Another Big Change

It's been a week since the last post, and a full week at that. Something super, super, super exciting happened on Thursday, which I will talk about more at the end of this post.
I worked a few days this week, and got some things done. I met up with Rick on Friday for lunch, and to buy his old external hard drive off of him. He loaded it up with all of Doctor Who, some workout videos and a whole bunch of movies. I was so happy for this, because now I have dozens of hours of things to watch while I knit! My blog feed is becoming stagnant again, so I am going to go through and eliminate a bunch, and find some new ones. If you have a blog you think I'd like, please share it!
After meeting up with Rick, I hung out with my friends Norma and Sarah, and their two dachshunds Pickles and Loki. We went to see Kick Ass 2, which was pretty good. I know I saw the first one, but I don't really remember it, so I have nothing to compare this one to. After the movie, we picked up a pizza and some cider and sat in the car by the river and watched the storm. An amazing Friday night, no doubt.
Saturday, I worked in the morning, which wasn't anything too exciting. Afterwards, I went home, tidied up my room and cleaned all the floors. I wasn't planning on going out, but then came across an event on Facebook where a friend, who is moving to the East Coast tomorrow, was playing a show at Phog with his band. I decided to go with my best friend, Cassia, and we had a great time. There was some drunken hilarity happening mostly involving others, that I got sucked into. I danced with many, many folks, and really enjoyed myself. It definitely beat the hell out of sitting around at home. Cassia and I ended up going back to my friends place with most of his band, and some other friends. I ended up crashing there after talking with everyone for what seemed like hours upon hours. Woke up Sunday afternoon, and went to the Tall Ships Festival at the Windsor riverfront. They played a second show there which was also very enjoyable. Went back to their place again afterwards, along with a whole crew of people. We ran to The Beer Store, which I conveniently remembered was open until 6, and made it there with minutes to spare. That was fun in itself. We drank our fill, listened to everyone (but myself) play wonderful music, and had a blast. I was up quite late again, and slept in today until eleven or so. Took an uneventful bus ride home, and that is where I am now.
Now, onto the exciting thing that happened Thursday. I mentioned it last week as something I knew I needed to do, and that would help light the fire under my ass.

I registered my business!!!!

I am no longer going to be known as Knit, Nicole, Knit! and instead will be Mercantile 519. This is something I have been wanting to do for a long time. I no longer just knit, and I wanted to change the name to reflect that. This name is something that can grow from being just me selling my handmade goods to selling stuff made by other artists and artisans in the 519 area code. I am happy to be from where I am from, and I knew the name had to reflect something to that effect. 519 is the area code for Southwestern Ontario, I have it tattooed on my left hand, and I just thought adding that would be perfect.

After my brother got home from work Thursday, I had him take a couple pictures of me holding my Master Business Licence. This is the best one. Seriously, every other one, my smile was so huge, I looked certifiably crazy.
I am so incredibly stoked, excited, ecstatic, nervous, happy, and every other emotion possible, about this whole situation. There are so many things I need to do, but they are coming together slowly, but surely. I have the Facebook page made, a Twitter account, an Instagram account that has not yet been updated, and I am working on building the site with Squarespace. Once I get some of that last one up and ready to go, I will have a mailing list so you can all join and find out when the launch will actually be. I will no longer be selling on Etsy for numerous reasons, but that's irrelevant right now.
This is such a huge step in my life, and I am so glad all of you are here cheering me on, sending me positive messages, leaving comments, and just generally being in my corner. These last few months, since I decided I was going to rebrand, up until now have been quite overwhelming and stressful. Getting a nice comment on something online brings me so much joy, and I am endlessly appreciative.
I hope you all continue to follow me throughout this journey. I will wrap up this already verbose post now before I start getting even more emotional.

Stash Down 2013: It's Not Over Yet

One of my goals for 2013 was the have a net change to my stash of -50 balls of yarn. If you've been following my Stash Down progress, you'll know that I acquired 150 balls of yarn a little while ago, and I was incredibly discouraged. Well, my knitting mojo is back in full force, and I've been knitting like crazy. Seriously, crazy amounts of knitting have been going on. Mom and I went grocery shopping last week, and I walked around behind her, knitting on a cloth. Between these six cloths, and a couple other partial cloths I have on the go, I've eliminated three balls of cotton. Sure, not a whole lot, but that's three less than I had before! Plus, it's yarn I no longer have a real need for, so I'm opening up a drawer in the storage area for yarn I really love. I've decided to leave dishcloth knitting to others so I can focus on things I truly enjoy making.
I calculated the other day that I need to eliminate 5.5 skeins of yarn a week until the end of the year, and not acquire any, in order to meet my goal. I'm intimidated, but I really believe I can do it. Summer is going to be difficult, but as soon as my hours at work drop down again, I'll be kicking ass and taking names.
What are you knitting on this week?

