Category Archives: Family

Sunday afternoon – June 3rd

Posted on by
2

It’s a nice weekend.  Yesterday we walked in the Denver Brain Tumor walk with a friend of ours (and her family) from school.  It was Davey’s first organized event.  It was just about a 2.5 mile walk.  The sun was beaming down though and Davey hadn’t walked that long before, so David ran and then rescued us at about 1.5 miles. He really enjoyed the walk though.  We walked around Sloane’s Lake which was nice.

After David rescued us, he took us back to the festivities.  They had a kids’ area set up and so Davey was able to blow bubbles and play some other games.  He even got a medal which is always a fun time.

This afternoon we are hanging out.  I’m grading and knitting. (I’m looking forward to posting about some of the fun baby patterns I’ve encountered as soon as I gift the resulting knits!).  David is reading and Davey is playing around with a new app on the Ipad (Davey refers to the Ipad as the “app computer”.  Pretty “apt”!).

If it doesn’t storm this afternoon, we’re thinking of heading down to the Chalk Festival downtown.  We really enjoyed it last year.  There was some amazing work.

 

 

A Little Trip to the mountains

Posted on by
2

Today we decided to make a drive up to the Silverthorne/Dillon/Frisco area.  We’d not driven up into the mountains in awhile.  It was a beautiful sunny day but chilly and windy up there!

We walked around the outlet malls at Silverthorne for a little while.  Not Davey’s favorite activity.  I can’t blame him.

Then we went hunting for a playground for him.  We began by going to the Frisco museum which consists of several historic old buildings.  We visited the jail, an old summer house, and an old general store.  We also saw this really neat sculpture.

It’s called “Repentance”.  A man was standing nearby also looking at the sculpture.  He was very disgusted because he said someone had broken off and stolen the arrow from the bear’s backside. Apparently, the story goes that the young boy had shot the bear in the backside with an arrow.  Here they stand face to face and the boy apologizes.  I love the expression on the little boy’s face.

We then drove around a little more and found a really nice playground by the Frisco Marina.  Davey had a great time.

I started talking to a nice lady there, and she told us about a lookout point between Frisco and Dillon via the mountain road (instead of the interstate).  It included an approximately 1/2 mile trail with some incredible views and the possibility of a tipi.  We thought this sounded really fun.

It was a perfect short hike for Davey!

It was really beautiful up there.

And we found a kind of tipi constructed from the dead trees.  I think the pine beetle has wreaked havoc in parts of the forests up there.

Now we are back home and it’s time to get Davey tucked in!

Patchwork Sock

Posted on by
1

I was reading some knitting blogs the other day, and I came upon a description of a Ravelry knit along that looked fun.  It’s a “sockalong”.  I’ve not knitted socks in a year or so, and I’ve missed it!  The idea of the knit along is to just use leftover sock yarn.  I have some of this.  I wasn’t sure how it was going to look, but I tried to pick out some colors that I thought would be ok together.  I finished the first sock today.  I think it is one of my all time favorite socks.  It also fits great.  I used this basic sock pattern from Susan B Anderson.

I think my favorite sock to knit is just a plain basic stockinette stitch – especially in fun yarn – or especially like with this sock where I changed colors every ten rows.

I didn’t want to try to get Davey to take a picture, and David wasn’t here so I put my sock on a sock blocker and used the marimba keys to help pose it.  Very handy!

One thing I learned from knitting these socks was a nice way to finish off those ends.  I had lots of ends to weave.

I may be one of the last knitters to have learned this handy method, but I watched a video by Susan B Anderson, and then I tried it out. It is easy, fast, and efficient.

At each color change, you just take the two yarn ends and tie them in a simple knot.

Then you take the end and run it up and down several stitches in a row through the purl bumps.

Then you trim the ends.  So easy.  Finishes it up so nicely.  Looks great!

Davey had his “big shows” today at The Little Gym.  He had one for his karate class and one for his Giggleworms class.  He had a great time.  David and I were poised with our camera and videocamera.   I had to switch to my phone when the videocamera battery died (I’d not properly charged it).  So we got lots of footage and some pictures.  Here’s Davey with Mr. Nick getting his karate medal.  He loved that.

 

Friday = puny kid and catching up

Posted on by
1

Davey and I are hanging out today.  He is kinda puny.  Yesterday he had a fever all day but today so far so good.  I can’t convince him yet though to get out of his pajamas.  I even offered to just switch out pajamas.  He’s had these on for two days so I think it’s time.  That’s the next goal after I finish this.

I’m taking pictures off my camera this morning, putting some up on flickr, and on facebook.  I am also finishing up a sock!  I started it over a year ago.  All that remained was decreasing the toe and kitchener.  I’m down to kitchener now. I really like this self striping yarn in all my favorite shades of green.  It’s from Knitpicks.

I do have to make the second sock still.  Hopefully it won’t be another year before I finish the pair!

Update:  Davey is dressed!

Sunday and Davey’s Knitting

Posted on by
Reply

We are having a nice day at home.  Davey is playing with his village.  Last I heard, “frost giants were attacking it”.  He’s very busy.

He picked me out a keychain for Mother’s Day.

I love it!

Yesterday, he told me that he wanted to learn to knit.  I told him that he might not be quite ready to take knitting on, but that I’d certainly try to teach him.  He did get his little fingers wrapped nicely around the needles.

By the looks of his thumbnail, it looks like he went straight from playing in the dirt to knitting.  This is certainly possible.

He sat in my lap and I held his hands, but I thought he did great for the first time. He learned how to insert the needle into the stitch and could pretty much do that on his own.  I had to wrap the yarn around for him, but then he was pretty good at sliding the new stitch off.  He wants to keep practicing.  He’s off to a good start.

