I survived this weekend!!!

Well, I survived this past weekend. It was crazy and somewhat stressful, but it had its fun points too.


My sister had her high school graduation party. I think we had about 100 guests come through the house in a span of 3 hours. It wasn't too overwhelming. It was a constant, steady flow of people though which was nice. My cousin and his newborn baby even showed up and surprised us all. It was nice to see a lot of our old friends that we don't see much anymore.

Anyways, after the party, everyone was exhausted. Cleo fell asleep on the chair on the screen porch. Her new favorite place to sleep.

The weather was great and everything worked out great! Cleo was afraid of the new baby when he started to cry. She went up to sniff him and then backed away as fast as she could. She likes to run back and forth when you blow the hairdryer at her. She turns it into a game and likes to run away and then sneak up and then run away again. She probably would have gotten to that point with the baby just because she was excited from all of the people, but we didn't let her.

Lastly, Mom and I joined our UU church. We each got a pretty rose and an official name tag! There were a total of 31 new members, which I think is pretty awesome!

Well, I think that is all for now! I hope everyone had a nice Mother's Day weekend!

Have a good day! :)

As always,

Peace,

Katy

Oh, Cleo!

Hello Everyone!


My family came home from dinner a few weeks ago and saw a happy Cleo. My mom and I went into our little library room for a little while. We were in the library talking when Cleo came in and jumped right up onto the window seat. 
It was the first time we had seen her on the window seat.

Normally, she is not allowed on the furniture unless it is in the basement, outside, or our beds. However, she acted like she had done this before and was comfortable sleeping in this spot. We weren't sure if we liked it or not. My mom is concerned she may scrape up the woodwork with her nails.

Since then, Cleo has jumped on the window seat multiple times. Even in front of us, which usually dogs don't do because they know they aren't supposed to.

We came home the other night and Cleo came running to greet us from the direction of the library. I went into the library and felt the window seat cushion. Guess what? It was warm and full of dog hair.

 Oh, Cleo!

She also discovered she likes to look/smell out my bedroom window. She is barely tall enough to rest her chin on the windowsill. 

Well, hopefully my next post will include crochet (which is at a standstill at the moment) or my butterfly garden. I have several Milkweeds popping up. :)

I'm going home this coming weekend for my sister's high school graduation party and will take some fun photos for you. 

Also, my Mom and I are going to join our church this Sunday. I am excited as I definitely fit in there and love the people I have met. We have only been going on a regular basis since last June, but I know I want to join. My Mom is little more if-y as she has had more bad experiences with previous churches and joining and then having her beliefs denounced. She knows she wants to join the church, but is a little reluctant. However, since I am joining, she is going to too. I am excited!

For those of you who are interested (sorry, I just really need to talk to somebody about this. I am NOT trying to push beliefs or anything on you. Just sharing my own beliefs), the church we found is our local Unitarian Universalist church. I like it because it is so open and accepting of all different beliefs. We have pagans, buddhists, catholics, atheists, and christians that all meet in our church every week and get along really well. Our main belief is more in taking care of the Earth and being respectful and loving to each other. This is a "scary" idea for many people in the US, but I love it. I have met many interesting, great people. 

Well... Thanks for listening/reading my ramblings.

As Always,

Peace,
Katy

Greater Good Network

This weekend, I received my package that I ordered from the Greater Good Network. Everything on the site is handmade and is fair trade products. It is a very cool site to order things from and they have a variety of causes that you can support through your purchases. Here is the link if you are interested in learning more: GreaterGoodNetwork.

Here are some photos of the items I bought. I am very happy with them. Some of them are going to be for my sister's birthday.

A ring

Worry Dolls

Anklet from Guatemala

A mug for my sister since her favorite one broke.

A Buddha figurine. I like to collect different Buddhas and things from different faiths in the world.

I also got some pearl earrings and some really pretty rainbow, tree of life earrings. Greater Good has really cool jewelry.

Anyways, just this short post for now. Have a great week everyone!

Peace,

Katy

Spring Flowers!

Ahhh! The sweet flowers of springtime! Hooray!


Plus, to add to the wonderfulness of spring, my exams are done and I am not into my May Term (one 3 hr class for 3 weeks). It is a complicated class, but it should be ok since it is the only class I have at the moment. :) 


Babies, Babies, Babies!!!


Wow. I know tons of people who have had babies lately. I better get busy crocheting some gifts! 
- my minister
- my neighbor
- my other neighbor
- my cousin


The good news is that I have some free time now. Not much- but some. More than within the past few months. I hope to be able to crochet a little bit now. I have some blankets I want to start, but I like to make little projects so that I can actually complete them and feel like I am making progress. :D 




Anyway, here are some pictures of daisies and other flowers that are starting to bloom around my backyard. :D

 Daisies!

Common Milkweed is starting to come up in my Monarch Waystation.

A Smiling Daisy!!

Cleo chewing her rawhide. She loves to run around the yard with it. She will throw it up in the air and then wait for someone to chase her. It is quite entertaining. :)

Cleo trying to get through the trellis part of our fence. She doesn't like it when I go to the other side of the fence to take pictures of the flowers. She likes to come with me, but then she sometimes runs over to play with the neighbor dog (a great dane). So when she has to stay in the yard, she tries to get as close to me as possible and barks and whines. This is what she was doing in the above picture while I was taking photos of flowers. 

