30 weeks and counting

I've made it through 30 weeks and things are going well. This week, the baby has been wiggling around quite a bit. A little different-feeling than the occasional poke or punch or kick I was getting before. Now it's more or a rolling or internal wiggling feeling - what is baby doing in there? I can also definitely feel hard spots or a bony spot - maybe the head/rear vs. a fist or foot? It's hard to tell. My biggest symptom this last week has been swollen hands and feet. I am hoping the cooler weather coming our way soon will help relieve this! Plus I am looking forward to fall in general, as it's one of my favorite seasons.

My friend Val has her first of many fall art festivals starting this weekend - check out her website, PenguinArts. I designed her penguin logo - isn't it adorable? Happy Labor Day weekend, everyone!

PASS #7!

I have so much to catch up on - golf lesson #3, my new stash from the bead show, our vacation to Siesta Key... but this was the best thing to come home to after a much-needed, relaxing, beach vacation, despite a few cloudy and rainy spells. This was especially a surprise, because out of all the exams I have taken, I came out of this one feeling the worst. The big man upstairs was definitely with me on this one. And it is much appreciated! Exam #8 is next Monday, so the updates may be a little slow in coming. I'll try to get some vacation pics up, at least. A Happy Memorial Day to everyone, and a special thanks to all the men and women in uniform who protect and have protected our freedom, especially my military friends!

Crafty Spurt

I got the crafting bug this week, since I was taking a little break from studying for my AREs. I'm a new fan of Amy Butler, and happened across a few of her patterns that were discounted due to a little outer packaging wear and tear at Knitch last weekend. (Knitch is where DH bought me some wool yarn so I could knit a cool coordinating hat to go with my awesome new indigo blue winter wool coat for my anniversary gift - it's the traditional 7th anniversary thing.) So this week, I decided to try out one of the easier ones to feed my crafty itch. I made the toiletry/clutch bag (largest one) out of the Stash and Dash Bags. Since we are going to the beach in a few short weeks, I thought it would be handy to have a little wristlet that I could throw my wallet, phone, and maybe a few other small things into. Although I did not use Amy Butler fabrics, I think it still turned out pretty cute with these fun floral coordinates that I found at Joann:

Side 1:

Side 2:

I also made Amy Butler's Birdie Sling a few months back with the Amy Butler Ginger Bliss fabric (which is discontinued) that Val brought back from me from the big quilt show in Houston, but kept forgetting to photograph it:

The bottom fabric and lining (sorry no pic) is the Ginger Bliss, and the top is something I found at Joann to coordinate. It's been a handy shopping bag!

Criss Cross Elegance Bracelet

I took a class with B.J. Kahn this past weekend to make this beautiful beaded bracelet. I didn't get much done in the class itself (about half the flower and 1 inch of the herringbone weave of the cuff), but was able to get myself through the rest of the directions the next two nights. It's kind of hard to see in the photo, but the cuff actually splits in half and crosses itself underneath the flower and then rejoins into one band again. I think it turned out pretty well! This is was the model. I love going to Bead Bayou - it's such a cute little bead shop and everyone is so nice. Too bad it is so far away from my house - way up in Alpharetta, but then again, that's probably a good thing or else I might be broke!

Crafty Christmas follow-up

Since the gifts have now been given, here's a pic of the two bracelets I made for Christmas gifts. The first one was from a pack of beads - turquoise oval nuggets, bronze bicone beads, and teal beads. The second one was my own mix of faux freshwater pearls (all I could find in my hurry, otherwise I would have preferred real ones) and clear AB beads, and aquamarine bicones. Hopefully the recipients will enjoy wearing them!

Also, here's Thoth sporting his Christmas bandana that I made for him last year:

We're planning to spend a quiet New Year's Eve watching the Peach Bowl (Go Jackets!) with some friends and having dinner. We are planning to try The Shed at Glenwood for dinner tonight, so maybe I'll write a review about that tomorrow. Took my ARE #4 yesterday - it went as well as can be expected. Still waiting on results from ARE #3, but I heard a bunch of scores were released by Prometric last week (they were doing some sort of quality control?), so hopefully I'll be getting my letter soon. I guess I'll be starting to study for the next one next week.