The Last Friday of the Month

This month is almost done, which is totally crazy to me. I know everyone always says how fast time is going, but seriously, where are the brakes?!
I've been pretty busy lately, knitting, hanging out with Rick, working, hanging out with my family and so much more.
Here is a "quick" recap. (I really hope it's quick, I have knitting to get done!)
I spent a few days out at Rick's earlier in the week. We baked and baked and baked together, which was a lot of fun. He has his project going on, which I can't share just yet, but I made some mediocre brownies. I used the recipe off the back of the cocoa powder. The pan made them pretty neat, but they weren't really that good. Nothing special about them. They weren't gooey and fudgey, which is how I like my brownies. Oh well, no big loss, the recipe only made these six brownies. I'll try a different recipe next time. If you have an awesome brownie recipe, let me know!
I went out with a friend to Second Cup after work a couple days ago. Second Cup is Canada's Starbucks, but I actually prefer it most of the time. I got an iced coffee, and he got a frozen hot chocolate. The coffee was a bad idea. I was laying awake in bed until like 3 am. I didn't feel tired at all. I don't think I'll be getting a large coffee at 9:30 at night again, any time soon. Unless the goal is to stay awake forever.
Anyway, my friend is moving to Sweden next weekend, for a two year teaching position. I'm going to miss him. I've known him since high school, and no matter how long we go without talking, we can catch right up whenever we get together.

Today, I was sitting in my room, knitting, and I heard someone knock on the door. My first thought was "Why don't people ring the door bell? It's so much more efficient" and then I finally got up and went to see who it was. The mailman was there, with a small padded envelope in his hand, and he said he was looking for Nicole. As soon as I saw the package, I knew what it was. I am so excited for this! I can't share it yet, because it's for the rebrand, but it's awesome.
I need to get back to my knitting! If I want to be down 50 skeins by the end of the year, I need to eliminate 5.5 skeins a week. That's a lot!
How was your week?

My Week In Instagrams: July 19, 2013

This week is almost done, and I can't wait for the weekend! I have a craft show tomorrow and Sunday at Walkerville Brewery, here in Windsor. It's the same venue as my most successful show ever, so I'm really looking forward to it.
Here is a peek at what I've been up to this week.

I spent a few days out at Ricks, and we went and sat in the car, by the water, eating our chilli cheese dogs. It was raining, but it wasn't as oppressively hot as it has been lately. Seriously, Windsor-Essex County is having some strange weather. If it's not 95 F +, it's storming. I love the storms, the heat, I could do without. I can't wait for summer to be over! Bring on the chilly fall and winter weather! I don't know if I prefer winter more because it's cold, or because I can wear jeans, sweaters and scarves.

I picked up a four pack of Jones Soda when I was out at Ricks. I love this stuff. This was the first fortune that was under my cap. I posted it on Facebook and Instagram, asking if anyone would be interested in being a pen pal. I got a couple takers, and I'm looking forward to writing to them. I'm hoping to pick up some decent paper today when I am out and about with my mom. I don't want to be lame and boring and just write on plain lined paper. That's no fun.
If you would like to be my penpal, send me your mailing address to nicoleATknitnicoleknitDOTcom I'm hoping to have like ten pen pals or so, and I'm about halfway there. I'm excited. I had a pen pal in grade school, and it was so much fun writing to her.

And now for the knitting content! I've been working with a lot of thinner yarns lately, and I'm really enjoying it. I haven't posted much on the blog, but there has been knitting happening. I cast on for a Terribly Simple shawl, and it's a lot of fun. Miles of garter stitch, turning into a gentle crescent shape. It's super fun. I'm thinking of modifying the pattern a wee bit, and adding a ruffle at the end. Nothing too crazy, just enough to have a little texture. We'll see how much yarn I have when it comes time. But I'm not opposed to striping in another colour.
This is Knit Picks Shadow Lace Tonal in Summer Blooms. I got it a while back, and caked it up after I got my ball winder and swift, and just haven't found something I want to knit with it. I think this pattern will be just the right fit.
What have all of you been up to?

Monday Knitting Update: July 8, 2013

FINALLY! My mojo has returned! I've been knitting like crazy these last few days! I know it's partly due to StashDash2013, but I'll take what I can get! Here is a little peek at what I've made lately.

I've been working on a bunch of little yarn flowers. These have been turned into brooches for my summer shows. The grey in this picture is one of the tiny left over balls I had of the sparkly yarn I used for some head bands and what not a little while back. I'm so happy I got a ball finished, no matter how small it was! I have 20 or so flowers made now, which I think is a good number. I'll still try to get more done, though. I think they're super cute. I have one pinned to my purse and it just makes me happy looking at it.

This is a Wool Ease Thick and Quick scarf. Just a simple seed stitch, which is my favourite stitch for this yarn. most of the stuff I've made out of it, is in seed stitch. This also eliminated a ball of yarn. And being that its a large, bulky yarn, it's a pretty big ball that was used up. If I can get one of my large storage bins emptied, I will be more than happy. I have five bins in my storage unit, so I could bring one home if that's the case. Slowly but surely, I'm eliminating the stash that isn't ideal, and I will replace it with yarns that I love.

Here is the third ball I eliminated this week. This was an even larger ball. Not as bulky as the Wool ease, but definitely a bigger ball. I think it was almost 250 yards! It's a random wool blend I acquired at some point in my knitting career, and I think it looks awesome done diagonally like this. I think I'll be doing more scarves like this in the future. I have one more on the needles, and I'll probably start another one soon. It's still miles of garter stitch, but somehow seems more interesting. This is ball number three that's been used up this week. I'm on a roll!

Now ball number four. Another bulky, wool blend yarn. Patons Echoes Shetland Tweed, a discontinued yarn. It's a light, warm grey with flecks of red, yellow, blue and green. Really neat looking! It's a simple garter stitch scarf. I was going to do seed stitch, but I knit two rows plain before I thought about it. Oh well, I think it looks awesome anyway.

This is all I've knit since the last time I checked in. Not bad progress, I think. You can check my StashDash2013 progress on my post, here. Overall, this is four balls gone, bringing my total to +73.