A pair of Mallard Ducks came to visit our little, tiny pond the other day. The mom hopped up to rest on the rocks to the right, but didn't leave very much room for the dad to hop up. He tried, but fell back into the water. Then he went over to the left, but the rocks are up higher, so he couldn't jump up that high. After that, he spent a few minutes flapping around in the water and then was finally able to find a spot on the rocks by the mom where they both rested for a while before leaving. 


Well, that is about all right now. I will try to get some crochet done and keep you updated on that! :)


Thanks for visiting!

As Always,

Peace


~Katy

A Quick Hello!

Hello everyone!


Just a quick post today as I haven't posted in a while. I have been very busy with school. We have our final tests next week, so the last few weeks have been a bit hectic. I have tons of projects, presentations and papers to work on. *sigh* no time for crochet at the moment. But come May, I will have a bit more time to work on projects. My college has a special term that we call May Term. For the first 3 weeks in May we only have one class, but it is 3 hours everyday. Then we are done for our summer vacation. My class will be in the morning, so I will have a fairly empty afternoon, minus work and volunteering time...
Anyway, I am looking forward to May Term just for the extra bit of free time that I should have. :)


I want to thank all of you for the nice birthday comments. :)
I had a good day. I taught a lesson in my practicum with the third graders. I brought little cupcakes and they sang to me in Spanish! I was impressed! This past Friday, my friends and I went out to a restaurant which was fun and then played board games and watched a movie until the wee morning hours. I am still a bit tired from this. However, it was a much needed break from schoolwork.


I am looking forward to starting some nice projects using some of the patterns from my new books. Plus, my boyfriend got me a yarn bag! It is pretty awesome. It has a bunch of zippered pockets. I am excited to use it. Now when I go home, Cleo (the puppy) won't be able to pull yarn out of it as easily as she can from my other bags. :) haha. Unless... she learns how to work the zippers. Hmm. She is really smart and she is constantly surprising us with the random knowledge she has. She will be a year old in the middle of May.


Anyways... I hope all of you are having a FANTASTIC start to yet another week. 
Take care and I hope to talk to all of you again soon! :)

As Always,

Peace,

Katy

Birthday Books! Yay!

It's my 21st birthday today, and thanks to all of my new yarny friends out there recommending so many cool things....

Here is what I got... :)

I also asked for yarn but was denied that request as I already have too much of it for my family's tastes. However, they decided that the books met with approval if only for the reason that it would give me a way to "use up that yarn somehow!"

I am quite excited to actually try some of the patterns and borders that so many of you talk about. Yay! Now I just have to decide (and find the time to crochet) on a pattern. Then once I am far enough, I will have to choose a border, etc. Oh.. I am not very good at decisions. 

Good thing I have all of you to recommend things to me, right?!

:D

Peace,

Katy

Crocheted Double Coaster Tutorial and Free Pattern

Hey everybody,

This is one of my favorite patterns to make. The coasters are simple and take me about 20 minutes to make. They make a quick and easy homemade gift for family and friends. I have made many of them for people and those who also crochet always ask for the pattern. Well, I decided that today would be the day for me to create a tutorial for how to make them. They aren't all that difficult, but they are a little tricky to understand without pictures. Sooo, Happy Spring and enjoy the pattern! :D

Oh.. I also apologize for some slightly blurry photos and if the pattern is confusing. This is my first tutorial. :)

**This pattern is in US crochet terms!**

*Feel Free to sell your finished items. This is an old pattern and can be found in many slightly different formats. 

This photo tutorial is mine, please link back to it if you wish to share it with others! Thanks!*

 Crocheted Double Coaster

Hook Size- 5.00 (H)

 Start by chaining 25. (If you want a nice-sized one for a hot chocolate/coffee/tea mug, then I like to chain 27 or 28).

In the first chain from the hook, single crochet 1.

 Continue sc 1 in each ch across.

Now comes the tricky part.

When you reach your very first chain, sc 1. 

Now you are going to continue around to the back side of the 25 chains. Does that make sense?

Continue with 1 sc in each ch.

Now you should be back at your first sc. 

See where the blue needle is pointing? 

Sc in this sc and in each sc around.

You should be getting a roundish type shape.

Continue to sc in each sc. 

Your coaster should kind of resemble a canoe type shape.

As you continue to sc around, your coaster will start to look like a pouch.

To see how close you are to being done, flatten in the corners of the pouch. You will be done once they meet in the middle. (This is further explained down further.)

(Above) Fold in the corners of the pouch. This shows you how many more rounds you need to do.

Keep sc around until the sides meet up in the middle. (below).

Once the sides touch, you can finish off, leaving a long tail for sewing.

Thread your yarn needle, and whip stitch your coaster closed.

Ta-Da! Easy, huh?

Now you are done, weave in your yarn ends!

This is a weird picture, but I pulled the coaster sides out after it was sewn together to try to show you the layers.

Here is the coaster from the side view.

Taa-Daa!!

Now you have a finished double coaster! I love these coasters because since they have the two layers, they are especially good at soaking up liquid/condensation from your drinking glasses in the summertime. 

I use Lily Sugar'n Cream or Peaces and Cream cotton yarns for my coasters. They come in cheerful summery colors. I can get 2 coasters from each of these skeins and have some yarn left over. 

This pattern is also a common pattern to use for potholders. Just make the square bigger (chain more at the beginning) and had a chained loop at the end. Since they are double-thick, they are great at protecting your hands from heat.

If you have questions or need help, please comment and let me know. I would be glad to help out!

Also, feel free to post pictures of your coasters in the comment section. I would love to see how your coasters turn out!

Thanks for reading! :)

P.S. - I will post the pattern without all of the side-notes and pictures soon. Stay tuned! :D

Peace,

Katy