Year: 2007

Ladybugs and Language

Sarah Carolyn

Carolyn wants a ladybug cake for her birthday. This morning I was doing a bit of cleaning up after breakfast, and she dug out one of my Wilton books and declared that she was going to find her ladybug cake. She looked through all three that were on the shelf, and then said, “Mommy, do you know where the ladybug cake is? Because I looked and I can’t find one anywhere!”

I’m amazed by the changes in her grammar recently. Just in the last few weeks she’s been using much more sophisticated syntax and more complete (and correct) sentences. It’s fascinating to me how the human brain acquires language – in less than three years Carolyn has learned an unbelievable amount of vocabulary and grammar, just from absorbing the world around her. She can recognize upper and lowercase letters, understands that those letters can be put into certain sequences to form words, knows how each letter sounds, and is starting to sound out words. She’s even starting to write somewhat recognizable letters. It’s pretty cool.

And the ladybug cake? She’s right, there are no pictures of ladybug cakes in my Wilton books, but really…how hard can it be?

I wish I could have caught on video all of her commentary as she flipped through the books. “Look, there are lots of ghosts and they have a gingerbread house!” as she was looking at a picture of a haunted house cake. “Oh, there’s the Cheese Man, and he has a cake with cheese on it and is eating it all up!” for a picture of a SpongeBob SquarePants cake. “Oooh, look, a Cinder-grella cake!” At least I have a few backup possibilities if the ladybug cake doesn’t work out!

Fiber Festival ’07

Sarah Knitting

This year for the fiber festival, I didn’t just buy stuff – although I did do plenty of that! – I also sold stuff. That was a really wild experience! On Saturday our booth was packed full of knitters. The line was never less than six people deep, even with three of us writing up receipts and making change. The weather was cold and rainy, but it didn’t seem to stop people from coming to the festival. Here are a couple of pictures of our booth before the fairgrounds opened:

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Sunday was much less busy, so I actually got to walk around for a bit and enjoy the sights myself. Sunday was much worse for my wallet! But the weather was beautiful, so Denis and Carrie drove down and met me there for a couple of hours and we had a really good time.

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Carrie especially loved the maple flavored cotton candy – her first cotton candy ever – and wouldn’t let go of the bag even for a picture.

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I didn’t get a chance to take pictures of my loot before it got dark today, so I’ll have to post about that another time.

First Day of Preschool

Sarah Firsts

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My baby started school today. No longer a toddler, she’s officially a preschooler.

I was not prepared. I had her clothes all laid out, my clothes all laid out, we left the house on time…but she’s been so excited about the idea of school that I expected her to run happily into the classroom and never look back. I would be free to go run errands without dealing with the carseat and have a couple of hours to relax, clean the house, knit…whatever. Instead, I had to peel her arms from around my legs and give her a firm push towards the blocks the teachers had put out for the kids to play with. And then I nearly lost it when I saw her bottom lip quivering and her eyes filling up with tears. I don’t think it helped that nearly half the kids in her class were already sobbing.

I barely made it out to the car before I completely lost it. They gave each parent a “first day survival kit” with a poem about how hard leaving is, and it contained a tissue, a Hershey’s kiss, and a tea bag.

You know what, though? She loved it! According to Carolyn (who apparently can recognize her name spelled out – who knew?) preschool was “really, really, really fun!” and she can’t wait to go back next week. I, on the other hand, haven’t quite recovered!

UFO’s? What UFO’s?

Sarah Knitting

So, with a shop full of yarn at my disposal, how long did you think it would take me to start something new? Or, maybe, several somethings?

Let’s see. First I started the Omega Wrap, a möbius style wrap made with several different weights and textures of yarn. A good way to sample several different yarns I hadn’t worked with before!

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And then…well…Carrie has pretty much outgrown the orange cabled hoodie from last fall. So I started her a green cabled jacket which may or may not have a hood – I haven’t decided yet. It’s the Duffle Coat from Zoe Mellor’s Double Knits book.

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Finally, we had a couple of balls of this clearance yarn left, and I whipped up a scarf in a couple of hours and will turn the second ball into a hat. For Carrie of course!

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Hopefully I’ll manage to finish these before something else tempts me! (Please let’s not discuss the other projects sitting around unfinished in my craft room…)

Did You Know…?

Sarah General

Did you know that your morning newspaper is delivered at 3:00 AM? I found that out this morning, when I got home just as the truck was pulling away from my mailbox. On the upside, we’re a lot closer to being done with inventorying all the yarn.

On the downside, I slept in until 9:15 because Carrie didn’t wake up as early as usual, and playgroup was at my house. At 10:00. My house which hasn’t been cleaned regularly in months.