Wooly Beads Part 2 & The New Stash

I had a great time at the Georgia Quilt Show yesterday with my friend Val. We really enjoyed the wool beads class that we took and met a bunch of fun ladies in our class. I am not a quilter, but the conversation turned quickly into lamenting over too many hobbies acquired, UFOs, and the like, so I immediately felt like I could relate right off the bat! We used a wet felting process for making the beads using wool roving - essentially working wool fluff down to a little ball, by slowing wetting our hands and then eventually dunking our ball of wool into warm, soapy water to help the felting process. It was so easy and fun, I just have sore arms today from working down 14 fluff balls! In the end I only needed 9 wool beads for my bracelet, so I have a 3 the same size leftover for another project and 2 smaller ones that I think I will turn into matching earrings. I ended up getting more wool roving at the exhibition hall and also some fun fat quarters that I don't know what I am going to do with yet, but just loved them!

Starting from fluff balls:

Ladies from our class with our finished products:

My finished bracelet and leftover wool beads:

My new stash of angelina fibers (sparklies) and wool roving:

My new stash of fat quarters:

Val and I also were able to meet up with one of my childhood friends, Judith, who recently moved back to Gainsville, and in the process we discovered the Talbot's outlet and a wonderful little French place, the Georgia French Bakery. I got away with a straw hat, velveteen jacket, ballet flats, and two belts for about $30 at the Talbot's outlet, and had delicious French onion soup, roast beef panini, and chocolate eclair from the bakery. Both are highly recommended!

Wooly Beads

It's been a crazy week already, and it's only Tuesday!

First of all, Happy Early Bday to my MIL - it's tomorrow, but just in case I don't post...

I am really looking forward to a class that I will be taking this weekend with my friend Val at the Georgia Quilt Show. It's a wool beads class. Aren't they cool?? This will blend my beading and knitting interests together, so I am quite excited about that. You all might just get a wool beads bracelet or necklace from me for Christmas this year...

Cameras and Disco Balls

I haven't had much to write about this week because I've mostly only been working, studying, and sleeping. But I did take some time this weekend to have a little fun.

I found out about a camera warehouse moving sale through my friend Val, so DH and I went with her early Sat. morning. There were maybe 15 people there when we got there (we got there about 20 min early, and the sale had already started), and who knows how many (LOTS!) by the time we left about an hour and a half later. Val got a great deal for some glass filters, mat board, light box, and some other camera stuff. I went without really expecting to get anything, but walked out with an awesome deal on a discontinued Epson compact photo printer for $3 (although it was missing a power adaptor that I am now working on trying to find), a brand new Nikon SLR camera case for $10, a random but cool looking leather case that once held an old camera for 50 cents, a couple $1 packs of 20-count double-sided 4x6 photo paper, and some free lens cleaning papers thrown in there for free. It was certainly interesting just to walk around an peek into the continually multiplying cardboard boxes that magically kept appearing, row after row, in their parking lot. So now I just need a camera to go into that camera bag! I noticed that the Nikon D90 kit is now in stores - they appeared in Sunday ads today. I should go by and check one out in person. Now just waiting for the body only to come out, since the lens I want is not the one that comes with the kit...

I also finally committed to designing a few jewelry pieces for myself using the cool "disco balls" that Val introduced me to. I was finally able to get my hands on some at the bead show we went to a few weekends ago, I just hadn't figured out what I wanted to make with them. They are a cool mix of antiqued, bali-looking silver filgaree and Swarovski crystals. I made a v-shaped chain necklace with the blue one and a pendant and earrrings with the purple and fuschia ones. I still have one more champagne-colored one that I haven't decided what to make with yet. The photos don't really do them justice - they are way sparkly and I love them!

GAMEDAY and Happy Friday!

