Wintertime

Whew! I was worried that winter wasn't going to show up. Luckily, it has been snowing almost all weekend. We have probably about 15 inches of new snow and it is BEAUTIFUL outside. I LOVE snow.

Sadly, the weekend is coming to an end. I loved having four wonderful days off. I didn't get as much done as I could have, but I had a lot of fun. I went shopping on Friday and got some neat stuff. Then I went skiing with Weston and Frito which was a lot of fun. I used muscles that I forgot I had and I'm still recovering. We also went tubing with my family Friday night. Saturday I hung out with Frito while Weston went ice climbing. I made a cute little bag. It is too small for my taste, but it can be easily resized. Today I pretty much just stayed home and relaxed. I made ice cream and muffins and cleaned the house.

Frito is loving the snow. He just sits outside and watches it fall. Walking him after it snows is a bit of a pain because he likes to smell every snowflake, so tomorrow morning I might have to run with him just to make it manageable. Hope everyone had a great long weekend!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Just wanted to stop in and wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving! I am very excited to have FOUR days off! I hope to maybe stamp some Christmas cards, sew a few bags, enjoy not going to work.....I will keep you updated on what I accomplish.

Purse!

Yesterday I decided that I was going to make myself a new purse. I had bought the fabric the other day at Quilt Tree and have been wanting to make this purse ever since I got Bend the Rules Sewing a month or so ago. I LOVE this book. The directions are easy to read and all of the project are the CUTEST. This bag was really easy to make, and it only took me two hours to make. There are a few things that I would change when I make another one (which will be soon because this bag is amazing). 1. I used batting instead of flannel for the facing fabric because it was what I had in my room. It made the bag seams a bit thick. I am going to go buy a bunch of cheap flannel to make more of the bags in the book. 2. The pocket on the inside isn't lined and is a bit too big for my taste. I plan on lining the pocket so you don't see any of the wrong sides of the fabric and making it a bit smaller. 3. I don't really like how I did the handles. I'm not very good at folding over fabrics and ironing them. I can never make them straight. So my plan is to cut different pieces and sew them into one handle and turn it inside out. That way I have a nice even, straight tube for the handle. Other than that, the bag is perfect. It looks so cute and professional...I'm a bit impressed with myself. :)

So if you don't have Amy Karol's book...go buy it right now. They have a copy at Quilt Tree, or you can get it on Amazon, or at Title Wave. Go now. You will love it and want to make everything. And the projects are so easy and quick you can make them for Christmas presents!

WOW. Big dog.

Obviously, the pictures from the earlier post are of Frito playing with his birthday toy. He loves playing with those squirrels. Too funny. The above pictures are of the knitting needles I was telling you about and the piece of art that I bought at the Make It Alaska Festival a while back. It was only $50 and I am in LOVE with it. It hangs in our living room/entry area and everyone always asks about it. Probably the best $50 I spent in a while.

Also, I just finished watching a movie called The King of Kong. It is about the world of competitive video gaming, specifically Donkey Kong. It was interesting and funny to watch. The whole time you kept thinking this HAD to be a mock-u-mentary. But it wasn't...this was for real. Very fun.


HA! I just changed my header to a funny picture of Frito. Didn't realize it was going to be GIANT. That just makes it funnier. In case you haven't figured it out yet, I'm obsessed with my dog....

Frito!

The Long List

1. New Knitting Needles
On Halloween Leah and I drove out to Eagle River to go to the Tangled Skein. I stopped myself from buying any yarn, but did leave with two new pairs of knitting needles to use for my socks. The are the TINEST circular needles I have ever seen. (I will post pictures tomorrow...) They are from the Shanghai Hiya Co. and they are called Hiya Hiya needles. I bought both a size 3 and 4 because I wasn't sure which size I used for my socks. Lucky for me, I was using 3's because those were the bamboo ones (the other ones are metal) and I pretty much only knit with wood needles. So the bamboo socks have been resurrected. I LOVE the new needles. They are super easy to work with and make knitting socks so much more portable! Having to carry and keep track of 4 DPN is a bit of a challenge for me unless I am in my house, so I was quite excited to take these to the movies yesterday and knit. Of course, Weston thought I was crazy and kept trying to convince me that I did not need to knit in the movie and it was rude. He lost and I did knit.

2. Wall-E
The aforementioned movie from yesterday was Wall-E. We finally got the chance to see the Pixar film last night at Bear's Tooth. It was very cute. I really enjoyed it and I can't wait to see the next Disney film, Bolt. That comes out on Friday and looks funny.