After a frantic 42 second shower and lots of pleading, cajoling, threatening and bribery to get Carrie into clothes and downstairs, I did a mad dash around the house to put away the very non-toddler friendly crap that has accumulated in every corner and on every flat surface in all the “public” rooms. At 9:59 AM the coffee was brewing and I managed to eat a bowl of cereal…

And nobody showed up until almost 10:30. At least the house was clean. Ish.

Take Me Out to the Ballgame

Sarah Family

We went to a Red Wings game tonight with Carrie. I’m not entirely sure why we thought it would be a good idea to go to a 7:00 (that’s PM) game with a toddler who goes to bed at 8:00. Oh, and why we thought the promise of fireworks would keep her awake and happy until 11:00…well, she was awake, anyway. Luckily she fell asleep on the way home and stayed asleep – and I think when she wakes up in the morning she’ll remember that she did have a good time. But next time? Afternoon game, hold the fireworks.

On the plus side, I got some really cool fireworks pictures!

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Thirty-Four Months Old!

Sarah Monthly Updates

Dear Carolyn,

So much has changed in our lives this month, I don’t even know where to begin. You’ve gone from having a full-time stay-at-home-mom to having a small-business-owner mom. Instead of spending our mornings making pancakes in our pajamas, you now eat dry cereal in the car on our way to an all-day playdate at a friends’ house. OK, it’s not quite that bad, but it is stressful on both of us, and all I can say is…I think it will get better.

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Despite the stresses of the past few weeks, you’re doing new things every day and being as cute as you can possibly be. The other day you actually started sounding out words! I wrote out several three letter words and you sounded each letter out and tried to squish the letter sounds into their words – you got about half of them right. But the neat thing is that you realize that those letters you love so much make words!

And it’s really, truly official: you are potty trained! You still wear diapers at night and for your very rare occasional nap, but during the day you wear your beloved Dora panties (you’ll deign to wear Blue’s Clues or Elmo if none of the Dora ones are clean.) It’s pretty funny – you’ve maybe watched Dora three times in your whole entire life, but since Dora is on the diapers you used to wear you just had to have Dora panties. And when I asked you what kind of birthday cake you wanted? Dora. (I’m drawing the line on that one. Shortly thereafter you decided you wanted a ladybug cake anyway.)

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Your imagination is starting to run away with you. You can take an empty bin (well, first you empty it by dumping all the toys on the floor) and make it into a boat, a car, a house or a rocket – that one involves taking your doll-sized pack & play and putting it on top, because of course the rocket needs to have a top. Mimi is constantly playing with you, but sometimes she’s a baby, sometimes she’s your age, and other times she’s a dog. For that matter, sometimes you’re a dog, and you will only do what I ask you to do if I say, “Puppy dog, could you please _____?”

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To celebrate my day off, you turning thirty-four months old, and your upcoming first day of school, we spent today at the outlet mall. Your favorite part? Driving the car with Elmo and Zoe that was outside the Carter’s store. My favorite part? Spending the day with my little girl. I may be a part-time working mom now, but I think that’s made me appreciate the time I am home with you even more.

Love, Mommy

I Have Officially Achieved S.A.B.L.E.*

Sarah Shop Talk

Life has been hectic for the past few weeks. (That is very likely the understatement of the century. Possibly the millennium.) The reason for this is that my Mom and I have done a completely crazy, insane and wonderful thing…

We bought a yarn shop!

Not just any yarn shop, but The Village Yarn Shop, which we’ve renamed The Village Yarn & Fiber Shop as we now carry spinning fibers and supplies. For the past several weeks we’ve been spending every waking moment (and maybe some sleeping moments) counting, inventorying and shelving yarn. We are nowhere near done, but we opened the doors yesterday and will be having a grand opening sale through the end of this week.

It’s been busy, in a fabulously good way, and aside from the guilt I’m feeling over no longer being a full-time stay-at-home mom to Carrie, this has been wonderful so far!

(And yes, I know, technically the yarn in the shop is not my own personal stash, but it’s fun to pretend!)

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* S.A.B.L.E. = Stash Acquired Beyond Life Expectancy

Sockapalooza Socks!

Sarah SockapalOOOza

My Sockapalooza pal, Jan from Indiana, sent me some absolutely fabulous socks and goodies! Check it out:

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The socks are made from Tofutsies yarn, and are soft and cabled and just the most lovely shades of blue. I can’t wait for the current heat wave to break so I can wear them! In the meantime, I have a teeny sock on a sock blocker keychain to make up for not being able to wear my socks. Plus a cute handmade sheep and a small bottle of wool wash.

What a lovely treat it was to come home to this the other night! Thanks, Jan!