A sea of white

Hello there!

 It's winter!!! On friday we all woke up to nearly a foot of snow- one of my favorite things to wake up to. There is something magical about waking up and looking out the window and seeing a sea of sparkly white  snow. :) But here we get not only snow, but extreme temperatures too. So the other day Kyra of course wanted to take pictures and enlisted me as her helper- outside where it was 7 degrees. I went out in my pajamas since I didn't think she would need me for much. A word of advice: you won't be very warm going outside in 7 degree weather if you only have tights, a nightgown, and rain boots on. Five minutes later you will realize this and go and get a coat and mittens.


 Even if I get lots of snow down my back (which I did) I still love it.

                   Plus, hot cocoa and tea and coffee are all better when it's cold out :) Along with knitting, reading, sewing watching movies, baking, and a bunch of other things.
      The cold makes some things better.

                      And some things (walking down the street, for example)
                 much worse and far less pleasant.

       

                                                                                    

Have a happy winter!

Maddy

Little Things

Hello there!

 Some days the best thing to do is just sit and read a book, or sip tea, or knit something. As I was writing in my journal this morning, I realized I have yet to do a blog post about the title of my little blog. That is, I haven't done a post about the little things. The little things like the ones I just listed, things that make you happy inside, that give you a strange little bit of peace just because something is familiar, or funny, or comfortable. So, here's a list of little things that make me happy, because it's nice to think about what you have already, the little blessings that we take for granted every day.

 1. Scarves, hats, mittens... Because sometimes all you need to cheer yourself up is to be warm and cozy.

 2. My new chair. It's the best thing in the world. Perfect size to curl up in a blanket or read a book or squeeze two people onto to watch a movie. Sometimes a favorite chair is all you need.

 3. A favorite outfit. Because, let's face it, everyone has one. Mine consists of a wonderful flannel shirt we found at a garage sale and my hand-me-down Big Star jeans that we found at a thrift store. Paired with a sweater and some fuzzy socks, or with the sleeves rolled up and my baseball cap, it's an outfit that I will wear any day.

 4. A favorite TV show. Because it's fun to curl up in a blanket and watch your favorite TV show with someone. It just is. I have a few favorites: Doctor Who (thanks to my cousin Ashley who got us hooked on it!), Psych (a hilarious show that I got my friend Kenzie to watch, now we are Psych-O's together!), Merlin (Kyra and I love this show. It's cheesy sometimes but is absolutely wonderful the rest of the time), Modern Family (just a hilarious show that we always watch as a family), and Sherlock (because who doesn't want a really well done modern version of Sherlock Holmes? Especially when it has Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman in it.)

 5. Warm beds..... I'd never get out of mine if I didn't have to.

Yes, my bed is in my closet. It's very cozy.

  There are a lot more things in that list, but that would be a really very long post. I'd love to know everyone else's little blessings, though. What are some of your favorite little things?

 Onto other things, I suppose. Last night was my sister's birthday :) She turned 17. She made a superb cake (chocolate beet cake, I believe the recipe is from Joy the Baker), and got some presents, and went on a chilly little autumn photography walk with me. For her present I knitted her some fingerless gloves from my issue of Knitscene (our favorite knitting magazine). She loved them, reminding me once again of why I love giving presents :) I also gave her an extremely geeky card, which only a Doctor Who fan would understand.
Click here to see her blog post about it, along with pictures that are much better than any that I might have taken- as I've said, I'm not the photographer. She is.

 I'm also quite curious, would anyone like me to put up a recipe? Because I have lots and lots of delicious recipes I'd love to share, such as an easy quick bread, or some delicious cookies, or really whatever. Maybe I'll look through my recipes and find some options for you :)

 Well, that's all for now! I hope everyone enjoys comfy chairs and blankets and fuzzy socks as much as I do, I'll be found in my room watching Doctor Who soon, probably, because as I type this it is snowing outside.... quite a lot! Yay! I love snow :)

Happy.... whatever it is you will be doing this week!


Maddy

Knitting is the new yoga

 I love to knit.

 It's one of my favorite activities, and it's so soothing and wonderful (unless you are a beginner. Then it's a bit more stressful). It's portable! I love to be able to just grab my current project and go to a coffee shop with it and just knit and knit, all the while thinking and thinking. And I'm actually quite lucky, because, what with all the knitting websites and things (my favorite's Ravelry!) you can find the most adorable patterns.

 I just have a bit of a problem.... I have horrible project ADD. I'm not kidding! And it's not just with knitting. I have so many half finished projects that sometimes my mom has to tell me to finish one or two before I start the next one. However, luckily for you, I do sometimes finish a project, so I can proudly present to you a few of my successful knitting endeavors!

