Oh, hi there!

It's been a while! I didn't mean to, but I ended up taking the summer off from blogging. I also took the summer off from knitting, and schooling my kids. I helped our contractor in the basement, and schlepped the kids to summer sports, and not much else got done. It was a busy summer.

Today is our first day of school. So here's our "back to school" picture...

Yep, we were just getting ready to read our Bibles together. Angel is now in seventh grade, Princess is in fourth, and Kitty is in first. Today was a pretty light day as far as schoolwork was concerned; we had some errands to run in town.

But anyway, about summer... we got the bedrooms and bathroom done, and the man-cave is nearing completion.

Kitty's room

Princess's room

The girls' bathroom

Sorry, I don't have a good photo yet of Angel's room. I was all set to take one, and then we had a natural disaster. The basement flooded. Most of the water came in through Angel's window, and we had to empty her room and pull up her carpet. We got the carpet cleaned and put back down, but then it was time to head out of town for two weeks to visit my family in Kansas. Which was awesome. So anyway, don't let me forget to post a photo of her room soon.

I've continued (very slowly) to lose weight. Here I am wearing a knitted pencil skirt that I finished while in Kansas. It took me about two weeks to knit. I've already started another one...

I still have about 25 pounds to go to reach my goal weight. I'm planning on doing that before the end of the year. I want to start 2014 NOT thinking about my weight. 

So yeah... I'm hoping to find more time to blog now that summer is officially over. And more time to knit...

Cleaning and schoolwork and exercise, oh my!

I've been reorganizing(as mentioned yesterday).  My house has been effectively de-Christmas-ed.  All of the decorations are in the attic...oops, just remembered the third tree is still in the library.  I'll have to find the box and get that put away today.  I switched the placement of a few pictures on the walls, putting Hubby's military stuff like his Cadet sabre from West Point in the front room.  The sabre now hangs prominently over the bar, and the pretty lighthouse picture that had been there is now above the mantel in the family room, which makes a lot more sense, if you ask me.  My front room/bar room/dining room is nice and clean, for the most part.  I haven't checked it this morning to see if the girls have messed it up, so I could be wrong.  Haha.

The kids are doing schoolwork...Princess is doing handwriting, and Angel just finished hers.  Kitty is playing with her Leapster that Grandpa Claus gave her for Christmas, learning about shapes.  I'm doing laundry.  Fun fun.

I went to the gym and worked my legs, then did 20 minutes on the bike and 10 on the stair-stepper.  I'm planning on trying Zumba tomorrow!

Beginning of a new week.

It's a new week. I really enjoyed the worship service this morning. I love my church; we worship passionately, and the Word is preached without being watered down. Speaking of my church, my pastor's wife, Laura, had her cancer surgery last week, and from the reports we're getting, everything looks good. The tumor had shrunk dramatically before the surgery, and the doctors are confident that they got it all out. Laura should be out of the hospital in another day or two. You can read more about her journey at http://www.laurashooksblog.blogspot.com/

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We went to a church "splash party" this afternoon. It was a lot of fun....for the kids. Actually I had a pretty good time, too. But I don't think I need to go for a walk this evening, after chasing Dolly all around at church. She's pretty fast for a two-year-old. My legs are tired.

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After a major tinking experience last night, I have regained my momentum with Ichthus. I've finished the second skein, and I'm on the last row of fish before I start the edging. I'm not sure if It'll take one or two more skeins. I'm just glad it looks like I'll have some yarn left over; I want to make some socks with this yummy yarn.

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The kids are ready for more schoolwork tomorrow. Guess I need to get ready. Angel read "Swiss Family Robinson" today, in it's entirety. Yes, it was abridged, but even so, it's a fairly long book. I know she loves to read, but I was surprised with how quickly she finished it. Princess told me a few minutes ago, "I didn't do any schoolwork today!" She was very concerned about this oversight. I had to explain to her that we don't do schoolwork on Sundays. She showed me a little coloring book that Angel had drawn for her and she had colored. As I praised her coloring skills, she informed me that she had the "most fantastic" pictures. How many four-year-olds talk like that? It made me smile. And ask hubby to repeat what he had said earlier about our girls not going to "a real school". Our school is plenty real, thankyouverymuch! Time for me to sign off now; I need to go print some math worksheets for Angel to do tomorrow.

Sent in my pattern...

Last night I sent my pattern and what seemed like a gazillion attachments to Knitty. I submitted it for their winter issue, which goes live in December. I don't know if they'll tell me ahead of time whether they've accepted my pattern, but I do know they'll tell me if they reject it. If they reject it, I'll either publish it on my blog for a price(not really sure how that works, since I've only ever used free patterns myself), or I'll set it aside for an even bigger project... I want to write a book. I don't know anything about publishing, so I'll have to do some research on that subject. But that's my plan right now. I'll continue to post here about what I'm knitting, and offer simple patterns for free on my pattern blog. But the more involved patterns I intend to save for my book idea.

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In the meantime, here's a little hint about a new project I'm designing. I don't know yet how I'll offer this pattern; it's more difficult and fancy than the other ones I've written so far.

It's going to be a triangular shawl, with "fishes all over", as one of my girls said. I'm using a gorgeous, soft, wonderful bamboo/silk/cotton blend. It's fingering-weight, and navy blue. I had planned on using some more of my recycled cotton, but when I was looking for a needle I found this yarn, which I had forgotten I had. When I bought it on ebay, last year, I didn't pay close enough attention to the details; I thought it was worsted-weight. When it arrived, I was surprised, and a little unhappy with my purchase. At the time, I was still a beginning knitter, and had no idea what to do with fingering-weight yarn. So I put it in my stash, and searched half-heartedly through patterns to figure out what I could make with it. I started two projects with it, but quickly got tired of them both. Then I was struck with the inspiration earlier this week, to make a triangular prayer shawl. I haven't ever made a triangular shawl before, but I had done a swatch a few weeks ago to figure out the technique. So I took that basic shape and did some charting and some swatching, and what you see above is the result of that. The picture was actually taken a few days ago, so it's quite a bit bigger now. I'd say I'm maybe 1/5 of the way done with it. I'll likely finish around the time when I'll be needing a warmer shawl than this one. So I'll probably make another one in wool.

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We're nearing the end of our first official week of school, and it's been a pretty good week. Angel is doing some review-work in math until I get her new math book(which I still need to order), and is learning to write in cursive, and doing a vocabulary workbook. She is also knitting a scarf for Princess's birthday, and sewing Christmas gifts. And I plan on having her blog this afternoon, too. Princess is learning letters, and doing handwriting. She has a hard time sitting still for very long at a time, but when she does, her handwriting is excellent for a four-year-old. My plan is to have her reading independently by the end of the school-year. Dolly plays while we do schoolwork, and I think she enjoys having a little time by herself to play however she wants. When the girls all play together, the older ones pretty much control the game.

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Whew! I think that's everything...

Done!

Last night I finished "number 4". Hooray! I'm so happy, I decided to take a day off from knitting. My hands are tired. So this afternoon, I'm planning to work on Angel's second green nightgown. I cut it out several days ago, so now I just need to put it together.

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I intend to have Angel write in her blog this afternoon as well. It's part of her schoolwork for this year. Instead of keeping a paper journal, she's keeping a blog. It's helping her learn to use a computer, and she types more quickly (and legibly, of course) than she writes. If you're interested in reading her blog, the address is http://thirdgradeangel.blogspot.com