Ticked!!!

I'm really ticked!. I just wrote this really long post and when I went to post it blogger was not available and I lost the whole thing!!! GRRRRRRRR!! This is the first time this has happened to me but I suppose that it won't be the last. I'll try to recreate it, although after you've written it once it doesn't seem the same the second time around! Oh well.

I've been really busy at work and consequently pretty tired by the end of the day. Come home, read some blogs, eat, watch t.v. knitting and then bed. Nothing too exciting.

We had a birthday supper for youngest son on Sunday. We did bbq chicken and oven roasted potatoes and mixed peppers-delicious. DIL brought a homemade birthday cake so we were all quite stuffed at the end of the evening. It was very yummy.

Youngest g'daughter had to have a little surgical procedure on Friday so grandpa looked after the youngest g'son for the day. They had a great time together. They went to Costco and g'son pointed out what he wanted for his b'day and christmas- everything they had in the toy isle for a boy!!! They also went to the park and played on all the equipment so they both had to come home for a nap after that.

One of the blogs I like to visit is 'Miles Away from Home'. It's written by an English women who moved to France with her family. Her site has been unavailable for over a week. Does anyone have any connections.

I thought I'd try a different 'look' for my blog. What do you think? I think I like the colours better. I'll keep it for a while anyway.

I've been knitting a little toddler outfit for BFF coworker. (No pictures yet). It started out as just a little sweater but there was more yarn so I knitted a hat and there was still more so I made a pair of mittens and there's still more left so I think I'll use the rest and make a scarf. I'll take pictures when they're all sewn up.

I got these fabulous fabric boxes from my BFF for my birthday. I love them, there from EQ3. It's a furniture and accessories store that are in Canada and the U.S. I don't know if they are in any other countries.


That's it for this time. Be back soon, hopefully. Bye for now.

Thanksgiving/Columbus Day

Happy Thanksgiving and Columbus Day to all Canadian and U.S. bloggers.

We had an amazing Thanksgiving dinner yesterday at #1 son's house. He and DIL did an amazing job preparing the meal. There was, of course, the turkey (delicious), dressing, carrots and turnips, corn, mashed potatoes, cabbage rolls, gravy and buns. As if that wasn't enough, the selection of pies was pumpkin, apple, cherry, banana cream and pecan cranberry - oh my!!! The apples and cherries were from the DIL's parents trees on their acreage in Saskatchewan. Needless to say we were all stuffed at the end of that. There were 10 people, but enough food for twice that many!!! I forgot to take the camera so no pictures.

I do have pictures of another fabulous meal we had about a week ago though. My BFF invited my husband and I over for a belated birthday fondue. Her mom has been visiting from Ontario so there was the four of us. Again there was enough food for about 10 people.



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We had 3 fondue pots going, two with oil and the third with swiss cheese. There was beef, chicken, ham, cocktail weiners, shrimp, bread for the cheese, mushrooms, potatoes, snap peas, radishes cherry tomatoes, peppers, cauliflower, broccoli, carrots and so many dips and dipping sauces I can't remember them all. To finish it all off there was a fabulous chocolate mousse cake with chocolate ice cream and lots of white wine throughout to help it all go down!
On Friday night #4 son, DIL and the grandchildren took us out for another belated birthday dinner. We went to a little Italian place called Nicko's Bistro. Very small, very trendy in the 'yuppy' area of town that they live in. I think the restaurant only seats about 40 people and you have to have a reservation or you won't get in. There were lots of people that were turned away as all tables were reserved. We started with calamari and ceasar salads. The calamari was cooked in a spicy sauce. None of us had had them cooked that way before and they were very good. We had two veal dishes, a salmon dish and manicotti which we all shared with the g'children. All dishes came with penne pasta in a red sauce. For dessert we had a creme caramel, chocolate mousse and apple strudel with ice cream. We were all very satisfied after the meal and the g'children were very good and they are only 3 and 6 years old. The 3 year old was adamant though that he wasn't going to sit in the high chair they had for him but he did settle for a booster seat!!!
Well, this posting is definitely of the 'one track' variety - food!!! It was all very good though and thoroughly enjoyed by all! 'Til next time - bye.

Sewing Show

I went to the Creative Stitches and Craft show yesterday. It is an annual event that has vendors mainly from western Canada. There is another one next month in Toronto for the east. I usually go with my mom or a friend but this time I went by myself. No one was available and my mom can't walk that far anymore. I had gone by myself once before and quite enjoyed it because I can take my time and spend as long as I like looking at one or another particular thing without thinking I'm holding anyone up. There are lots of quilting stores there and more and more yarn stores. Some scrap booking and a few selling the latest and greatest iron, sheets, dog grooming tool etc. But I'd say 95% is crafting of some kind. I didn't take as many pictures as I'd liked, mainly because I'd forget and then not bother going back to take pictures.

These are just a few of the beautiful quilts that were on display. The one of the wolf is amazing!

This is a scrap bag that I bout for $7.50. It probably has enough fabric to make a baby crib blanket or play mat.

