On to the next year..

This is my New Year's Eve....



I still Love them anyway!!

The Chicago Bears don't have a chance in the post season despite my hopes of them going to the Superbowl. Did you see their game tonight? More drinks please.

I hope everyone has a great 2007!!

An anniversary of sorts

I realized on Christmas that I had just experienced an anniversary. On Christmas in 1989 (17 years ago) I met my husband to be. I was 17 so I've now known him as long as I haven't known him.
Christmas Eve this year we headed to Chicago to the Museum of Science and Industry to take in the Holidays around the World. It was really crowded but we enjoyed seeing all the trees representing other countries.
Christmas day was relaxing with all of us lounging in our PJ's pretty much all day. My husband purchased all the books I had on my Amazon wish list.

He hopes I keep up with the knitting I started last year as all but one is knitting related. The sewing book is awesome as it teaches me how to build clothes to fit. I would love to be able to design my own clothing in the future.
I also received a wonderful gift box from Teavana. He got the idea from my blog.

I hope all of you had a great Christmas!

It's a swap

About a month ago I came across a swap that seemed to fit me perfectly. A coffee and yarn swap. It seemed easy enough. The person in charge matched you up with another knitter in love with coffee and yarn and you answered a few questions through emails or your blog to get to know one another.
I ordered freshly roasted beans from a Chicago based company (Intelligentsia Coffee & Tea) that I like and yarn from an Etsy store (Fearless Fibers) that has been mentioned several times on different podcasts lately. The coffee came without any problems but the yarn came smelling like the barn, more accurately-the manure pile. How could I send this foul smelling yarn with the wonderful smelling coffee? The Etsy store owner was very helpful in exchanging this yarn with other yarn but now I was out more shipping fees.
A $40 gift package ended up costing me about $30 in shipping fees.
Over a week ago I received my swap package.

I loved the coffee, it tasted great. The cup at a time brewer is excellent and very addictive. The travel mug is fabulous. Thank You JavaJem for the package.
I'm not sure why this swap thing it so addictive though. I'm glad I finally participated in one but I don't think I'll be signing up for any in the near future. Thank goodness I signed up for one that involved only one package. These other swaps with multiple packages over several months would be cost prohibitive for me. This one stressed me out enough. It didn't help that it's the end of the year.

Field trip

On Saturday we headed to Chicago for the Renegade Craft Fair.


I had all 3 men in my family with me and I couldn't believe how well behaved they were. It was really crowded and overpriced on most items but I gathered tons of ideas. My husband talked me out of an Obama in 2008 t-shirt but he doesn't know about cafepress.com. My husband even picked up Christmas gifts for his sister and niece.

Next, I drug them to a store called cereality. They couldn't complain about the vegetarian menu because all they offer is cereal. I had a mix of granola, cornflakes, apples and dried cranberries topped with soy milk. It was fantastic and filling.

Next stop, State Street. To say it was crowded is an understatement. It was a bit odd to see the Macy's signs between the decorations.

We only got close to a couple of Mary Poppins windows before heading over to Daley Paza to check out the Christkindlmarket.

It was very crowded and the parking meter was running low on time so we headed back home.
Later Saturday night we went to a local stage production of The Christmas Carol. The kid's enjoyed seeing one of their fellow home schoolers acting on stage.
Sunday, we completed decorating our abode. The stockings are hung on the mantle. The CD player is loaded up with carols galore. The tree is decorated with lights, ornaments and dropping more needles than retaining them. The Christmas train encircling the tree is causing even more noise pollution in this already noisy house. Ahh the spirit of Christmas.

St. Nicholas Day

Happy St. Nick's Day!

Wow time flies at the end of the year. Just 19 days until Christmas. I'm not working on any knitted Christmas gifts this year and that was a great decision. I finished a pair of slipper socks for the youngest last week and he loves them.
I topped the stocking top with a stockinette/seed stitch trim in a natural color. I've tried to put his name on it several times but he's being extremely picky about just how it should look.
My cabled poncho is poking along. I have had a heck of a time figuring out exactly how I want the collar to be. It seems to take me longer to rip back my "experiments" than it does to knit off a pattern.
I've been busy trying to keep the kid's on task with their school work. There's so many fun projects this time of year. Math, spanish, history, language arts and geography just seem so boring. It's been lots of fun having them both home this year to pick what crafts we should work on. Tomorrow we're going to attempt to build a gingerbread train. We mixed up the dough tonight-11 cups of flour!!
We had lots of snow last week which made our first sledding adventure a blast. It's so nice to go to the sledding hill during the school day and have the whole hill to ourselves.