My Week In Instagrams: July 5, 2013

Still trying to get back into the swing of things, and one of these Instagram Friday posts is definitely going to help. This week hasn't been too exciting, but I've gotten a lot of knitting done. This is a little peek at my week.

Rick came to pick me up last weekend and brought me to his place so I could go to work. It was super stormy off and on, and this was taken during a break in the down pour.

I won't be spending any more weekends in the county, at least not for a while. I finally got transferred to the store close to my parents, and I'm working a whole bunch. There is a second store a couple kilometres up the road that I have also picked up some shifts at. I was initially scheduled 16 hours next week, and with shifts from the second store, I am up to 32 hours. I'll gladly take that!

I've been earring factory-ing a little bit this week. I have a whole bunch of thingamajigs to make into earrings. These ones were made on Canada day, and I was feeling patriotic.

I am going to hold off on releasing most of my new earrings until I rebrand. Some of them will be ready for the Luv Local show in a couple weeks, but not all of them. I really need to get some yarny things ready for that show. Having loads of earrings is great, but I want something that will fill my space a little more. We'll see what I come up with.

My dad and brother were gone out of town for work this week, so it was just mom and I at home. This meant we got to have a little fun with dinner. We went for Chinese at my mom's favourite place. Chicken Soo Guy, shrimp with mixed vegetables, chicken fried rice, egg rolls, shrimp rolls (which were delicious), won ton soup, and of course, fortune cookies. It was nice getting to hang out with just her for a bit.

They're going away again next week to finish the job, so we'll probably be getting Chinese again! I can't wait.

Here is the completed Mosaic scarf! I am so happy with it. You might remember it from a couple days ago. I finished the skein off, and ended with a pretty nice looking scarf, if I say so myself. It's all in the yarn and the pattern I used. I just did knit stitch after knit stitch and let the fabric do the talking. I love it! This means I knocked another skein off for my Stash Down, and 209 yards towards StashDash2013 with TheKnitGirllls. I am going to start the second ball of this yarn soon! I'm working on a couple other projects right now, but I'll be getting my butt in gear for that. It's super easy, and so pretty!

I also finished a blanket I started a couple months back. I also finished a WET&Q scarf that finished up a skein. I'll have photos of that later on. Three balls of Wool Ease Thick and Quick gone makes for a pretty big dent in the space my stash takes. I have a drawer in my storage area that is now almost empty.

That's 4 balls down, for a total of +77. I'm making it, slowly but surely. I just need to start working with the smaller partial balls, and I'll definitely get there! Having two stash elimination goals going at the same time is really motivating me to knit more. I'm trying to end this blog post soon, just so I can get back to knitting!

I've mentioned it before, but I'm in the process of rebranding. I won't be Knit, Nicole, Knit! anymore. This has been a great journey, but I'm ready for something else. I'm using SquareSpace to build my new site, and it's a lot of fun. It has everything that I need. I can't wait to share the finished product with all of you. It's coming along quite nicely. It is a paid service, so I am using a temporary free account, which means I'll have to redo everything I've done so far, but that is alright with me. More practice means I'll be more likely to have it perfect. I can't wait to share it with all of you! I'm shooting for October to be fully functional, or maybe even late September. We'll see!
What are all of you up to these days?

Starting Over

Lately, I've been feeling pretty apathetic in regards to just about everything in my life. I'm using today, July first to start over. I'm going to start counting calories and working out, blogging regularly, updating my YarnYarnYarnYarn tumblr, taking regular Instagram photos for a 365 type project, and knitting more frequently.
I haven't been feeling myself lately, and I think adding all these things back into my life will help me get back to what is "normal" for me.
I'm slowly but surely working on my rebrand. I have a friend who is working on the graphic stuff, and I'm working on getting familiar with the new site I will be using to host my shop. No more Etsy for me!
Here is a little peek at what I've been up to lately.

I've been trying to find fun, new, summer friendly projects for my warm weather shows. These tiny flowers are one of them. I'm going to turn them into brooches. I've made a dozen or so, and I want to double that number before my next show. They hardly use any yarn, are quick and easy, and I think they're pretty darn cute, to boot. I still have to put all the pins on them, but that shouldn't take too long. I'm also thinking about turning some into hair pins, so we'll see about that! I've also been looking around on Ravelry for some summer knits, and I've found a few more things I might add to my arsenal.

These tiny pink pearl earrings are going to be gifts with purchases of $15/$20 or more (not sure of the actual minimum just yet). I like having a bonus for my customers, and I think these are going to go over really well. I've already gotten some good feedback about them. Up until now, I was just having people pick a pair of earrings for their free gift, but I've had some complain that they can't get a three pack, or one of the more expensive pairs. I try to calmly explain to them that it's a free gift, and I am doing this as a bonus to them. I don't want to lose money at the end of the day by giving out free gifts.

I always get this genius idea of growing my hair long, and I usually end up hating it. This most recent time, I was considering getting a perm because my hair is naturally so straight. A couple weeks ago, I decided to chop my hair off. I am loving it! I style it a bit differently than this photo shows, but regardless, it's so nice to have all the hair gone. I am probably going to dye it in the near future, but that is all pending on how I feel, and whether or not I have the spare cash. I'm in a cycle of perpetual broke-ness, and I'm trying hard to get out.

