Monday, November 30, 2009

Preparations

Our Advent celebration begins tomorrow!! Aurora is super excited. It's looking to be a very, very busy month.... let's just hope this little guys stays inside me until after Christmas;)
We'll be adding some new celebrations this time around.... St. Nicholas Day, Santa Lucia, and Epiphany/Three Kings Day... but to start is our Advent Calendar which Aurora and I made out of cones of Christmas scrapbooking paper we had on hand. 24 cones pinned in two rows along the wall.... each cone will hold a small surprise or project or outing to do together.

Leftover scraps from the cones became refrigerator tangrams.... which have gotten much use already.

And, despite it still really only being Autumn, we started setting up our Winter Nature Table today.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Our Martinmas Lanterns

Aurora enjoyed this so much! Martinmas will now have a permanent place on our holiday calendar, I believe. And it has inspired me to to take a closer look at some of the lesser known/celebrated holidays and festivals- next up would be Santa Lucia in December.


working on her lantern (she loved the gluestick!)

a very, very happy girl

out for our lantern walk

back home, the lantern aglow on our Nature Table

St. Martin was a noble military officer who sliced his cloak in half and gave one half to a freezing beggar. He later dreamed that the beggar had been Christ, or a messenger of Christ, and was moved to give up his Military career for a life of peace and service, in God's name.

Next year, I plan to have Aurora help me gather up her warm winter clothes that she's outgrown and help me deliver them to shelter or donation center. Another way people celebrate is by having a meal in which each person has a roll or muffin that they then slice in half and offer half to the person sitting next to them.... we'll plan to do this, too.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

WIP Wednesday and Martinmas

Happy Martinmas everyone! This is the first year we will be celebrating.... Aurora and I will be making a lantern this afternoon (she is very excited about this) and then joining some special friends for a twilight Lantern walk. I'll make sure to share the pics tomorrow.

I'll be sharing some of the stories/poems with her and following the lantern tutorial found over at Our Little Nature Nest.

Yesterday, Rory and I went to Ikea after preschool for lunch and to pick up a package of tealights for our lantern making. You should have seen my little shopper- she took the task of picking out the perfect candle very seriously and carefully sniffed each and every candle Ikea sells. It took quite a while, but she finally decided on some berry scented tea lights. Since she is so very excited about the candles, I think we will also make a table lantern of a glass jar with tissue paper glued on to have on our dining table.

And.... the incessant knitting continues (hmm... could I be nesting?!)

I've got a sweet little baby gift on the needles now for a little guy who should be making his appearance any day now (not mine!).... but since his parents occasionally check this blog--- no pics right now....

But Aurora's sweater shirt vest thing is done- and she loves it!


Thursday, November 5, 2009

Halloween and Knitting

Halloween first... not too many pictures here...it's surprisingly (or maybe not so) difficult to get a three year old to stay in one place long enough for pics on Halloween. But, I did get one of her helping to carve the pumpkin:


And one with Maddie next to the jack-o-lantern just as they were about to set off trick-or-treating. Aurora was Minnie Mouse and Maddie was a beautiful princess. Rory, as you can see, was more interested in trying to rip open some candy than look at the camera.... oh, well.

And, now knitting.... I finished two hats for the babe... both with the pattern from Rory's hat... I love this pattern, it offers such great coverage around the ears and back of neck. This one was done in Malabrigo Merino in Continental and was left over from a hat I made for myself, but have yet to photograph....
and this one was done with NaturallyCaron Spa, one strand each of Ocean Spray and Green Sheen held double. The yarn is an acrylic/bamboo blend, mostly acrylic though. I don't usually like to knit with that much plastic content, but the yarn was there in my stash, pretty, soft and my fingers were needing something to knit... I made this one without the loop on the top, to see how'd it look.... I prefer the loop, I think
All this knitting for the baby has finally got Aurora interested in me knitting for her- This is my current WIP- the Girl's Cap Sleeved Shirt which is also being knit in the same bamboo yarn as above, should be easy to wash at least. I've finished more since the pic, but probably still have a good 2-3 inches to go before it's done.
~Sorry about the horrible picture... Rory's not even all in the frame- but at least she's smiling for once~