Happy Early Mother's Day To Me!

my teas from around the world

Please note: this is a sponsored post. I am being compensated for sharing this information with you, but as always, all thoughts and opinions are my own!

The year is flying by quickly and Mother's Day is quickly approaching - the end of this week!

This year I got an early Mother's Day gift thanks to the folks at UncommonGoods. They approached me and offered to send my a gift in exchange for this post (but as always, all thoughts and opinions are my own). So I headed over to the site and looked at some of the gift guides that they have already curated for mothers.

I browsed this list, then I browsed this list. And I hemmed and I hawed. The adorable bowls to hold yarn to knit really called out to me, but at the end of the day, I picked this lovely tea set. Both of my daughters love to drink tea and we often make a cup for ourselves and then a cup for each other. So in the spirit of Mother's Day and to be able to share with 2/3rds of the reason I am a mother, I decided to pick a tea set for UncommonGoods to send me. I was so impress by this company, that ON MY OWN (to clarify, the mug was not a gift to me from UncommonGoods, I purchased it myself), I purchased this healing stone mug in red for myself.

our two cups steeping

My packages arrived just a few days later and we opened it up and whipped up some tea right away! I let the oldest pick the first tea and she went with the Genmaicha from Japan. We were a little worried it would be stronger than what we were used to it, but it was perfect. I put a bit of honey in mine and was in love. Definitely going to the top of my tea list.

 Last night, after freezing for my daughter's softball game, I came home and whipped up another cup of tea for us. This time we went with the Butterfly of Taiwan. I thought it would help warm me up. Plus, the tube conveniently told me it was a good bedtime tea, so I whipped up a cup, and once again: so good. I'm so glad I picked this tea set for us all to enjoy!

My new mug with a perfectly steeped cup of tea

I am in love with this company and so glad I learned about them. Right away when I went visited the UncommonGoods website, I was struck by how much good the company is trying to do. First of all, half of everything they sell is made by hand. That is amazing. And you all know, how much I love things made by hand. There are so many talented artisans working with UncommonGoods to sell their wares. Which I think is just fabulous!

I was also impressed by their responsibility to the environment. Many products are made from recycled materials. Nothing they sell has harmed animals (which is the thing that excited the vegetarian and deep animal lover in our house the most!).

And then, when you check-out, you get to give a dollar to one of the four organizations that UncommonGoods supports. But, no, you don't give a dollar, the company gives a dollar. Nothing is added to your total. When I purchased my mug, I picked to donate to Women For Women International. You can also donate to RAINN, American Forests, and City Harvest.

my new mug with my new tea. They taste better together!

So, I bought a mug and was able to support an artisan here in the states and support Women for Women International and felt pretty good about myself. Plus, I got a beautiful mug that I'm positive makes my tea taste even better!

It's possible I'm so in love with UncommonGoods that I might want to work for them now myself. Well as I don't live in New York, I can't work there, but I can pretend that I do by visiting their blog and learn about the people who do work for them. Or take some virtual studio tours with some of the artisans who sell to them. And the whole time dream of having my own lovely studio to knit and sew and craft in (because if I'm going to dream, I should dream big, right?).

Anyway, if it seems like Mother's Day is sneaking up on you, head on over to UncommonGoods and browse this gift guide or this gift guide. I'm sure you will find some pretty beautiful things for the mother in your life! As long as you buy by Thursday, May 10, you can get it by Mother's Day!

On holidays, gifts, and cancer

our mantle

So. It's December.

The month of Christmas.

Christmas is a big deal in this house.

It is my goal each year to give my family the perfect Christmas.

Several years ago, a perfect Christmas looked a lot different than it does this year.

For a few years I made the pajamas the kids would wear for Christmas morning. I tried to also make everyone at least one handmade gift. I baked dozens and dozens of cookies. Every inch of my house was decorated. We strung popcorn on thread and put it around the tree. Gingerbread houses were made. Crafts were done. Ornaments were made.

All of this equated to me not sleeping much during December. It left me stressed and frazzled and overwhelmed. There were probably enough tears to water our Christmas tree.

It was fun. But it was a lot of work. And at the end of the day, the perfect Christmas, probably wasn't so perfect for those in my family who were dealing with the fall-out of me being tired, stressed, and fretting when things didn't turn out completely perfect.