Now for the not fun thing that has happened lately. I got new work shoes a little bit ago, and I loved them dearly. Needed to wear steel toe shoes means I get stuck with ugly footwear most of the time. These were actually pretty nice. Sadly, they hated me. I got a blister on my achilles. It got all icky, and the ickiness spread to the rest of my foot/ankle. I couldn't put any weight on it, and used crutches for a couple days. I went to the clinic, and the doctor put me on some crazy antibiotics four times a day, that stink to high heaven. The pain started going away after a few days. It's still slightly swollen and a little tender, but hugely improved from what it was. I'm returning the shoes this week. Which sucks, because I really did like them.

What have you all been up to?

Knitting Monday: May 6, 2013

The weekend is over, and to be honest, I couldn't be happier. It hasn't been a fun one, at all.
Friday afternoon, I went to Kingsville High School to set up for the craft show this weekend. I was the first one there, and picked an excellent spot near the entrance. I set just about everything up, and was very happy with how it was laid out. I came back Saturday morning, and I wasn't the closest to the door anymore. A woman set up next to me, and had her stuff squished up against my racks of scarves. It ticked me off, but I tried to let it roll off my back.

That wasn't even the crappiest part about the show. I try not to complain about shows too much, but this needs to be said.
If someone signs up for a show, and commits to doing it, and then doesn't show up without as much as a phone call or email, it is a terrible, horrible thing to do. Especially when all the money raised from the table fees goes to helping students with special needs.
There were supposed to be roughly 50 vendors, and only 25 showed up. I wish I had the list of them with me so I could call each of them out individually. I couldn't believe it Saturday morning when the gym was still only half filled. It was upsetting to say the least.
On top of that, traffic was low, so I only sold two things. Overall, just a cruddy weekend.
A couple things made it a bit better though. I won a giveaway done by Babydoo Dolls, and Jennie, the creator of Babydoo won a giveaway I did on my Facebook page! I laughed when I saw her number come up on the random number generator.
Also, I'll be doing another giveaway for some wooden buttons right here, on the blog, tomorrow! Keep an eye out!
Over the weekend, I managed to eliminate one skein of yarn from the stash. I knit quite a bit, but no finished skeins. This brings me to -16. I might be acquiring some yarn next weekend, so make sure you check back in next Monday to see where I stand.
How was your weekend?

My Week In Instagrams: May 3, 2013

Happy Friday! Today is already shaping up to be a fun one. I took Winston for a walk to the post office to pick up a parcel (more on that later) and it's set up day for this weekend's craft show! I'm so excited.
This is a peek at what I've been up to this past week.
I started reading UnEnchanted by Chanda Hahn on my iPad this week. Finished that up in sort order, and bought the second book in the series, Fairest, and ploughed through that as well. Simply amazing. If you have an iPad or e-reader, you need to get them! The first one is free, and the second is just $3.99. She's working on the third book now.
I took Winston for a nice walk down the trail that runs along the back of where we live. There are big rocks marking the end of the actual trail and I had Winston jump up on them so I could get a picture of him. I was hoping to get one of him looking at the camera, but he was too busy looking around and smelling all the things. He's been really good the past few days, I'm sure partially due to the walks and extra exercise he's been getting.
We've been taking him into the front yard for him to run around in the longer grass and see different sights. He loves long grass, especially being able to roll in it. I have a video of him rolling around in the grass that I find absolutely hilarious. When we first got him, almost 3 years ago, he would roll in the grass a little bit, but then his face would swell up, so we stopped that, assuming he had a grass allergy. He seems to have grown out of that, which is good. We have to bring him to the vet on Monday though, unrelated to all this grass rolling. He has a lump in his neck that we're a little nervous about. It could be anything, and we're hoping it's nothing severe. It seems to have shrunk a little, which we're assuming is a good thing.
Wednesday, we went for a nice drive up to St Thomas for something to do. With the new car, we made it there and back on a tank, which costs us between $20 and $25 to fill. Pretty darn good I'd say!
It's a convertible, so we made sure to slather on the sunblock before heading out. I'm half Irish, and I burn faster than toast. Rick is pretty fair skinned as well, so he was pretty well covered.
Generally, when we head out for drives, we like to go along lake Erie for as long as possible. This takes us to Blenheim, where Delhaven Orchards is. We stopped here a couple years ago and got some of the tastiest apples I've ever eaten. And I'm not a big apple eater, so that's saying something. We stopped again this time, and got a small mixed bag of Granny Smith, Red Delicious, and a couple others which are slipping my mind at the moment. We picked up a little paring knife to cut them up and eat them in the car. So delicious! I had two of them with some brie last night, which was absolutely wonderful. We also got some sweet potatoes that are gigantic. Not sure what's going to be made out of them yet, but they're sure to be delicious as well.
We decided to stop in St Thomas and have a look around. There is a brewery there that makes a beer I really enjoy, so we went on a quest to find it. Railway City Brewing makes Dead Elephant IPA. I love IPAs (India Pale Ale for those who don't drink) and this is definitely a good one. I initially got it because of the the name, but kept getting it because it's that good. The brewery was closed, but now that we know where it is, next time we go, we can make a stop. Rick unfortunately isn't a beer drinker, so I'm not sure he'd like to go on the tour.
Yesterday, we went up to Windsor for the afternoon. We had some things that needed to get done, like doctors appointments and returning some things to Costco. We went for all you can eat sushi at TenkO, which is our favourite place. The food was excellent as usual, but the service was pretty much nonexistent. I couldn't get my fried banana for dessert which kind of bummed me out. Oh well, next time I'll just have to get two! And next time probably won't happen for a while. My restaurant spending has been crazily over budget the past little while, and I need to reel that spending in.
This brings us to today. The weather has been a little up and down lately, but today has been absolutely amazing. I took Winston for a walk to the post office, hoping our PO box would be stuffed with some Etsy goodies I ordered a few days ago. I was right! I practically jogged home, I was so excited. In the package were three packs of tree branch buttons from Pymatuning Crafts, on Etsy. Clockwise from the top are No Bark, No Bite Apple Wood, Cherry Wood and Yew. All prettier than the last. I am so excited to use these on my baby props! I have a few things in mind that I want to whip up, and these will get sewn on there as soon as the knitting is finished.
If you like these buttons, keep an eye out next week, because I'm going to be doing a giveaway!
Tonight is the set up for the KDHS craft show I'm taking part in. If you're in the area, you need to check it out! 9-5 on Saturday, and 9-4 on Sunday.
Check out my Facebook page for an earring giveaway!
How has your week been?