Yay!!!! Gloves!!!!!

 I am sooooo happy with how these gloves turned out. The beautiful pattern is from a book we found at Half-Price Books in Seattle (my favorite store EVER!!!!), called Knitting New Mittens and Gloves, written by Robin Melanson. It's a wonderful book with lots of easy (and some very difficult) patterns. WHY I chose to start out with gloves instead of mittens, I will never know. Definitely not my smartest move. I did mess up a couple of times, but my worst mistake was on the right thumb, if you look at it, it is definitely not as pretty as the left thumb. Oh well, lesson learned (that lesson being, don't get too cocky after the first glove and think you can do something without looking at the pattern... whoops....).

  These were my first pair of socks ever, Kyra and I both took a sock class at our favorite yarn store to learn how to make them. They aren't two at a time socks, however, so one sock is slightly bigger than the other.... but that doesn't matter! They are still the comfiest socks I own.

Our neighbors just had a baby girl, so we made them a little gift basket, along with some knitted items from both Kyra and I. I made the little fair isle hat, and had quite a bit of fun doing it, since I didn't have any pattern and I love doing fair isle. I was pretty happy with how the pom-pom turned out, since my first attempt at a pom-pom was.... less than stellar. Kyra made the adorable gray baby booties from a free pattern from Michael's. I also made some of the cutest little baby socks ever, but apparently I didn't take pictures of them. They were made out of pretty purple yarn from our stash, but I'm not actually sure what kind of yarn it was... so we told our neighbors that they might come out of the dryer felted and the size of Barbie socks. :)

 I didn't actually make this adorable little giraffe, but my beautiful friend Kenzie (in the picture) crocheted it for me. Seriously, the cutest thing ever. Kyra named it Giraffamo, a name which I started out hating and I have now accepted as his name (happy, Kyra???).

 I hope to soon start knitting sweaters and cardigans, something I have looked forward to since learning to knit. I'm betting, though, that those projects might turn into year-long projects If I start one. :)

 One thing I love about living in Montana is that whatever you knit, you get to wear for at least 8 months out of the year! It's fantastic! Besides, cold weather is the perfect knitting weather, when it's too hot it's kind of hard to knit, seeing as your hands get sweaty and it makes the yarn really hard to work with. So, another reason to like the winter, also. :)

 I have knitted many more things than that, and will knit many more in the future, but those are for another post. :)

 Until then,

 Happy knitting!

Maddy

P.S.
If you have a Ravelry, go friend me! The link to my page is to the right, below all the blogs I follow.

The end of a lovely summer...

 Bonjour!

 I'm back! I hope everyone had a beautiful summer, with lots of swimming, watermelon, and sunshine. :) But it's almost fall now, which means the weather is getting chilly, school has started, and I'm getting excited for snowboarding (I know, I know, it's a bit early to get excited about snowboarding. But honestly, I get excited for snowboarding right after the snow melts in the spring. Cut me some slack, I didn't even get to snowboard once last year!).

 Unfortunately, we really do need it to snow. Or rain I guess. Because the fires here are really quite bad. Seriously, when you step outside it smells like a giant campfire. The smoke also makes everyone's throat and eyes hurt rather badly. Not fun. So if you could pray for some rain for us, it would be greatly appreciated.

 Kyra and I just started school (goody). It is one of the advantages of homeschooling, being able to start school slightly later. Unfortunately you also have to motivate yourself to do your work, and some days that is just kind of difficult. I'm very lucky, too, because both of my friends are homeschooled now, which is really nice if we ever want to go somewhere and do school together. :)

 We really did a lot this summer, went to Shakespeare in the Park, drove to Beartooth highway, went camping, had outdoor movies.... and a whole bunch more. Kind of funny, but when we had one of our outdoor movies it was just a few weeks ago, and since it was night we all had to have a bunch of blankets, and Kyra and I even got warm winter hats on. It was just funny how people always think of summer nights as just having on a light jacket or whatever, but we could have gone all out and gotten big poofy coats on and everything :) To test out if the projector we used would work, we watched Iron Man! I ♥ Iron Man!

We tried getting some pictures of us as Iron Man in front of the projector, but it turns out that is a lot harder than you'd think, especially when it's on the title screen and Iron Man is spinning in circles.

