Just Call Me "Auntie Purl"

I've been doing a bit of knitting lately and thought I'd share some of what I've done.

This is a baby sweater I made for a friend. She's due with her fourth child (3rd boy) the end of the month. Last month she had a baby shower at a paint your own pottery place. It was pretty cool. I think I may bring Josh there -- he'd have a blast painting up a plate or something.

Anyway, I got the pattern from a book I have called "Weekend Knitting." It was fun to knit up. The yarn was not so great, it kept splitting -- but it was the color I needed. It knit up quickly too. It's unique because it's knit "sideways" -- instead of knitting from bottom to top, it's knit from side to side.

I'm not really happy with the buttons either, but over all, I think it's cute.



I have another friend who just had a baby. This is a bib I quickly knit up for her. I got this pattern from a knitting community called Ravelry. It's from the blog "String Theory." It was a very easy, quick knit up. I used some stash yarn and it didn't take much.



And the last thing I made is my favorite thing so far. I made a turtle -- from the Sheldon pattern on Knitty.com.


This one is Josh's and he named it "Dribble" after the turtle in Judy Blume's "Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing."



This is so cute! And very quick to knit up. Plus it was interesting to knit -- lots to do. The boys love it and of course now I need to knit another one so they each have their own. Right now they're doing a great job of sharing "Dribble."



And after I finish Sam's turtle he wants me to knit him a super hero cape! So I've got a few things on the horizon... and still, nothing in the que for me!

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And on an unrelated note... I'm having a giveaway on the Being Savvy Atlanta site. Five gift boxes of Tree Top Trim are up for grabs.... Head over to enter!

Introducing The New Improved Play/Game Room

This weekend we cleaned out the kids playroom to make it more of a big boy playroom/game room.

Here it is "before"....

And here it is "after"....

Aside from the 3 bags of broken or too badly worn toys we threw away, we have a heap to give to charity!

We did move a lot of toys into the kids rooms. Josh has one toy bin in his closet. And Sam has one in his closet and one at the foot of his bed. But they are still no where near to overflowing like they were before.

The boys really love it this way. They've been playing up there most of the day. And even when they wake up in the morning, they go in there, close the door and play -- which is nice for me because they don't make me get out of bed!

Now they can get to the toys they really like to play with. Sam spent almost all of yesterday playing with his GeoTrax. Before it was hidden away at the bottom of the closet. Now, he can see it and bring it out to play with it.

And when we were done, Rich looked around and said, "Hmmm... Darts (it's a magnetic dart board), PS2, Football/Air Hockey table.... all we need is a mini fridge stocked with beer and I'll hang out here."

I hadn't told him what Josh said earlier in the week. Like son, like father!

Toys, Toys, Toys....

Since Josh's birthday is next week I've been thinking a lot about toys. What are "good" toys and what are "one-minute wonder" toys.

Today the "free" portion of the Atlanta Journal Constitution came and in it was a big article titled, "Toys that Rock." I thought to myself, "cool... that should give me some ideas for his birthday..." Well, no. The article is sub-titled: "Playing with Interactive Music" and was all about all the high-tech toys that you can plug your iPod or other MP3 players into.

I see these at the store... the i-Fish, the i-Dog, i-Cat, whatever... Honestly, I never got the point of these "toys." What do they do? You plug your MP3 player in and the "toy" dances and lights up. What's in it for the kid? Do these "toys" encourage kids to listen to more music? Does the "novelty" of these toys wear off?

I don't know the answers to these questions. I'm sure some kids enjoy these toys. I just don't know how they would stand the test of time.

Today, Sam was upstairs in the play room listening to his songs on an old CD player we have. He was singing AND playing with his trains AND dancing (well, as best he can with a cast on his leg). If I had the i-Pod plugged into any of these devices for him to listen to his songs, would he have stopped playing?

I love that my kids love music. I love watching them dance and sing. They make up songs, pretend to play instruments, bang on the key board. Josh even does a little air jamming on both "air guitars" and "air violins." We make up songs every day.

My in-laws always say that the toys that last the longest are the ones that the kids can be creative with and use their imagination. I'm sure the "i-Toys" are are cute and can be a fun for a time, and I can guarantee we'll have some around our house in the future.

But for now, Lego's, blocks, balls, crayons, stickers, cars and trains. These are the toys that have stood the test of time in our house. Classics that I grew up with and will be around for a long time. I think we'll (try) to stick with them for a while longer!