Monday Knitting Update: April 29. 2013

This month has flown by! I can't believe May starts in just a couple days! This whole year is just zipping by, to tell you the truth.
I've been knitting this week, but neglected to take pictures of most of it. I made a few things for the RTS sales I will be taking part in, which I will be photographing tomorrow or Wednesday, depending on the weather.

I had quite a bit of yarn leftover after the grey and pink blanket, so I decided to do a stocking cap. I couldn't find a pattern that I liked, so I just winged it. It's done on US 10.5 (6.5mm) and I magic looped. I think it's absolutely adorable, and I'm making one in blue and grey as well. I hope to get that one done tonight so I can photograph the two of them together. I have a lot of ideas for the RTS items, it's just a matter of getting them knit. I still need to share all the RTS items I've already photographed on here for all of you to see! I'll be doing that soon!

The second project has been a striped Wool Ease Thick and Quick blanket. This one will be going to Trinkets and Treasures. I want to get a few more made and brought there. Mel has a few pastel blankets, and wants so variety. I think greys are a nice change from that. Once I get a few of them sold, I'll be picking up some more yarn so I can make more. I don't want to invest too much into this before I know if anything will actually sell!
This week, I finished off three skeins of yarn. Not a huge amount of progress, considering they were all pretty small to begin with, but I'll take what I can get. This brings me to -14. I'm starting to make progress again!
Now, it's time for me to get reading my book. I downloaded a bunch of books on my iPad and I'm loving reading on there.
I hope you all have a wonderful day!

Monday Update: April 8, 2013

It's Monday, and I'm a bit of a grump today. I don't really know why, all I know is that I didn't sleep well. Combine that with other silly things, like the internet not cooperating, and that means I'm in a bad mood. I'll make this a quick one, and hopefully go take a nap or something and get happier.

This week, I've been working on a whole lot of brand new things. The first two are part of a set. I'm still working on the smaller black thing. It's been set aside, because working with double points can frustrate me sometimes. Case in point, this particular item that I am knitting was ripped out because it was gigantic. I cast on a swatch of sorts, but knit flat on the same needles. When I did it in the round, I cast on less stitches than the swatch told me to do, and it still ended up huge. Frogged, cast on even less stitches, and it's a lot better. I can't wait to have it finished, photographed, and shared with all of you!
Like I said, this second photo goes with the first. It's out of completely different yarn, but they compliment each other pretty nicely. They're both vintage yarn I got from the woman last year.  I used three balls of yarn on the larger, multi coloured piece. I think the smaller one will use a whole ball, but I'm not entirely sure. I'm really bad a guessing yardage. I can see a small ball of yarn left, and think I can only do another row or two. Then, six rows later, I'm actually almost out. It's a little annoying to say the least.

This third photo is actually of a couple things. But, I'm keeping it all hush hush until I have it ready to sell. I don't want to ruin the surprise! It used three balls of yarn.
I knit another pair of things that used another ball of purple Homespun. That means six balls of yarn eliminated this week! This brings me to -19 for this year. That actually puts me ahead of schedule. I was figuring one ball eliminated per week, on average. We're less than 14 weeks into the new year, so I can breathe a little bit!
Anyway, I'm off to workout or otherwise get away from the computer. I don't know what is wrong, but it's more than frustrating right now. I hope your day is going better than mine!

My Week In Instagrams: April 5, 2013

This past week has been a busy one. I worked quite a bit, we had Easter Weekend, and other fun things have happened.

The first three photos are from Good Friday. Winston doesn't like other people, but likes to see what's going on, so we put him in the office with a glass door, just off of the kitchen area. He's pretty content in there, and it keeps him from getting too stressed out. I wish he was better around other people, but it's not entirely his fault. Some people do bother him, and that upsets him. 

Rick's mom goes all out for holiday dinners. We had king crab legs, calamari, a shrimp ring, and baked salmon, as well as a whole bunch of fantastic sides. The crab legs were my favourite, as usual. I had quite a few of them. After the meal, Cindy and I cracked the rest of them, pulled out the meat, and bagged it up for later. Yesterday, Rick made a delicious Asian-inspired crab meat, avocado and cucumber salad, with mayo and wasabi. It was absolutely wonderful. I'm so lucky that he creates such amazing food. 