 The drive to Beartooth highway was beautiful. Long, but beautiful. And when you finally get there.... it's incredible. The drive up the actual highway goes from 5,200 foot elevation to 8,000 feet in just twelve miles!
It's crazy. Honestly, on the way up you are almost underneath the next part of the road (if that makes any sense at all. It loops around a lot so just imagine being underneath the loop above you). When you get to the top, the road in the bottom of the valley is so small it's like a piece of yarn. It's actually kind of frightening. You can look out onto this hill that goes almost straight down the whole way, and all I could think about while looking at it was that if you fell off that you wouldn't stop until you hit the bottom. Ummm.... not really a pretty thought. However, we had candy, so the prospect of falling down a giant mountain was lessened by sugary, unhealthy, corn-syrupy goodness.

 

 It was truly one of the most awe-inspiring places I've ever seen, which is saying something, because there are so many beautiful places here in Montana, but this definitely ranks in my top three. That hill, on the left, is  exactly the hill that makes you think about falling to your horrible death. It's GINORMOUS. And, yes, the bold typeface was necessary. That little tiny white line is the road at the bottom of the valley. So, maybe smaller than yarn? I guess it depends on the kind of yarn. Maybe.... fingering weight yarn? Sure. (For all you non-knitters and non-crocheters, that is pretty small yarn.)

                

I really can't resist a sign like that, now can I?

 All in all, it was a wonderful trip. I would definitely recommend visiting there. Bring a camera! And candy, of course... or not. You can get candy at Red Lodge, the town at the bottom of the road. So it's really up to you, whether you bring your own candy or not.

Oh! Our garden! I showed you the veeeeeeery beginning of it, and since then it has grown magnificently well for our first year!

 Mmmmmm, strawberries, carrots, and mustard greens!

 

 We got a lot more than in these pictures, like lettuce (soooo much lettuce... soooo much salads....), tomatoes, broccoli, squash, and even a tiiiiiiiiny, tiny cantaloupe! Unfortunately, my dear little cantaloupe didn't grow nearly enough for us to eat.

 Okay, this is a rather long post, but I haven't written in a while, so what the heck. I could go on and on, I mean, I do have a bunch of knitting projects to share with you.... Okay, I'm going to show you the knitting projects in another post (even though I'm dying to show everyone), and shall now show you my new patterns!

Yes, sewing patterns. I really can't help myself. Especially when I go online and see that they are on sale for only $3.00 a piece!!!! And they are beauties!

 Oh my word, I just LOVE them!!!!! Especially the one on the right! It has tie sleeves!!!!!!!! Hopefully I will eventually get some adorable fabric and actually make a dress from one of my patterns. I'll get around to it eventually.

 I also started a painting last week, I'll put pictures up when I'm finished. It's of my friend's lovely barn! Which sounds strange, but really, it's a pretty stinkin' cute barn. I did a preliminary sketch, so I'll show you that :)

I understand that's not the best picture (hey! It's not me who is the photographer! That would be my sister.), but at least you can sort of see the barn in the background. I'm hoping it turns out well.

Well I guess that's it for now! I'll try and have another post up next week.

Until then,

Happy Autumn!

Maddy

 Hello and Happy June!

 I had a pretty good May. In fact, it started off beautifully with my fun tea party! Here is some of the stuff I've done in the past month... drum roll please... no, I'm only kidding, none of it was exciting enough to need a drum roll, but most of it was pretty fun.

                                                                                  I knitted up this cute little leaf-patterned thingy. I was originally going to make it a headband, then I was going to use it as the brim of a hat, and now I'm not really sure what to do with it. Sure is cute though! :)

                                                                                  

I worked on this striped dishcloth- my favorite one so far. :)

  I sewed up some hexagons for my tiny quilt, which is fun when you can have so many different fabrics!

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 I made some more pincushions. You miiiight be wondering why I make so many of these- I'd really like to have a booth at Farmer's Market one year and sell my creations. Hence, I make lots of dishcloths and pincushions and other things.

This May we got our new gardens all planted and already they are flourishing! This box is mine. :)

And the apples on our tree are juuuuust starting to grow! So it looks like June is off to a good start also.

 I did a lot more things than that. Honestly. It's just that Blogger and I are having a small disagreement and I can't post all the pictures I would like to.

 Let's see, I got my patterns! The ones I told you about in my last post. I am sooooo darn excited to sew them up! I'm sure it will be a very good learning experience and I'll end up with some cute dresses. :) Also, I WON two books! Yeah! From Goodreads. Lots of people host giveaways on there and I like to go through and enter a bunch. Hey, it's fun winning things. :) I won The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb by Melanie Benjamin and Eloyn by Karin Rita Gastreich. I was quite excited. :) Also,I got some fleece fabric and made a blanket for myself, the fabric is fantastic it has different kinds of foods with smily faces on them!

 That's really all I can think of that I did in May, so it's off to a new month! And really it will be a good month because I get to go to my friend's birthday party AND I'll be done with school by then! I hope everyone had a good month and I hope everyone enjoys the new one. :)

Happy June!