3. Frito's birthday
Yesterday was Frito's SECOND birthday! I can't believe he is already two. He had a great dog birthday which started out with a special dog pup-cake for breakfast. Then he got his presents...two squeaky dog balls (which he loves!) and a new toy called Hide-A-Squirrel. The HAS was a HUGE hit! It is a plush tree with holes in it where you hide squeaky squirrels. Then Frito is challenged to get the squirrels out so he can play with them. He wasn't too fond of it at first, but once we hid some treats in the tree and he realized what he was supposed to do he LOVED it. It is an inside toy (he has struggled with this, he loves to take his favorite toys outside) and he can't chew it up so we have to supervise him with it, but it is a hit! He is in love with it. Overall, probably his best birthday so far!

4. Rock Band 2
Everyone loves Rock Band. It is the best party game we have because even just watching it is a great bit of fun. We bought Rock Band 2 (just the game, since we already had all of the instruments) right after it came out. It doesn't have as many classic rock songs as the first one, but it is nice to have more songs to play. We made it into the Hall of Fame in both games already, so we just play for fun. Last weekend we were at Best Buy and came upon the Rock Band AISLE. Yes, there is a whole aisle of Best Buy dedicated to Rock Band. Gross. Anyway, we found something that we DESPERATELY need to complete our Rock Band experience. A smoke machine and strobe lights. That is right, a smoke machine and strobe light the hook into your X-Box and coordinate with the song you are playing. How could it get any more awesome. I really hope that we get it because I have dreams of amazing parties where we all dress up like real band people and play concerts in my living room. Crazy fun.

A quick list

Some things I want to get around to blogging about. Don't have time now, but hopefully tomorrow.
1. New knitting needles
2. Wall-E
3. Frito's birthday
4. Rock Band 2

See you soon.

Bananas, Pumpkins, and Pies...oh my!

I don't know if any of you have ever made a pumpkin pie from scratch (meaning from an ACTUAL pumpkin) but it is a PAIN. I made one last year because I was so excited about the pumpkin patch and the fact that I had just learned that I loved pumpkin bread. I thought, hmm...pumpkin bread...pumpkin pie....delicious. Well, it turns out that I HATE pumpkin pie. Unfortunately, since I had made one from scratch Weston was hooked. It was his favorite pie. Great. So this year I decided to do it again. I love my husband. So I got home late from work and started my pie adventure. About an hour and a half into it (yes, this is a long process) I discovered I didn't have all of the ingredients I needed. So it is all in the fridge waiting for me to finish it up tomorrow.

I was on a baking spree that couldn't be stopped...so I made some banana bread. I'm also not a huge fan of banana bread, but it is SUPER easy to make and smells pretty good.

Last night we went and played pub quiz at Humpy's. For those who don't know what pub quiz is, basically it is like playing Trival Pursuit at a bar with lots of fun prizes and delicious food (at least if it is at Humpy's!). It is best to have a very diverse crowd so that you have the best chances of getting the answers right. We did pretty well. We even won one round (out of seven) and won some t-shirts! I had a good time, minus the fact that we didn't get home until 11. I wish it started earlier, because I would probably go every week if it did. As it stands now, I probably won't frequent pub quiz as I like sleeping better than free t-shirts that are way too big for me!

I'm bad

At blogging...at keeping up with friends...basically at everything that isn't right in front of me while at school.

So sorry.

A few updates...Taylor Swift (one of my favorite new(er) artists) released her second CD today. Wonderful.

I had other things...but they have since been forgotten. I am really going to try to be better at blogging. Tomorrow.

Homemade Brownies

I came home craving brownies. Unfortunately, I come home like this a lot and there wasn't any brownie mix left in the cabinet. So I searched my many cookbooks and found a brownie recipe. I didn't have any unsweetened chocolate that the recipe called for, so I substituted handfuls of chocolate chips. And man, they are yummy. They are a bit different than normal brownies, but still delicious. I might post some pictures tomorrow.

Pictures Galore

Five yards of this fabric was turned into what felt like a billion blocks...

That look like these. And one day they will be turned into a quilt!

And here is my sweater that I have been diligently working on for a while now. It is coming along.

Trick or Treat...where are you?

Weston and I were SO excited about trick-or-treaters this year since it was our first Halloween in OUR house! We invited people over to help hand out candy, we had a plan to scare older kids...it was going to be great. For some reason, there weren't many trick-or-treaters out. We had less than twenty come to the door. :( It was very sad. We talked to other people in town and it seems that fewer and fewer kids are trick-or-treating. WHY? I don't get it. We live in a really populated residential neighborhood where there are a lot of kids...but they were all hiding in their warm homes. Lame. I did love that I had Friday off because of conferences. Three-day weekends KICK butt. I wish I had them every weekend. Well, I'm off to enjoy my Sunday.