With the meal, I decided to treat myself to a beer. I am trying to lose weight, so despite having a metric crap tonne of beer in my fridge, I don't have it very often. I looked through my collection of random beers, and the only one I knew would go well with fish was a Corona. I don't normally choose imports, but I knew this would be a good pairing. And I was right. I only have one bottle of the stuff left, and it will probably be sitting in my fridge for quite some time. Maybe I'll just have to give it to someone who would enjoy it more than I would. There's nothing wrong with drinking Corona, it just isn't really for me.

Saturday, I was back to work. I packed up some yummy fruit left over from the night before, and munched on that for lunch. I love pineapple and melon, and they were pretty darn good, considering they weren't in season. The watermelon that was in the fruit tray, was not so delicious. Which is why you don't see any in my little bowl. I'm trying to eat healthier, and this was a good start. It beats the heck out of a bagel or donut from Tim Hortons which is often a snack for me while I'm at work. I'm making little steps towards the weight loss/healthy eating thing. I know if I try to change too much all at once, it will backfire. 

Easter Sunday, Rick and I joined my moms side of the family at my Uncle's house not far from where we are. This is a get together that is repeated for more or less every holiday. We have a big family, so these events are usually pretty fun. My Uncle and Aunt from Ottawa come down with their three kids, and their hilariously awesome goldendoodle, Molly. That's the cartoon-looking pup in this photo. One of my littlest cousins, and my brothers girlfriend had to hold her steady so I could get a decent picture of her.

I've started drinking tea more regularly again. With there being a Tim Hortons right across the street from work, it's pretty easy to do so. I prefer Earl Grey, but I won't turn down just about any kind. We still have a pretty large loose leaf tea collection at home, but I'm lazy, and hate cleaning out the infuser after making it. I might just go out and buy a big ass box of green tea bags and do that every day. This is another small step towards healthy living. I need to get soda out of my diet and replace it with healthier alternatives.

I saved the best for last in this post. This is a picture of a car dashboard. A bad picture, but a picture nonetheless. This car dashboard is in our driveway. I was sitting in the passenger seat of this car. Rick was in the driver seat. It's a silver 2005 SmartCar. Diesel, 52 000kms, convertible, awesome. It's not ours though. But we will be using it regularly. We went to Windsor the night we got it, and drove all over the place. Then back and forth to work for me, and a few other trips in town, and we still have more than half a tank of gas left. With our old car, we would have had to put $30+ in the tank. I think I love this car.

I've been knitting quite a bit these last couple days. I'll update about that on Monday. I'm hoping to get some pictures taken with a real camera before then, but we'll see!

Some Stash Down Progress!

Normally, I don't post on the weekend, but I just had to tell you guys about my stash down progress. As you may know, I'm working on eliminating at least 50 skeins of yarn from my stash this year. It's not a super hard goal to reach, but I acquired over 40 skeins of yarn from various sources, so that put me way behind. I finally made some headway this week.

I went through just one small area of my stash where I normally keep the yarn for charity projects. I just haven't had the time to do as much charity knitting as I used to, and I felt bad. My mom started knitting hats for LeeLee Hats recently, and has a very, very small stash (seriously, it's like half a drawer in her dresser) I wanted to help her out. I gave her TWENTY skeins of yarn! They filled a reusable grocery bag to the brim, and were super packed in there. She seemed to be very happy with her spoils. There's a little bit of everything in there. Some sparkly eyelash stuff, bulky, worsted, baby yarns and much more. Twenty skeins left the stash which made me very happy. Plus, the yarn is going to help out some deserving babies, which is an extra dose of happy. I'm going to be giving her some more looming lessons in the near future. I want her to be able to do stripes.

I also knit up some stash. I used two teensy balls of yarn for more bows. The blue is dish cloth cotton, and the grey is some random worsted acrylic. This makes a total of 22 skeins eliminated from the stash. And I'm still knitting lots, so I'm sure I'll get more out of here soon. Overall, this brings my count to minus 13. Only 37 more skeins to go! 

My Week In Instagrams: March 29, 2013

It's Friday! I have the day off for the holiday, so I took advantage and got some Etsy work done. More about that later on in the post. This is what I've been up to this week!
Rick is an awesome cook. This week he made bacon wrapped filet mignon, over caramelized onions, a fried egg and toast. Super tasty, and a wonderful breakfast. I'm so spoiled with how well he cooks for us.
Winston has been really good this week. He has days where he is a total grumpy pants, and hates everyone, but we haven't experienced that for a few days. He's so cute when he sleeps, I can't help but take pictures of him doing it. Seriously, I looked through some folders on my computer today, and found a few dozen snaps of him snoozing. Somehow, yesterday, he cut open his paw pad on one foot. It looks pretty gruesome but it doesn't seem to be bothering him. I'm hoping it heals up soon.
I often get cravings for very specific foods. The other day, I really wanted a single Reese Peanut Butter Cup. Just one. So Rick and I went to the convenience store and picked up a couple packages of them. They were buy one get one free, so there was no way I was turning that down.  We got a couple other little bits and bobs, and came home. We watched The Following, and Bates Motel while munching on our spoils. I'm really enjoying both of those shows. Have you watched either of them? What do you think?
Thursday was Winston's third birthday! We got him a cheeseburger like we've done for the last two years. He did really well wearing the crown before we gave him the burger. This year was a Whopper from Burger King. He loves his burgers! He's so funny when he eats things that aren't dog food. He sniffs and sniffs before he'll eat it. Rick is in the process of putting together Winston's burger eating video. We record him eating his burger every year, and Rick puts together a short video. The ones from the last two years have been hits. I can't wait to see what music he picks this time.
I got an order for some hair bows from a friend of mine. She's the one that got the pink head band with the white flower. She also picked up a hair bow when she came to the craft show, and now a bunch of her friends and coworkers want some. I had some very specific colour requests, so I had to dig stuff out of some of my bins. Some people have been asking how much yarn I have. These four bins are less than half of what I have. I have four more of them, filled to the brim, as well as the drawers you can kind of see behind the bin, on the right. There are three sets of those too. And those bags in from of the drawers are filled with knitting/other crafting supplies. I'm sure you can understand why I'm doing a stash down this year! I'll update you on my progress in that department on Monday.
Like I said earlier, I have today off work. I took some pictures of the rings I've been making lately, with my iPad, and got a few listed in the shop. It's really nice being able to take and edit pictures without having drag out the camera and tripod. Much more convenient for small things. I will be adding more earrings at some point in the next couple weeks, and take the photos in the same way.
What have you all been up to this week? Do you have any exciting plans for the weekend? I'm going to be working Saturday, and visiting family on Sunday. Not a bad weekend, I'd say.

