And She Knits Too!

ATV Adventure

File under: stuff I a) didn't expect to do and b) didn't expect to like.

Yesterday I drove a big ATV four wheeler 75km on the roads and trails around Tweed.

We are visiting the cottage and my father in law thought it would be fun for us to join a group doing an organized drive (ride?). We all met at Trudeau Park at 10am and went in two groups on a pre-set course with some pretty fun, bumpy, muddy off road trails. There were about 35 vehicles, many with passengers and it was far more fun than I expected.

I am not generally of the motorized "sports" persuasion and as I drove the trails I did think they would be fun to run or mountain bike, but I can see why people think this is a good time. Oh, and the kilometre we drove where the trail was actually flooded over the axels of my vehicle would not be fun on a bike does show the utility of these machines.

We let Emma drive a bit in the muddy field. She liked it a whole lot.

I only have two complaints: this group stopped too often and some of them drove too slow. Once I got used to driving my machine--something I haven't done in about 30 years when ATV's had three wheels and I rode with no training or helmet--I wanted more bumpy trails!

I also wanted to stop and take photos of the sheep and alpaca grazing in a farmer's field and the trilliums lining the paths and all that water and mud. So maybe I'll plan a family only ride next time we're up here.

Something less than 75km though. I was totally spent when we finished around 4 that afternoon. It's actually a physically demanding thing riding around all day in the sun and mud.

 

Ethel

I treated myself to a new project bag.

Meet Ethel.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She's a robot with a sparkly gold dress and killer glasses.  Just large enough to hold a sock-in-progress.  When I see her hanging out in my purse she makes me smile.

Made by Robot A Day, Ethel is a one of a kind sassy pouch.  There are so many other great robots--animals, zombies, smart-asses--they're silly fun.

See all the robots here on Etsy.  I can't go look or I'll get another one.

Owls at 14

On January 14th, my baby turned 14.  Champagne birthday.  Full-on teenager. 

Whoa.

She's now taller than me, growing up to be a great person and she's a riot.  

To celebrate she had her two best friends over for movies (Dirty Dancing, Perfect Pitch and Strictly Ballroom), music (from A-ha to Florence & the Machine), boy chat (the cast of The Outsiders and boys in popular culture that I have no idea about) and not-much sleep.

Emma, may your life have lots of moments like these:

In a nice coincidence, I also finished the sweater I was making for her in the wee hours before her actual birthday.  It wasn't a surprise, but it was still a nice gift.

It's Owls with some modifications.  Emma wanted a loose sweater so I made the 38" size with no waist shaping.  By request, I also made the extra long cuffs with thumbholes.  It's two colours of Debbie Bliss Luxury Donegal Tweed chunky because that's what I had in the stash.  I rather like it.

My silly teen-model likes it too:

It still needs to be blocked and Emma decided she wants all the owls to have button eyes. 38 buttons.

Good thing I love her so much.

(and the sweater fits me too!)

Rhinebeck (sigh)

Rhinebeck, I always love visiting you.

This year was made better by the absolutely perfect house we rented right in town.  We parked the car Friday night and didn't use it again until we left for home Monday morning.

(one of three sitting rooms!)

I travelled with great friends: Michelle, Kim and Jo and we drank wine, ate amazing food, fondled yarn, enabled, laughed, cried and didn't share our desserts (even when we said we would).

I ran into a bunch of virtual friends I only get to hug once a year: Vanessa, Angela, Hope, Jaya, Cassandra, Julia (I love love love her not-released green cardi), Cara (and her amazing Maxfield cardi!), Chris, and others that I'm sure I'm forgetting (sorry!).

I finally got to meet (and hug) Lisa Souza and Nora Bellows of Noni knits (must write to her about getting copies of our photos in our Ella coats).  

I ate amazing meals and drank fantastic wines.

I got this super duper fantastic custom mug from Jennie the Potter. My morning coffee is now being consumed in style (and I got to hug her too!)

(yarn on an orange bike-squee!)

I bought yarn (seen on my lap) to knit pretty things.

I enjoyed the scenery. But didn't take any photos until we were driving over the Hudson on our way home.

I'll be back next year (to take a bath in that tub!)

 

Rhinebeck (sigh)

Rhinebeck, I always love visiting you.

This year was made better by the absolutely perfect house we rented right in town.  We parked the car Friday night and didn't use it again until we left for home Monday morning.

(one of three sitting rooms!)

I travelled with great friends: Michelle, Kim and Jo and we drank wine, ate amazing food, fondled yarn, enabled, laughed, cried and didn't share our desserts (even when we said we would).

I ran into a bunch of virtual friends I only get to hug once a year: Vanessa, Angela, Hope, Jaya, Cassandra, Julia (I love love love her not-released green cardi), Cara (and her amazing Maxfield cardi!), Chris, and others that I'm sure I'm forgetting (sorry!).

