finished object and other things

After being so sick for a while, I fell really behind on Christmas gift making. My progress is pretty pathetic.....mostly I've just been managing to barely maintain regular life processes around here (just don't check my bathroom cleaning. omg.)

But I did finish one thing in time for Christmas

Granted, I only got one iphone shot of it before sending it off to the recipient, but at least I have that!

It's a pattern from the new book Island from Jane Richmond and Shannon Cook. After having some initial casting on issues, which always seem to happen with EVERY project I do, it was pretty smooth sailing. I hope the person who gets this likes it! The yarn is spud and chloe sweater, which is a cotton/merino blend. Nice and soft.

Other recent news around here is that Violet and Clover both caught colds a while ago....again...*cries* (I swear, Satan's minions are gleefully piping germs into the nursery at church every Sunday), and Violet was suffering from congestion one day. She suddenly became very upset and said something was "up there" and asked for a knife to get it out. Lol. 

I had used a butter knife to remove some things from her cast, so I guess knives are now the method we use to remove unwanted objects. But I wasn't going to give her a knife to get rid of her snot, so she ended up asking for a band aid instead. All day she was pretty upset about her nose, which always happens when she gets the least bit snotty. Fast forward to 9:30 PM, she woke up screaming and wound up downstairs with us for some Christmas Vacation. 

It was then that, through some deductive reasoning, we realized she had shoved a small rubber computer part up her nose. *facepalm*

The battle to remove it was epic and dramatic, and the unlikely tool that worked was a blunt tapestry needle that I had been using to weave in yarn ends. Suddenly her breathing REALLY improved. 

That same day we also went thrifting at a hospice charity and found some fun dress-up items. Clover feels like a real lady.

A very large batch of Ina Garten brownies was also concocted here this week. The cleanup crew was hard at work....You can see the sad visage of my sewing machine in the top left of the photo. It's been untouched and unused for weeks. Weeks! This means that zero progress was made on the girls' quilt, or their tutus. Clover's birthday is in February, so I guess that will be my new goal. It makes me sad that I've had no energy/opportunity to make Christmas dresses for the kids either. They have been very demanding of my attention and time lately for various reasons, and it makes it hard to do anything like shower or cook regular meals, let alone craft. By the time they are in bed and I have the kitchen cleaned, there is no gas left for anything but sitting on the couch with the hubs and knitting in front of  a show (yay for free downton abbey season two on amazon prime instant!)

I know people say that you need to slow down and enjoy this age with your kids because it goes so fast, but sometimes it's hard to not just want them to be older so I can get some sleep and be able to reason with the people I live with all day. I'm sure many moms have seasons where they are feeling less parental bliss than they think they should, but it's still hard not to feel super guilty because you think you're the only one. 

On that note, I hear Violet screaming bloody murder because "Coco hit me with a stick, mama!!" 

Gotta go!