 

 

Spring Soccer comes to an End and a little Knitting

Posted on by
Reply

This morning was Davey’s last soccer practice/game.  It was really cold out though.  Still is!  40 degrees, but there was no wind so it wan’t too miserable.  I think he liked the cool air.  He is so hot-natured that maybe it invigorated him.  He scored a couple of goals!

He was really proud of his trophy.

We also got his team pictures back.  His individual ones are quite cute.  His team photo is cute too but in a different way.  I didn’t want to totally violate copyright, so I just took a shot of part of his team photo. I’m not sure what is going on here.  He wasn’t upset, but it was pretty bright and warm that day I think.

Davey had a great team and great coaches.  We will miss them.  I think that in the fall he moves from co-ed to all boys.

Now we are looking forward to tee-ball.  He will try this out for the first time next month.

And I’ve been knitting some too.  I finished a really fun beret the other day.  I made it with Manos del Uruguay.  Such nice yarn to knit with.  It’s a fair trade company and non-profit too.  It was created to help women in Uruguay.  It’s some of my favorite yarn to knit with.

This pattern was a lot of fun too.  It’s called Early Morning Beret.  It’s a free pattern, and I highly recommend it!

 

4.5

Posted on by
4

Yesterday Davey turned 4 and 1/2.  We had a small celebration. He’d asked for another addition to his “village”.  He kept asking about it.  So he was pretty happy to come down the stairs and see that he did indeed get what he’d requested. This is not a great picture, but you can see the smile and the “yay! I was hoping for that present” look.

Here he is explaining some of the finer details about his new toy.

Later it was time for cake.  He wanted cupcakes and a cake, so I made a single layer cake.  It’s pretty plain but it was good.  I bought a premade one last year, but I really like home made better.  Well not totally homemade.  I made the icing but used a cake mix.  And I guess that worked out well, because Davey just eats the icing anyway. (The sprinkles were also a specific request!)

This picture of the cake and his superhero “guys” in silhouette appealed to me.  I guess I like the outline of Spiderman’s outstretched hand (I think that’s Spiderman.  I’ll soon be corrected if I am mistaken).

Davey had fun playing with them as well.  I love his focus here.

4.5.

Podster, Potter and a photograph

Posted on by
1

I’ve not had an alliterative blog title in awhile.  It was time.

I have decided to focus on one knitting project at a time (I doubt anyone will believe this.  I don’t, but I’m going to try).  I started some Podster Gloves for a friend.  I was worried that they were going to be too big for her, so I mailed them off for a “fitting”.  She assures me that they are fine.  I still am worried that they are a little big, but I am moving forward.  These gloves have half fingers and then the optional flap you can pull over to make them a mitten. I am knitting them with Shibui sock yarn.  It’s awesome.  I love knitting with it.

I am a little worried though, and I hope I am not in absolute denial.  I am afraid that I don’t have enough yarn to finish this glove.  I have to finish the flap and then do the thumb (it will also have a flap option).

That doesn’t look like a lot of yarn.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

And while I claim that I am focusing on one project at a time, I decided to participate in the Harry Potter cup on Ravelry.  It’s this massive knitting group.  I was sorted and am in Ravenclaw.   There is a 3 month term. You have to complete one project per month.  The projects have themes based on the course you choose (Potions, Herbology, etc).  I think it is going to be great fun.  I’ve got to decide on a project though!  You can work on more difficult projects – for OWLS and NEWTs. I don’t even quite know how all that works yet.  I’m starting with the basics.

And last, but certainly not least, I want to include a Davey picture.  I have a new very favorite picture that I took with my phone the other day.  It’s of Davey and my grandfather.

Back from a trip

Posted on by
1

I think this is the longest I’ve gone without blogging in awhile.  Don’t like it!  I miss it!

We just got home from a week long trip to Arkansas and Oklahoma.  Great trip seeing family and some friends, but we are glad to be home.

One of my favorite parts of the trip was visiting my friends at the knitting shop in Arkansas.  This is where I relearned to knit, got really interested (really really) in it, and made some great friends doing it.

I tried to get a picture of smiling Davey  in front of the store sign.  He was not interested.

Another favorite Davey picture moment – in which he looks rather frightened – but he’s not.  He went for a short boat ride with his Uncle Johnny.  Johnny is right there getting the boat ready.  Davey is not sailing away alone, although it does look kinda like it.

The pink is lovely on him isn’t it!  We didn’t have a lifejacket for him but we were fortunately able to borrow one.  He had a great time.

He also got to mow with his great uncle.  It appears that he might be headed straight into a tree or something from the looks of his expression in this photo.

Gotta get this thing turned! (He was steering and was taking it very seriously!)

And there were laughing pictures too like this one. He was having much fun with his cousin Adilyn while David pushed them on the swing.

And then sometimes Davey had just had enough of the pictures already!

 

 

Fishing and C3PO Dance Party!

Posted on by
1

Today David took Davey fishing.  I was not able to go because I had class, but David took lots of pictures. They met Davey’s friend up there (and her mom). They had a great time and caught a bunch of fish.

Davey reeled them in all by himself!

He also enjoyed watching Olivia reel in her fish.

Serious kid proudly holding up his fish.

Davey told David, “There is NO way that I am touching a worm.  I don’t want to touch a worm.  No Way, I am not touching a worm!”

So after they began fishing, after awhile David turned around and saw this:

Olivia got right in there with him.

I’m looking forward to joining them next time (well maybe I will pass on playing with the worms).

I also had to post this picture.  Davey arranges all his little guys into different scenes.  For example last night, he had a big party in the Millenium Flacon.  Apparently C3PO was the life of the party!