I finally got to meet (and hug) Lisa Souza and Nora Bellows of Noni knits (must write to her about getting copies of our photos in our Ella coats).  

I ate amazing meals and drank fantastic wines.

I got this super duper fantastic custom mug from Jennie the Potter. My morning coffee is now being consumed in style (and I got to hug her too!)

(yarn on an orange bike-squee!)

I bought yarn (seen on my lap) to knit pretty things.

I enjoyed the scenery. But didn't take any photos until we were driving over the Hudson on our way home.

I'll be back next year (to take a bath in that tub!)

 

Holy concert night! (shameless kid bragging)

Last night was Music night at Emma's middle school and as dutiful parents we went to see hersing in the choir.  I confess that I'm not as involved in the life of the middle school and I had no idea how much talent there is in the place.

 

The choir was quite something (if you're interested, here's a couple of short snippets.  Emma is right in the middle--I'm not one of those parents who goes right to the front).

 

 

The concert featured a whole bunch of other fantastic performances--strings, band, solos (including Emma's new French teacher playing the theme from Star Wars on the bagpipes), a parent/teacher rock band featuring Emma's homeroom teacher (who sang professionally before teaching), a group playing the baritone ukulele and singing Sweet Child of Mine (that I totally should have filmed), and a student rock band belting out songs from The Guess Who and Rolling in the Deep.  

 

It was actually a really enjoyable evening.  Especially after all those years of sitting through some pretty horrid concerts at the school and daycare.  The kids are always cute, but now they are choosing to participate and the teachers are really invested in making nice music.

We also got a preview of the production of High School Musical they're doing in May (Emma is in the chorus).  I'll have more bragging to do then!

 

It's the most wonderful time of the year...

Boxing day (It's a Canadian thing, go look).

The whole Christmas thing is over and we can just sit on the couch, watch our new DVDs, play with our new Wii games, knit whatever we like (though I didn't do any gift knitting this year), eat leftovers and RELAX.

This year we hosted Christmas at our house and all I've done on the 24th and 25th is cook, clean the dishes and cook some more.  All meals were a great success, it was mostly fun, but I'm done.  Done.  DONE.

I haven't even been outside since Thursday.  Too busy.

I'm off until after New Year's so I'm planning on doing a bit of loafing, some knitting, some running, some stuff with the kids (I'm open to ideas, because I don't have any plans) and no complicated cooking.  One prime rib dinner with all the fixings and one turkey dinner with all the fixings is quite enough.

I now return to my annual scheduled do-nothing time.  

Halloween Tweens

Halloween was a fun time this year.  Except the part where I was FREEZING.  It was much colder than I thought it would be (that's due to denial about winter coming) so the standing around while Xander sprinted from house to house was not all that fun. 

Seeing the kids in their costumes having fun, getting candy, being silly etc. is always entertaining.  This year we had one Annikan Skywalker ala Clone Wars:

 

And the more eerie version:

 

And, one Glam Rocker.  Notice the attitude?  I see trouble ahead...

 

Yes, those are silver doc martin's. What you can't see is the silver sparkles on the leggings...

Halloween Tweens are PROS at getting the candy. There are a lot of empty calories in the house. Now the trick for me is to avoid eating too many treats (gotta keep off the now 18 pounds I've lost this year!!!).

(Note: I don't like the term Tween, but do love a good rhyme for my title.)

I have my own drill...

Uses for your drill
Originally uploaded by Dr. Steph

And I know how to use it.



Turns out it's not only good for making holes and screwing screws, with a 9/32 drill bit, it makes an excellent bobbin winder.

Just be careful taking the bobbins off; I dug a nice gash in my thumb with the drill bit.

What am doing all this for? I'm warping the loom to make two scarves. The yarn is uber-gorgeous Briar Rose Fibres BFL light fingering (or maybe lace) in some of my favourite blue, teal and brown shades. After the Tour de Fleece (which I consider a success; just waiting for the yarn to dry so I can show you), I wanted to dust off the loom and burn through some stash.

Getting there is all the fun

Today I'm 40!

There was cake (it was yummy)

 

 

There was also lazy family time (I'm on holiday), regular routine stuff (kids needed shoes), dinner out (with a couple of pints), a DVD (Matrix, because Emma asked to see it) and some very nice unmentionables from Craig (which I guess I just mentioned).

I've been feeling a bit funny about this decade/landmark birthday.  It's supposed to mean something more than a non-ending-in-zero birthday.  It was one of the reasons why I started exercising last year (and yes, I'm still running, lots actually, and liking it).  I wanted to leave my 30s in as good shape as I started them, though considering I was pregnant with Alexander, I'm not sure how to gauge being a gestator of a giant healthy baby against looking and feeling pretty dang good on my 40th birthday.

Today, I stopped sweating it (only partially because I didn't run).  Getting to today has been all the fun, so why worry about the number?

My motto for 40:

 "No one's the boss of me"

I think I might get a t-shirt made with that on it.