Maddy

A Few of my Favorite Blogs

Hello there!

 Sometimes I do crazy things. However, crazy things are always more fun when you have a good friend with you. :) I guess I'd better just tell you... I'm going to run a half marathon with my friend. Ugh. I still am not sure how or why I agreed to do it, but now I have to. It's sort of strange, too, because I don't really enjoy running. Biking? Yeah. Hiking? Love it! Running? Ick. But I guess we will see how it goes. :)

  I have recently discovered Vogue Pattern's line of Vintage inspired patterns, and I love them so much that I would order them all if I could! As it happens, though, I can't order them all, but I did get to buy two of them. :)

Aren't they just the cutest! I had a very hard time just choosing two patterns, I'll tell you that.

 Now, I suppose I should get to the subject that the blog post's title says this is about. I follow quite a few blogs, some cooking blogs, some sewing blogs, and some really cute vintage-inspired blogs.

 1. David Lebovitz Living the Sweet Life in Paris

His blog has some of the most AMAZING recipes, and I've learned a lot about Paris and its restaurants since I started following the blog.

  2. Casey's Elegant Musings Celebrating Inspiration and Creativity

This is such a fantastic blog! Casey, the writer, is a very talented seamstress and knitter and she has the most fabulous closet of vintage inspired clothes I have ever seen. She has lots of tutorials on handy things, such as how to draft a pattern, sizing for vintage patterns, or how to sew scallops. She is quite the inspiration for me to start sewing my own clothes.

3. Two Peas and Their Pod

Another blog with yummy recipes. Every time I open an email with one of these blog posts, I nearly gasp at how yummy whichever recipe is on there looks. :)

  4. Just One Kind of Folks

My momma's blog. :) I love her.

 5. Sweet Dreams Cake App

This is my best friend Kenzie's mom's blog. It has lots of very handy cake decorating tutorials on it and some pictures of the beautiful cakes that she creates. :)

 6. Craft Passion

This blog is just filled with crafting wonderful-ness. :) It's the blog that I won a giveaway from, for the cute pear coin purse that I made.

 I think that's it, but make sure to visit all the blogs, you are sure to find all sort of goodies on them, whether a delicious recipe or a knitting pattern or helpful tips on sewing. :)

 Happy Blogging!

 Maddy

Will you join me for tea?

Hello there everybody!

I live in one of the strangest states. For the past two days it has been sunny and warm, even slightly hot if you stayed outside for a long time. But Montanans know that that weather is not here to stay, not in the spring. So, today it is snowing and slushing and being very wet, and I figured it would be a good day to stay inside and knit and read and have some nice hot tea.

Speaking of tea, my tea party was such a blast! I had such an amazing time and I got some cool birthday presents (my friends know so well what to get me!) and it was just so much fun. The food was fantastic, thanks to my wonderful mom who helped me plan the whole thing out. We had scones, cucumber sandwiches, baguette sandwiches, strawberries, and a wonderfully delicious lemon yogurt loaf cake. The cake was so delicious and moist that I had a very hard time waiting for my friends to come so that we could eat. :)

We were all dressed up, which was hilarious and perfect, and Kyra got some very cool pictures of us!

We each had a different tea cup with different saucers and I made a fabric napkin for each of us. Plus, we got to use my great-grandmother's beautiful crystal, which was so fun. :)

Kyra did my hair, and she did a very good job!

We went outside and posed with our bikes, since we each have an awesome cruiser bike. :)

I really love this one of all our feet. I mean, just look at how cute our shoes are!

Kenzie's mom made these amazing sugar cubes for us, and I just could not get over how adorable they were! We absolutely loved them. :)

Cam got me this super fantastic jewelry holder that has a little giraffe on it! It's perfect for all of my rings. :)

She also got me the cutest candle ever. It looks like a book and says A Guide To Afternoon Tea Service. How perfect is that?

And Kenzie, well she is super talented, so she got me this cute yellow teapot and knitted a tea cozy for it! It was the first time she'd ever knitted anything like that. She is very ambitious in her choices of knitting projects. :)

We talked. We ate chili. We played Sequence. We even went on a bike ride to the park while we were all dolled up. It was so much fun. I'm so lucky to have the best friends in the world. :)

So, after that long, fun day we settled down to watch New Year's Eve (which is just a great movie) and then went to sleep, after much chatting, of course. :)

"You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough." -Mae West
"Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened." -Dr. Seuss
"The happiest people don't have the best of everything, they make the best of everything." -Anonymous

Happy Tea Drinking!

Maddy