Elijah the Elephant

Elijah the Elephant
Originally uploaded by elletrain

Here is my latest finished project...Elijah the Elephant. He was knit for Clancy Dabbs, my cousin's new little boy. This was a really cute end-product, but a little tedious to make for my taste. It's not difficult though and is such a cute gift. The pattern is by Ysolda Teague, http://ysolda.com/. She has a lot of adorable patterns. Because I did the stripes with left over yarn from the crocheted baby blanket it only took one skein of the green/grey Debbie Bliss Cashsoft DK. He was my first toy to knit and I'm so glad he turned out well. It was a big effort to pick up all those stitches for the ears and limbs. I hope little Clancy enjoys him for a long time :)

Apparently I've been busy

I just realized how long it's been since I made a post! As you can see, I've been more involved with tweaking the design of the blog than with blogging itself. Here is a recap of what I've been up to:Pinky and I with my dad, Christy, Jon, Elliot and Cassie at our Engagement Brunch hosted by Dad and C. It was such a lovely brunch! Here is a picture of Pinky and I at one of the lovely tables decorated with Christy's beautiful hydrangeas.

This week on Tuesday I decided to paint an accent wall in our living room. I love Color Splash with David Bromstad on HGTV and he definitely inspired me to do this. At first I chose a muted blue/teal to go on the wall, but it wasn't quite right. Then I tried out "Painted Turtle" by Behr and it was perfect. It almost looks like the color the shadows are on the lighter green of the living room. I couldn't be happier with the result. Sorry for the blurry-ish iPhone photo, but at least you can see the color contrast.

Today we're getting the house picked up and ready for my brother to visit on his way helping a friend move back to Arkansas. We're so excited to have company!! I'm off to get ready and buy some fresh flowers to have in the house. I've been buying them weekly now, but I especially need some when we have guests coming! Happy weekend everyone! If you're around East Nashville, there's a small craft show going on tomorrow near 5 points. Check it out!

Mattie gets a haircut and I get new fun things

So, it gets super super hot in Nashville in the summer and I have a very poofy border collie. I usually get her Summer Smoothie haircut at the groomer's, because I have attempted to perform this act myself before and I know the outcome. But this year Pinky insisted we do it on our own. He ordered some clippers and was intent on 'saving' us the money. After 3 hours, a mishap with the shop vac (it blew Mattie's clippings all over the hall upstairs), an aching back for me, and a scene where it looked like Mattie literally exploded all over the backyard, we ended up with this...

It's a little rough around the edges and I would definitely not show you a close-up, but I found there's a tiny adorable dog under all that fur!!! I mean, I think she's adorable to start with, but how cute is she with a tiny body and a giant head! Here she is quite skeptical of me and is letting me know she was not happy having to sit still for 3 hours. Her reward was getting to play in the sprinkler for 1/2 an hour though, so I know she thinks it was worth it :)

In other fun news, I recently got my first hoola hoop! I'm taking a class at my neighbor's hooping studio, Hooprama, where I've been taking Zumba for almost a year now. I have to tell you...it is SO fun!! And a great workout for the abs. Here is my lovely hoop she made for me!

The part of town we live in, East Nashville, is a superb community with really interesting people. The listserve is well-used by our area and I recently found someone through it that was asking for new sewers. I've sewn a few napkins and the odd straight line here and there, so I emailed her. Look what she sent! A beautiful sewing kit with ALL THE PIECES ALREADY CUT OUT! Wow. Now this is the sewing I can get into. I loathe cutting out fabric. But I really do enjoy sewing. She needed people to test out her kits and give her feedback. I happily agreed and got this great package in the mail last week. I'm hoping to put my skirt together today. I'll let you know the result and eventually where to get these awesome kits!

Finally, yesterday I received beautiful yarn in the mail to make a new project. The sweater is called "Thulstone" and is from Louisa Harding's book Little Cake. I've had this book for a while and am excited to start a project out of it now.

It's a gorgeous striped cardigan with pretty edging. I'm making it out of Knit One, Crochet, Too's "Second Time Cotton." It is a nice weight, slightly textured cotton yarn made from recycled mill-ends. The lighter color I bought is actually more grey than the photo shows, and the edging will be in the muted teal color. I'm very excited to start it this afternoon!

Well, I'm off to trim Mattie's cut up a bit and then take the fur to my hair salon. They are sending their hair clippings from their cuts to help clean up the oil spill and have agreed to send Mattie's bag o' hair clippings along with their next shipment. I'm excited that all that work not only created an adorable summer version of my dog, but that it is also going to be put to good use. Check with your local salon and get them to send in their clippings as well. Go get a trim and help out the clean up! ♥

Calligraphy Kit

Look at what I got in the mail yesterday!! It's a beautiful calligraphy kit from Emilie Friday. It's so lovely!! I'm going to attempt to hand-address all of our envelopes using a newly learned more formal handwriting. We'll see how it goes, but kudos to Emilie for such a gorgeous package of goodies!!

Happy weekend everyone! We are about to give my Mattie-girl her summer haircut...at the groomer's they call it a Summer Smoothie. Here is a picture of us from last summer when she had her cut. She looks so cute in it!