Monday Update: March 25, 2013

Well the weekend is over, and it's almost Easter. That means lots of candy, good food and a few extra days off work for me.
This weekend, I had a craft show at Essex High School that went alright. I didn't sell a whole heck of a lot, but I had fun. I was set up near some of my best craft show friends, which made the day that much more fun. I met some awesome new people at this show as well, ones I will be happy to see at future shows. I also got some ideas from other vendors and customers for some new thing to add to my line. I have one idea that I think is going to be a great one, I just need to get the supplies necessary for it. And the tools. It's a little outside what I normally make, but I think it's pretty awesome, if I do say so myself.

Now, onto what I've been knitting this week!
You saw this first picture of the giant knitting on Friday, so not much needs to be said. The last picture is the pile of yarn I had after I ripped it. I have about a foot done in garter now, but I haven't really touched it in a little while. It's a bit of a work out to use these gigantic needles.
The other two photos show some of the soon to be bows I've made the last little while. I used up five teensy balls of yarn on the bows in the first picture. I'm counting that towards my stash down. So that brings me to +9 this year. I'm slowly but surely making progress. I'm going to box up a bunch of yarn to hopefully sell, or at the very least donate. That will definitely make a visible dent. Crossing my fingers that I will actually be able to part with some stuff. The second bow photo is actually a pile of dark purple bows. I'm trying to get a good variety in the colours, so I don't want to do too many of any one particular yarn.
Now I end with a question: For your metal jewelry, do you prefer silver, gold or another colour (gunmetal black/grey) Please let me know!

Monday Update: March 4, 2013

Just a quick hello this evening! I had a busy weekend, and I am still decompressing from all the excitement. I'll tell you all about my craft show later on this week.
The most exciting thing that happened recently is meeting my niece. Christine had little Lucy almost 2 weeks ago. My Mom and I went to visit this morning before heading to bring me back home. I gave them the blanket I'd been knitting, that you all have seen peeks of over the last couple months. They both loved it. Lucy was a little fussy when Christine first handed her to me, which pretty much caused me to panic. I'm not good with kids. I rocked her a little bit and she settled right in. I like her a whole heck of a lot, and she seemed pretty content with me. This doesn't mean I'm having kids, for all of you that are going to suggest it.

My Week in Instagrams: Friday March 1st, 2013

Everyone is probably saying it, but holy crap, when did March get here? This week has been a fun one. I have it off work, so I've been quite productive. You can see that from the picture overload. I'm going to try to keep this one from getting too long.

Rick reheated some of the lamb stew for us. He threw and egg and some tomatoes in there, as well. WE stirred a little sour cream in there, and it made it even better.
This is Rick's mom's cat, Jazz. He likes me a lot. I don't mind him. Winston loves playing with him, they're pretty funny together.
I knit a head band for myself out of some sparkly yarn. I also have boot cuffs to match. I'm going to wear those this weekend.
I made and packaged quite a few earrings this week. I haven't done any four packs, as far as I can remember, but I loved the colour gradient I got form these pinks.
I bought a pack of lamb shoulder chops when we got groceries recently. Rick cooked us up a couple. It's been pointed out that these look like two horse heads facing each other. Now that it's been said, I can't un-see them.
With the lamb, we also had potatoes, cabbage and onions. The chops are under all that good stuff.
I bought some fun socks a while back. I really liked these orange and pink ones. Nice and bright!
When Rick brought me into Windsor on Wednesday, we went for all you can eat sushi. We got hand rolls and they were pretty good. I had a hell of a time ripping through the nori at first, but after I got past that, I was golden.
After sushi and some other errands, we went to see Warm Bodies. I really enjoyed it. I didn't know it was an adaptation of Romeo and Juliet, but now that I've read it in some articles online, it totally makes sense!
When I got to my parents, my dad gave me the rack he built for my earrings. The cord in the centre is in the process of being replaced with some thin wire. The clips I have to put the earrings on there are super tiny.
My parents have a panini press, and I made peanut butter and banana sandwiches for my Mom and I yesterday.
Mom took me to Wendy's after going shopping. After Wendy's, I visited my friend Lauren of Whimsical Warmth. We got crafty and played with her dogs. It was lots of fun.
When I got home from Lauren's, I watched The Knit Girllls and worked on head bands. I forgot to take photos of those, but I made two out of the mustard yarn. That eliminated one skein!
Dad and I went grocery shopping in Michigan today. One of the major perks of living in a border city. I ended up picking up a 6 pack of another flavour of Shocktop: Honey Crisp Apple. We went to a liquor and craft beer store, and I knew I'd find something I'd like. I can't wait to try it!

