Baby Rimes

This week we will be doing a little Thanksgiving with a little Christmas for those relatives we don’t get to see on the actual Christmas holiday. So I’ve been working like a busy little elf to get things all finished by Thursday.

I made a ______ for ________. It’s very pretty.

And this other one I made is made from _____ with a little bit of ______ and a ______ tucked inside. It’s for _____.

I made another ______. I loved the pattern so much I made another in a ______ colorway. This one is for my ______.

And since I don’t just make things from ____ and _____, but I also make _______. This one will be for _______ and _______.

Sorry, no pictures until after Thanksgiving!

the kids will play!

Daddy is at a conference in Grand Rapids, so Mommy and Miss R had a s night. First, we started with some library time. Miss R found the mouse-you know the one who got a cookie and then wanted some milk-and dragged him all around the library showing him her favorite books, coloring with him, and playing with the trains while he sat on the floor watching. Too cute.

This meant that I had some time to knit. Not much, but every bit helps.

Then, we went home and made pita pizzas. We ate them on the living room floor with a blanket so we could have a carpet picnic. We also watched The Wiggles. Wiggly Wiggly.

After dinner, we made some caramel corn. Don’t worry, I know 2 years olds and popcorn don’t mix, but she just helped to pop it on the stove. If you don’t have this book, you totally need to find a copy. It is the best thing for anyone who entertains, snacks, or just gets the munchies. Yummy.

After a bit of coloring and stories, it was time for bed. Ladies night is just not what it used to be.

But in a very good way.

This weekend, while taking care of the kitchen disaster, we also managed to do some yard work. It was necessary. The grass hadn’t been mowed since sometime in August and was threatening to take over the house in a fit of jungle fever. Plus, it made it that much harder to rake leaves.

OUT WITH THE MOWER! We said.

Of course, all those leaves meant that the mower wasn’t getting very far.

Back to raking first.

Miss R had a splendid time. She would diligently rake a small pile of leaves (about 4 leaves) into a small pile, then drop the rake and run like mad for Mommy’s pile of leaves. After the first few times of this and thinking, “awwww, so cute!” I came to realize what an AWFUL mess she was making of my pile!

We tried a different tactic. Help Mommy get the leaves on the tarp to drag them into the street. She loved pulling the tarp. But before we could dump it, she had to jump in the leaves again. More raking and more dragging, and they were finally at the curb.

What a lovely diversion from painting the kitchen.

Plus Miss R slept like a log, so when we did get back to the kitchen to paint, we had 2 uninterrupted hours to paint like crazy mad monkeys with paintbrushes. Only a little neater.

According to the calendar, we have 4 days until Thanksgiving. That’s 96 hours, and if you subtract sleeping time, and at-work time that leaves us with 48 usable hours to make our kitchen presentable before we have guests over. ugh.

This weekend we are feverishly finishing the trim, painting the fireplace, hanging curtains, photos and new lamps.

On top of all this, we still need to do the cleaning, shopping, cooking, and other pre-holiday activities.

Did I mention that we don’t actually have curtains or lamps yet?  yeah, so we still need to go get them.  Go ahead and add “hardware shopping” to that long list too.

But it’s going to look fantastic when it’s all done and no one will no the hardships we faced to get our house ready.  Unless we tell them.  Which we probably will.

This is what we did this morning while Mommy folded laundry.

Those are my slipper socks. Daddy calls the red ones my Elmo socks. They make my feet look like a little red monster puppet I guess.

However, Miss R has confiscated them and redesigned them for her own purposes.

Of course, they could probably use some rubber soles on them to prevent sliding.

These were so quick to knit up! They are a gift for a friend is who is due sometime in December.

Please excuse the fuzzy picture.
They are Wool-Ease in Denim.
Knit on size 6 needles.
And they fit on a Cabbage Patch doll (who was unavailable for pictures due to an early bedtime).

Happy new baby!

overheard this morning:

Mommy: Where’s Daddy?

Miss R: In the chicken.

Mommy: Where?

Miss R (slightly exasperated): In THE CHICKEN!

Mommy: Oh, of course.

a little later…

Mommy: What are you doing?