I bought a couple of fat quarters, you can't see but they have raised paint on them. The bundle of fabric is a 5 meter package. There is a double panel and 4-1 meter pieces of co-ordinating fabric. It is the Tropical Safari collection by J. Smith and Lynda S. Milligan, Possibilities for Avlyn Inc. The booth was a quilt shop from out of town. As it was getting late in the day she had reduced everythingby 50%. I only paid $12.50 for the 5 meter bundle - very reasonable!!

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The colours are quite a bit brighter than what the pictures show. I took the pictures on the bed in the master bedroom. I still have to figure out a good place that I can take pictures year round.

It took me about 3 hours to see all of the show and by then I was ready to call it quits. Cement floors are not kind to the feet or back when walking on them for any great length of time.

That's me for now. Back soon I hope!

Fall

Today is the first day of fall and it is raining and a little chilly. It's supposed to get nicer during the week. Hopefully we will have an Indian summer. Lots of the trees are changing colour and loosing their leaves.

It didn't take very long being back at work before we all had colds. One of the students came back to school with a runny nose and before you now it 5 out of our 6 staff, including me, had a cold. It's been about 7 days now so hopefully it will be gone in a few more days.

Haven't done very much knitting this week. Really haven't felt like it. Spent most evenings watching tv or reading.

Dropped into V.V. a week or two ago and picked up 2 wool blankets.

Tried to find out about them on the web but couldn't find much, other than there was a slingby mill in Yorkshire many moons ago. I thought the price was pretty good. I washed them in hot water and they have started to felt a little bit, but I think I'll have to wash them a few more times for them to completely felt.
Hope everyone is having a nice weekend.

Finally Ready

I think I'm finally ready with the etsy thing. I've figured out all the ins and out (I think, I hope) and I'll be ready to list a few items maybe today or tomorrow. Here is a little peek at some of my stuff.

Size 2

Size 4

Size 6

Fits size 2-8

I make hand knit vests, sweaters and hats (toques in Canada) for kids, sizes 2-6. Hopefully people will like them and buy, buy, buy (lol).

I've been pretty busy the last couple of weeks. What with school starting again, yard work, house work. airport runs and my birthday in there somewhere there hasn't been enough time for posting. I try and read my favourite blogs (there are so many of them, and the list is growing all the time) every day and then I don't have any time to write my own posts. Have to get more organized around here.

Must go and make supper so that I'll Hopefully have time to get back here later.

Bye for now!

Back to Work

How soon we forget how exhausting it is the first week back at school. I thought I would have everything ready for my etsy store by now. Obviously I forgot that for the first week or so I'd be bagged at the end of the day and end up doing nothing in the evening except watch t.v. and do a little knitting. Hopefully I'll get my first wind, never mind my second wind, by next week.

It was good to see all the kids. They were so excited to be back at school with their friends. We have a couple that have never been to school before so it's proving to be a little traumatic for them. But they should settle in pretty soon. Our classrooms are still a mess but they should be putting some walls up this weekend and things should start falling into place.

There is a chance of frost tonight so I will have to go out and cover my tomato plants soon. I've picked a lot of them but there are still some that I would like to see get a little bigger. The upside down tomato plant from the last post is really easy to grow. The green round part has a collar inside at the bottom. You have to buy any old tomato plant (mine is a roma) take it out of the pot and put the root part inside, inside the collar, with the green part on the outside. Then you fill the green thing with potting soil, hang it up, water, and watch it grow.

Hopefully I will have more to report the next time I post.
Bye for now!!

End of Summer Holidays

This is the last weekend before it's back to work on Tuesday. It was sure nice having the last 9 weeks off.
Had to go into school last Wednesday for meetings. Our program has only just moved to this school for the coming school year. As of Wednesday they had only just started the construction required to get the rooms ready. They promise it will all be ready by Tuesday-we'll see!!!


How do you like my upside down tomato plant. It's really neat. I've got quite a few tomatoes on it, they just need to do quite a bit of ripening. These are my flowers on the deck. They are a little bedraggled and wild looking.
This is the last of the roses. They'll probably all be gone by next week.

I went to the garden centre today. I wanted to get a heather plant and English Lavender. I was told that neither do well here in zone 3. My aunt has heather in her yard so I know it will grow here, I just have to find it. They didn't have any lavender either for the same reason. They did have a plant called Sea Lavender. I've never heard of it. The picture looked like regular lavender and it said zone 3 so I bought it. I''ll find out next spring if it survived the winter.

I've been busy this last week trying to get things organized for opening my etsy store. I got all the banking part figured out. I'm in the middle of opening the Paypal acct. My husband just came up with the name for the store - Kinderstitches. Kinder as in kindergarten. I'll be putting in mostly knitted stuff for kids, but I also hope to do other stuff in the sewing line too. I still have to take pictures of all the sweaters I've been making and figure out my little blurb so it'll be a few more days yet.

Many thanks to Gill of Lucy Locket for telling me how to move the pictures around. So easy when you know how!!!
Hope everyone has a great rest of the weekend!!!