GAMEDAY! GT vs JSU

DH and I attended the GT football game last night - click on Buzz above to see more photos. It was a great kick-off for the new season and a new coach. We got to see the triple option in play, and it seemed to work pretty well, at least against Jacksonville State... We also got to see the new uniforms in person, and yes, the "old gold" pants are as mustard-greenish as they appear in photos. DH has decided to give this color the name "mold gold," which I think describes it pretty well! I did notice, however, in looking at the big screen in the stadium, that they do look more like the classic, tannish-old-gold color on the jumbotron, so maybe it will look good on TV. One can only hope. My personal opinion is that anything is better than white pants. For many reasons that I will not get into.

The Mellow Mushroom down the street from my office finally opened up this week, so we went by for lunch today - pretty standard MM pizza, and pretty good service. I am looking forward to the long weekend. I have more ARE studying to do, and DH and I plan to head downtown for a break tomorrow to watch the Dragon*Con parade (that's some great people-watching there!), so I should have some good photos from that. Sunday we plan to stop by the Decatur Book Festival, as one of my fave comic strip creators, Patrick McDonnell of Mutts fame, will be in the Children's area on Sunday at noon. Might actually take some of my Mutts books to see if I can get a least one signed!

Oh, I forgot to mention my WIP update - I did finish my wedding present for C&M last Sunday (the closing day of the Olympics, no less!), but I now need to clean it, then figure out how I will package it and mail it to Denmark. I have photos, but don't want to spoil the surprise until C&M get it, so photos later. But I will say that I was very pleased with how it turned out!

WIPs - part 3

Here are the finished photos of the baby blanket I made for John and Susan. Baby gender is yet to be determined (although I think it's a girl), so that's why it's in sort of neutral colors. It turned out pretty well - I got to play with the fancy stitches on my sewing machine for the binding, and also got to use the serger machine that I have on loan from Cyndi (thanks, Cyn!) while she is in Denmark to bind the raw edges of the blanket before putting on the binding. Quick tip for a fast and easy blanket is to pick a fabric with squares on it for one side. As you can see from the numbers side, this made the quilting process pretty fast. I need to make one of these for myself!

WIPs - part 2

So here are the little projects I am working on. The first one up there that Thoth is helping me with is a baby blanket. The numbers side is cotton, the green side with bugs is flannel. That was when I had pinned the sandwich together, and last night I was able to quilt it all together, so all that is left is the blanket binding, which will be yellow. The bottom three are from the Debbie Mumm Noah's Ark of Animals fabric panel book. I ended up putting some batting into the cover section, but just interfacing for the inside pages. These are sewn and turned right-side-out, but I still need to whipstitch the openings closed from turning them out. I'll get finished pics of the blanket up this weekend. Looking forward to my showers tomorrow - I hope the recipients like their gifts. And happy 8-8-8 day! I can finish up my projects while watching the Opening Ceremonies tonight!

WIPs and UFOs

So my crafty friends are familiar with these terms: WIP - works in progress, UFO - unfinished objects. They refer to those oh-so-exciting projects that you pick up, only to find yourself perhaps a little less interested the next week, then forgetting about it on and off the next week, then it gets under a pile of other stuff and it's left your mind completely. I decided about a month ago that I had several showers coming up and somehow decided to make gifts for all three. One is a wedding present that I am not going to reveal much about just yet (even though the wedding happened two weeks ago and they are currently on a plane to Denmark), but they already know that it is going to make it to them via airmail. I will say that I am very excited about how it is turning out, and friend's former roommate saw it and approved of my work so far. I started it about a month ago, and have finished everything but the border, so I will post pictures of it once they get it in the mail. The other two are baby shower projects - one blanket and one fabric panel book. Hope to get them both done by Saturday, as both showers are on Saturday! Ha! So hopefully these WIPs won't become UFOs...

In other news, our downstairs room continues to dry out. The dehumidifier we bought last week is working like a champ. We cleaned up more gutters last weekend and did more work in the yard, so hopefully that helps improve the yard drainage if more showers pop up this week. Two waterproofing contractors have come out and priced the work within $50 of each other - amazingly close estimates! So I hope we'll get this taken care of this month. Also, a old Tech friend and an aunt of above newly-wedded-moving-to-Denmark friend have both been diagnosed with cancer in the last week, so my thoughts and prayers are with both of them as they begin their treatments.