Miss R: I’m in the Chicken making breakfast for Baby.

Mommy: You’re where?

Miss R: In THE CHICKEN!

Mommy: Oh, ok.

For those of you who still need a translation: chicken = kitchen

So, Daddy and I were chatting the other night, and we think it’s time for a move. Baby Rimes is not really a baby anymore, and the title of this website is a bit misleading.

I think perhaps we should move the whole blog to a new page seeing as how I spend just as much time writing about our child as I do about all my crafting, cooking, and other exploits. But how to accomplish this without sending all 3 of my readers elsewhere because they can’t find my site any more?

So be on the lookout!  We might just up and move to a new bat time at a new bat channel!

I had the chance to see some of the most beautiful quilts in the world this weekend. Really. The best quilts from Japan, Australia, Germany, South Africa, US, and a whole lot more that I’m forgetting right now, but were all wonderful.

One of my favorites was the artist from Australia. These quilts were so amazing, and photographs cannot do them justice. There were these trees. And they were everywhere. Simply stunning.

Gloria Loughman   “Canopy”

I’m also a big fan of sparkles. I love embellishments on quilts. Especially beads and sparkly thread. It must be the little in me. One quilt was not only sparkly, it had CDs sewn right onto it. Talk about some major bling!

Debra Hosler   “Cosmic Debris”

There were also some wonderful colorwork quilts that never cease to amaze me. I am just in love with these color wheel type quilts. Would you believe I’ve never made one? I’m such a bad art teacher.

Judy Coates Perez   “Primordial Sea”

I just want to say Congratulations! to every single person who had art work at this show.  It is an amazing feat to finish a quilt, let alone to finish one as beautiful as all the quilts that I had the pleasure of seeing.

Look out Keith Haring, we have a new Baby Picasso on our hands.

Today, as is usual on our Mondays, we went to the library.  We played with the puzzles, picked out some books and colored.  Miss R wanted to color hearts.  So as we were coloring hearts, Mommy got a bit distracted about looking for books.  Miss R was happily coloring her heart with a wide range of colored pencils and as I peeked over the book I was looking through-something about Really Loud Songs for Toddlers-she continued happily coloring.

Until I heard, “Mommy, I coloring!”

Now, she never really says this unless she has done something new.  So I look over my book to see her perched on the chair, backwards, pencil in hand, and beaming at the painted post right behind her chair.

Mommy voice comes on, “uh-oh.”

“Miss R, what are you doing?”

“COLORING!”

Yup, you got it.  On the wall.  With pencil.  Does anyone know how HARD it is to get pencil off the wall?  Nearly impossible.  Erasers don’t do it.

So, in typical teacher fashion (which goes against EVERYTHING that is Mommy behavior), I said very quietly, “Miss R, I think you need a time out.”

She took it like a good little 2 year old.  She sat right down looking at me with eyes that said, yup, Mommy you are absolutely right.  What I did was completely wrong and I DO need a time out.

I’m so amazed at how  well she processes things.  I looked at her after cleaning up our coloring mess and suggested we clean up her mess.  She jumped up and said, “yeah.”  So we got some paper towels and did our best to clean up the wall.  She was such a good girl and scrubbed and scrubbed.  She wanted to clean it all up herself.

When we were done, I asked, “What do you think we should do now?” She hung her little blond head and said, “I sorry.”  I kid you not.  Without any prompting, that’s what she said.  I was so proud of her at that moment.

We went up to the librarian, who is not named Marion, but is named Jo, and who Daddy Rimes knows as the mom of one of his friends.  I said, we have something to tell you.  Miss R hung her little head down even further, looked at me and begged me to pick her up.  Jo the librarian was so sweet as Mommy explained what happened.  She even said that Miss R was very brave for coming up and telling her.  She had a stash of Magic Erasers for this very thing and said not to worry about it.

Long story, but the end was so sweet.  Miss R was so sad, and I’ve never really seen her show remorse for something she did.  Which really helped the Mommy side of me from becoming completely embarrassed by something my kid did in public.

But in the end, we went home and made waffles for dinner, which is Miss R’s current favorite pick and made up for a messy afternoon by dancing around the living room to the Corrs after dinner.