Now, onto the stash down! My mom bought me three skeins of sequin yarn from Zellers. The price was great, and I'd had my eye on them for a while. I got one in silver, and two in light blue. These will be turned into boot cuffs and a head band. Hopefully each skein is enough for a full set! I also bought two skeins of sparkle yarn when I went to Joanns today. These were a bit of an impulse purchase. When I got up to pay, I found out they were on a ridiculous sale. I paid about half of what I was expecting. If I wasn't on the "stash diet" I probably would have run back and picked up some more.
This puts me up five skeins. BUT! I knit one into the head bands. AND I gave two to my mom to make  into LeeLee Hats. AND I'm giving six more skeins, and fairly large ones at that, to Mel of Trinkets and Treasures for some of her crafty goodness. It's all yarn that, although I do like, I will likely never get around to using. This means I am at minus 4 for the week! This brings me to +19 overall. I hope to make some progress on this very soon. I'm knitting as fast as I can.

How are all of you fine folks doing? What's the weather like where you are?

Wednesday's Are For Gratitude: February 27, 2013

Halfway through the week, and I can't wait for the weekend. I have a craft show Saturday and Sunday, and I am really excited for it.
Every week, I post about what I am grateful for. It's a nice way to look back, and see that my week wasn't all crappy, even if it may feel that way. (This week wasn't crappy, but some are)
Here goes!
Richard  / Winston  /  My family (which I will be spending the weekend with!!!)  /  My yarn stash  /  New yarn (more on this in a minute)  /  New blog followers (Welcome!)  /  My internet friends  /  My real life friends
Now, for the new yarn. I got two wonderful packages in the mail this week. I knew they were coming, and I was really antsy for them. Melina, of Midwest Yarn sent me two skeins of Homespun in a pretty lavender colour. They're not the same dyelot. I didn't think it would be that noticeable, but you can totally tell! Usually the yarn I get is the same dyelot, so I've never really noticed how different it could be. No worries though, because my projects use less than one skein each for the most part.




The second package is from Lori at Evermore Studios. You remember her from the giveaway I did recently. I got this gorgeous pack of mini skeins. I LOVE them! This adds ten skeins to my stash down. So with the Homespun, I'm up 12 skeins just this week. This brings me to +23 for this year. I'm determined to get down in the negatives soon! I have a problem where I get bored of the yarn before I'm done the project. So, as soon as the project is finished, I'm done with the yarn and I don't want to make something else out of it. I'm bringing a limited selection of yarn with me this weekend, so I'll be forced to use it all up. Crossing my fingers that I can make some progress!

I have to cut this one short, because Rick is taking me to Windsor today. I hope your week is going well!

Monday Update: February 25, 2013

Only 10 months till Christmas! Sorry, I had to. This week, I've been pretty productive as far as knitting goes. I already shared a few of the items I've made, but I've done several more.
I've been knitting away on head band/ear warmers/whatever you want to call them. They're super simple, and I've been using up scraps with them.

The first photo is of a really pretty grey one I'm considering keeping for myself. It's Wool Ease T&Q, and super cozy. It finished off a small ball I had floating around in my stash.
The blue one in the second photo is a custom order. It's pretty much the one that started this whole thing. A lovely lady that's bought some items from me at other shows emailed me and asked if I knit tis style of head band, and I said I was working on some for next year, but I'd do one for her if she'd like. She enthusiastically said yes, and that got the ball rolling. The burgundy looking one at the bottom is actually the Fig colourway of T&Q, and left overs from the neck warmer I did recently. Another ball of yarn eliminated!
Finally, the pretty orange one. I have loads of this colour of yarn, so I'll probably be making more of the same.
Overall, I'm down another two balls of yarn, which brings me to +11. I'm getting there. I'll be bringing lots of little odds and ends to my parents this week, and hopefully get a bunch of it used up.
How was your weekend?

Fat Tuesday and Some Other Stuff

It's Tuesday, a day I don't normally post, but since we're at the Arby's office, I figured I should. I drew the winner of the giveaway yesterday, and she got in touch with me so her prize will be on its way very soon. ON that note, Lori of Evermore Studios is keeping the discount code active until this Saturday, February 16. The code is knkrocks and you will get 20% off your entire purchase, excluding shipping. You should definitely pick up some of her yarn, it's beautiful!

Now, Fat Tuesday, Mardi Gras, Shrove Tuesday and what have you. Rick's mom is making pancakes for dinner tonight, and I am so excited! I'm a big fan of pancakes and waffles and other breakfast pastry/bread type things.

In other fun and exciting news, I've been knitting up a storm. I've made a small dent in my recent stash enhancements. I finished three scarves in the past couple days, to knock out 3 whole skeins from the stash. Two of them were from the new Wool Ease Thick and Quick I got a little while ago, so that's really good.

These bring my total stash down count to +8. I've decided that I would be happy with a total of -50 at the end of the year. One skein a week is totally doable. I just have to counteract the skeins that will be coming in. I have some yarn coming to me in the near-ish future, NOT stuff that I bought so I'm not really breaking my New Year's goals, that means I will have to get more knit up asap.

How are all of you fine folks doing?