Wednesday 25 February 2009

Baby Surprise Jacket

This is one of those famous knitting projects that has been made and blogged about thousands of times. It's a little jacket that is knit all in one piece. When you first finish, it looks like this:

Then you fold it once...

...and fold it again...

... sew two seams (and weave in the ends - my least favourite part) and you have an adorable little jacket, which is even more adorable when modelled by Lily.

This was a pretty easy knit once you get into it and I love that the pattern has you knit in some butt ease, so it fits nicely over Lily's cloth nappies.
Ravelry details here

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Tuesday 24 February 2009

(yesterday was) Sunday Update

I didn't get around to writing this yesterday and almost missed writing it today as well. I've had one of those weeks where you feel like you never stop, but then you look back and can't quite work out what you achieved...

We all caught a minor bug early last week - nothing major, but it was enough to keep Graeme home for a day and Lily and I housebound for a couple more. Kind of felt like the flu, but like a really wussy strain of it that was pretty easily defeated.

We went for a trip to Kingston-on-Thames on Saturday (there's good shopping and nice restaurants there) and had planned to stop off at Kew on the way home, but there was something crazy and infuriating going on with the buses and it took a ridiculous amount of time to get between Kingston and Kew, so we decided to keep going home.

We missed church on Sunday because we suddenly realised at 10.05 that it was, in fact, 10.05am and there was no way we were ready enough to get sorted, out the door and to the church anywhere near to on time (10.30). It was nice to spend the whole day at home and we were actually quite productive - got some cleaning and other unexciting but necessary house things done.

I finally finished one of my many projects that had been sitting, almost finished, for a while. But that's another post (hopefully tomorrow - I need to head to bed soon, to be sure I get enough sleep before Lily decides to wake up, since that's been very unpredictable lately).

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Saturday 21 February 2009

Lily's a Superstar


I've written up my first couple of reviews for Frugi. The kimono bodies are something that we finally bought when we realised that even the 12 months size bodysuits we had were getting tight on Lily - she's in the 6-12 months of these and still has plenty of growing room.

The romper (that's the link you want to see Lily) was something that I thought was adorable, but may not have bought myself. It was sent to us to review and has me wondering if we should get more rompers.

Yeah, if you follow Lily's blog and/or are friends with me on facebook (add me if we're not - search for my kateandgraeme email address) you've probably already seen these photos, but I don't care :)

I know, I owe you some better updates than that - it's almost the weekend so I should get a chance to have more than 5 minutes sans-baby.

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Monday 16 February 2009

Sunday Update

I have meant to update more over the last week. In fact, I have several things in various stages of completion that are destined for the blog, I've just had a hard time finishing and editing to the point where I'm happy to post. Hopefully I'll get them up over the next week. In the meantime, here's the interesting things we did this week...

On Monday, we walked (well, I walked, Lily rode in the stroller) to the Royal Mail depot to collect a package that they'd tried to deliver while we were away. I ended up getting drenched (Lily was nice and dry under the stroller's raincover) but it was worth it because the package was my first taste of Frugi's new range - 2 adorable new items for us to try out and review. They're both currently drying on the airer after their second wash, the first wash being Monday afternoon - I compulsively wash things before they're worn. The reviews are two of the many part-written bits sitting on my computer, but I want to road-test them at least once more before submitting the reviews. So that I don't have to mention Frugi again this post (I don't want you to get so sick of hearing about them that it turns you off because that would be a loss for you) I'll also say that I got their new catalogue on Saturday and it is beautiful, like a little magazine with articles about the cotton and stuff, plus, of course a whole bunch of adorable clothes that you end up wanting one of everything. I also got some extra catalogues and some little flyers with a discount on them and am looking forward to passing them out when people say how adorable Lily is (because they always do :D).

