloth napkins. I went to my local box store and got 3 yards of fabric and found some fabric in my stash and made these:
So far I've only made one of each pattern. I've got 15 or so left to sew. The part that takes the longest is ironing down the edges. For those of you interested, I cut squares 14" x 14" and folded over the edges a little more than 1/4" (just eyeballed it) and ironed it, the folded again and ironed it. I did this on all 4 edges then just sewed using a straight stitch on the machine. I think I may try the next few with a zig zag, but then the corners always look a bit wonky. We have about 50 or so paper napkins left in the house and then we're not buying anymore ever again!! I spent about $8 on fabric and will have 20 or so napkins that should last a few years, even with my feral sweetie. Yay going green!!!

In knitting news, I finished the presto chango baby sweater:
The center panel can be taken off and replaced with another panel.
I made a straight stockinette center panel as well. This is a gift for a friend from grad school who's having a baby very very soon. I'm going to babies R Us on my way back from dropping my sweetie off at the airport so I think I'll pick up a rattle or something and send the package out early next week. All in all I'm pretty happy with the sweater, it looks like it's supposed to look, but I didn't really enjoy knitting it and it seems a bit stiff and thick for a baby sweater.

The other thing I've been knitting on is my nursing cover up.
I like this project a lot. It's coming out really nice. I just don't have a comfy place to sit and knit on it where I can place the chart somewhere I can see it. It's a bit of a balancing act right now with putting it on one of my legs and hoping no dogs tails knock it over. We desperately need some end tables! I just finished the first ball of hempathy (you can see the ends coming off the left side) and I think I have 4 or 5 more. It should make a decent size shawl/cover-up.

Usually I like to include some sort of cute picture of the dogs if I have one. Today though we have a somewhat disturbing picture of my sweetie with our younger dog, Trapper. Trapper used to be scared of my sweetie. I got Trapper just after my sweetie left for a year in Iraq. He's a nervous dog in general and it took a while for him to get used to being pet or touched at all. When my sweetie came home it took a good 6 months before Trapper started to realize that my sweetie was here to stay. Now, just over a year since my sweetie has been home, they're best buds. Trapper is still a mama's boy and follows me everywhere. But if the seat next to me is taken by Cooper, which it usually is at night, Trapper is more than willing to be a puppy pillow for my sweetie: