It’s weekend time again. Phew. It’s been crazy and wonderful around here with all the visiting family and celebrations but we are needing a weekend to get back to a schedule, catch up on sleep and think about getting back to school. We’ve been very generous with our homeschooling vacation and now it’s time to refocus.

I’m trying not to over plan this weekend but it’s filling up already with dinner dates, crafty ambitions and catching up with friends. I’m hoping to squeeze some knitting in and maybe even some sewing (barring any surprise house showings). I’m even planning a little surprise for you lovelies next week to celebrate my first blogiversary (Woot! Woot!).

Along with my plans I’ve been browsing Ravelry for hat and mitten patterns as I joined another knit along over at luvinthemommyhood . If you’re not familiar with Ravelry, it’s an online database of knitting and crochet patterns. Just sign up for a free membership and browse to your heart’s content. My problem at this point is not with finding patterns I want to knit but with choosing between them. So as I’m agonizing over them already I thought I’d share a peek at some of my favourites. Maybe you can help me decide?

1. grove 2. mitten cuffs 3. leftover 4. gradient 5. fiddlehead 6. endpaper

7. isidora 8. polska 9. fallberry

1. windschief 2. thistle 3. ql slouch 4. norby 5. jane 6. honey hat

7. a hat fit for a boyfriend 8. lina 9. from norway with love

See my dilemma?! Do you have any suggestions for me? I’m looking to knit a hat for my mom as well as for my hubby (who said he’d rather a sweater but is getting a hat for the time being). I’m hoping I can squeeze in a pair of mittens for myself. And it’s all gotta be from stash wool because I have some busting to do.

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How are your plans shaping up for the weekend? Will you be out and about or staying close to home? Visiting with loved ones or cozying up for some quiet time? Do you have crafty ambitions as well? Either way I wish you a very beautiful weekend! Be sure to stop by next week for my little surprise!!

Happy Monday!

Our weekend flew by in a flurry of fun, surprises and busyness. We’ve been basking in the last few precious days before my family flies back across the country from us. Blessed by lazy mornings when grandma puts the porridge pot on, quiet moments with children snuggled up on grandpa’s lap, and bedtime stories read by Auntie K. Hubby and I have been spoiled by these last few weeks with extra adults around washing dishes, helping with meals, folding clothes, tucking littles into bed and bringing extra love into these short days of winter. The inevitable return to normalcy (although the idea of normalcy is laughable) is looming. It is nice to get back to a schedule but it is a bittersweet transition. For now I’m enjoying these moments and hoping to avoid the post-holiday letdown.

This weekend was full. We enjoyed sibling harmony (and disharmony), family meals, many cups of tea, indulgent calories (replete with January resolve), and unbelievably kind temperatures. We shared it with family who are friends and friends who are family. There were trains in jammies, stolen moments with books, late nights with boardgames, and a much anticipated series. There was a surprise house showing – with no other result than incredulity that three adults were able to clean the house around six children in two hours (thank you, dear Sis). There was a five month birthday. There was a sweet boy who discovered he loves to share. There were many baby kisses.

It was good.

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How was you weekend? Are you charging into this week or squeezing in a few more hours of weekend?

Here we are having just flipped the page to 2012 (figuratively as we still don’t have a new calendar…).

New Year’s has never been a favourite celebration of mine. It’s always just sidled up, riding the coattails of our Christmas festivities. We’ve established certain traditions surrounding it and more again this year but we’re still pretty dull around it. We pause the game, the movie or occasionally the snores to share a New Year’s wish. We feast with family and friends. We get back to a schedule, regular bedtimes, foods outside the umbrella of chocolate. New Year’s is the bookend on our December revelries.

This new year, though, has felt somewhat different. I feel this year, more than previous years, the weight of its promise. A new year, a fresh start, a renewal of hopes and dreams. A reset button of sorts on all those things I didn’t get done last year and a chance to look ahead.

Without consciously deciding it, my mind has filled with plans, goals, hopes and desires for this new year. Some to share, some to ponder, some to challenge and some to release. They’ve been swirling around in there, amongst the unfinished Christmas gifts, laundry and Christmas…er…New Year’s letter I’d like to write. And so I’m beginning to name them…sharing a few with hubby, jotting them down in my journal, let them gather speed.

But rather than holding myself to another  (particularly longer) to-do list I’m naming a word for this coming year, aspire. Rather than resolving or goal-setting, I’m choosing to aspire. Aspire to try new things, have more fun, love deeper, drop anger, smile at strangers, cherish the moments, enjoy the twists and turns of this adventure…and on the more practical end I just may have told Dan I am going to aspire to tackle my yarn stash. Doesn’t aspire have a much more forgiving tone to it?

Yes, I have many aspirations but I know also how little I can foresee the path this journey will take. So I’m holding tight and looking forward to this year of promise.

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Have you made any resolutions for this new year? Or perhaps, like me, you’d prefer to aspire?

Either way, I’m wishing you many blessings for this new year!

Beautiful Girl, how is it seven years since you entered our lives? Seven years that feels like a lifetime and yet only a moment.

This year perhaps more than any other you have grown and changed. You are no longer such a little girl but always our baby. And somehow it has just happened. Suddenly older, suddenly growing. Your baby face hides behind those bright eyes…I still see it there.

Such a dear, dear girl full of generosity and kindness. Sharing of your great or of your little, making the peace, offering a smile full of heart. You slip a hand in mine, an arm over your shoulder, stroke a baby cheek, snuggle a little brother.

You are unique and special and wonderful. From your outrageously wonderful sense of fashion: jewelry, stripes, skirts and leggings, always leggings. You are a little mother, always aching, moaning, begging to help with the babes. Daddy’s little charmer, pulling that sideways smile, that twinkle in your eye, the batting of eyelashes. The horse, the piggy back, the mama in so many games. The dancer, the princess, the good sport and the gracious winner.

And as I struggle to write this I realize I struggle because you are so intangibly you – that look, that smile, that style, that laugh, that joy. It’s all so wonderfully you, Amalia.

So full of love, so full of life, you bring a flavour all your own to our lives.

Happy Birthday, lovely.

Was that a weekend?

Let’s review, there was:

a little birthday shopping,

a teeny, tiny thrifting,

cleaning, cleaning, cleaning for an open house,

an open house that no one attended,

playing with (and ordering more) lovely felt,

a little friend’s birthday party,

a chance to visit with that little friend’s most wonderful parents,

drinking green tea and working on green tea,

cupcakes, whoopie pies and popcorn,

lots more pumpkin,

a friend who was happy to enjoy pumpkin with us again a week later,

unseasonably warm temperatures slightly dampened by the accompanying wind warning,

more work on the green tea only to discover a miscount on an increase round leading to much deliberation,

deliberation resulting in lots of ripping back accompanied by hair pulling over the encroaching deadline,

and an evening with green wool, green mug and peppermint tea.

It was a blur, it was beautiful, this last November weekend.

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joining with Amanda for weekending