Friday is Lily and my going out day. Even if we're confined to the house every other day of the week, I make an effort on Fridays. We start off the morning at 'Baby Bounce n Rhyme' at the local library and usually spend at least an extra half hour there, playing with other babies and chatting to their mums, reading books, taking advantage of the carpet to perfect our crawling since we have slippy wooden floors at home... OK, that last one is just Lily. Then we usually move on from the library (or, on the odd occasion, just across the library to their cafe) with at least one other Mum and her kid/s. We also often do some shopping, mostly of the window kind - I do the shopping while Lily has a nap in her stroller. This Friday, we had such a good day out, including eating at a proper restaurant for lunch, just the two of us, we didn't get home until about 4pm... and then completely crashed out.

We (that's a Graeme and I 'we', this time) never really celebrate Valentine's Day, but we did end up going out for a nice lunch and some shopping yesterday - we bought Lily a present, if that counts (not actually because it was Valentine's Day, though, just because we saw a toy we knew she'd love for less than half price). That was, of course, after our first lie-in in weeks that included a skype call with Lily's Nana.

So, what did you do this week?

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Wednesday 11 February 2009

Pay It Forward

Almost exactly a year ago, Leonie made this post on her blog (go read it, it's a great story, I'll wait, plus, it'll basically explain this post for me)

All done?
OK

So, around Christmas time, I received an amazing package containing some of Leonie's artwork, which I have always loved and plan to buy some of to decorate our future home when we get back to Australia. I've been slack about getting this post up because I wanted to have some photos to show and only just got around to taking them today when Lily drew my attention to the package which had been accidentally pushed under the coffee table, but which she, in her grab-at-everything phase, pulled back out.

Two beautiful prints:



Even the notecard was cool:

(my photos don't do her work justice - the light here is poo at the moment)

So, now its your turn. Leave a comment on this post by next Monday and sometime that day (remember, GMT) I'll pick 3 people at random (yeah, I know some people do the first three to comment, but I'm trying to get those people who read but never comment to come out of hiding - a simple 'hi' is enough to get you in the draw). Those three people will receive a handmade gift from me within the year. The only catch is that you then have to Pay It Forward and make the same offer on your blog. I'll leave that last bit open to interpretation for you - I think it's most in keeping with the idea to make the offer once you have received your gift, but I have noticed some people make the offer on their blog straight away, so either way, you can decide when you know if it's you :)

Oh yeah, just in case you're wondering (because I know I always do), I'll post to anywhere in the world, so get to commenting.

ETA: As my Mum pointed out in the comments, you can get your hands on some of Leonie's amazing work and help out the Red Cross Bushfire Appeal. Check out the details here.

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Monday 9 February 2009

Sunday Update

We've spent the last 9 days travelling around Germany with a one-day detour into Czech (as the locals call it) to see Prague. We had a great time and are constantly amazed and thankful at how great a baby Lily is - she travels like a champion. We kept notes as we went around, so hopefully we won't take too long to put it up on our travel blog. My personal highlights included the east side gallery of the Berlin wall and the design classics in the Applied Art Museum in Cologne.

As you probably know, London has been hit by a massive cold snap while we were away. At first I was annoyed that we were missing our first decent snow in London, but then I remembered that once the novelty wore off, the reality would quickly settle in and the reality is that London is just not set up to cope with any weather other than overcast and in the teens (in degrees Celsius). No snow in sight when we got home though, just lots of rain, though Graeme said he saw some snow from the tube on the way back from the airport.

In other news, Lily broke her second bottom tooth. We noticed it yesterday morning and think it might explain the huge inconsolable crying episode on Friday evening. Her first top tooth is also visible, but hasn't actually broken through yet. As graeme said, she looks like she's going to be one of those babies that shows signs of teething for months before one breaks and then they all appear in quick succession.

My plans for this week include a lot of laundry, catching up with friends and trying to convince Lily to sleep in her own bed - she much prefers to sleep in our bed, even though hers is joined directly to the side, and has been enjoying doing just that while we were away.

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