Sigh.

I'm tired just thinking about it frankly.

It took cancer to realize that maybe it was time to streamline things and focus on the parts I wanted and let go of the ones that were stressing me too much.

White Christmas and knitting

The Christmas of 2011 left me pretty much unable to do, oh, everything. That year my husband, bless him, was in charge of Christmas. I was sick, dealing with an infection for most of the month that wasn't actually diagnosed until December 23 in which I underwent emergency surgery. I had already been in the hospital earlier in the month. I was tired, in pain, and spent a lot of time in bed. I don't think I participated in Christmas hardly at all to be honest.

And I hated it. Except I was too tired to hate it as much as I should have.

2012 was better. Except I still feeling tired, run down, exhausted. I was dealing with the iron issues and bleeding and anemia. I didn't spend most of the month in bed, but I spent my fair share of time napping.

Last year was a lot better. Still exhausted, but able to shop and bake and do things.

It was good.

This year will be good too.  I'm still exhausted, still dealing with some chronic pain, but I'm here and I can be present.

That is a present in itself.

And I've learned to cut back. Because you know what? The couple years where I wasn't able to really do much (not by choice), an amazing thing happened .... the sun still rose, and the kids still had a good Christmas, and so did I (well, provided I divorce the holiday from the medical things going on).

We buy pajamas now. I make almost no gifts - just a couple as I can. I will still bake an obscene amount of cookies - because that is important to me to keep it on the list.

But I'm also spending a fair amount of time hanging out on the couch watching Christmas movies. We've watched White Christmas, Muppets Christmas Carol, Santa Paws 1 and 2, and some other movies. It's been lovely.

We are hosting Christmas Eve and bless my husband, he set-up for a cleaning service to come get the house cleaned. We pretty much never have anyone else come clean, so this is awesome.

I'm doing Christmas cards this year ... which I haven't done in a while. They are pricey and a lot of money. But I got them on-sale, they are postcard cards, and they will double as "we've moved" cards (which I never sent out).

Our gorgeous tree!

This might be the most relaxed about Christmas that I've felt since being a child.

It is lovely.

Because in 20 years I don't want to look back and think about how stressed I was this time of the year, I want to remember being happy, despite anything else going on in our life, whatever that may be.

But don't mistake me. Getting sick may have allowed me to step back and see that there is more to the perfect Christmas than I what I previously thought, but there is not one ounce of me that will ever. And I mean EVER. I will never call cancer a gift.

I know, I can my hear my husband in my head "Never say never. Or always." but no, I can say never here. Cancer was not a gift. That is, as I've said before, not to say some good things came out of that time period - new appreciations, new friends, new relationships, and changing how things were done to make it better. There were good moments, good things, but none of that will ever make me think of cancer as a gift.

I've got a lot of gifts in my life. Mostly a fabulous family and some awesome friends, who are there whether everything I give is handmade, or lovingly picked out from a store. I have good memories with my kids, some beautiful holiday moments. Those are my gifts. And I plan to appreciate them as much as possible this holiday season.

Hats: The Sequel

I also made a batch of hats for another friend.

She too needed the hats because of the side effects of cancer.

[Side note: cancer sucks]

She requested autumn colors, and maybe an orange that doesn't look like a pumpkin.

She also asked for one hat. So I knit her one. Then another. And another. Because I didn't want one hat to get lonely while being shipped!

Special Knitting

A few weeks ago I read a terribly sad story on facebook. About a new baby, Olivia, who was coming into this world, but because of genetic issues -  trisomy 18 - discovered in testing, this baby will not be with us long.

And my heart crumbled into a lot of pieces. I thought of her family - nuclear and extended. And I thought of her mom, someone I went to high school with. And have remained connected through facebook.

I have never been in this position and I won't even try to pretend I understand or imagine what those closest are thinking or feeling.

So, I did what I know how to do. I started knitting. I knit and knit. Because I knew that time wasn't on my side, so I knit and knit.

I took that blanket everywhere with me. And put my heart and soul and as many good thoughts as I could into that blanket. Because whether this blanket is used for a few hours, or longer, Olivia, I felt deserved nothing less than any other baby.

And so a blanket was knit.

As an afterthought I whipped up a medium sized preemie hat. Because again, I felt strongly in my heart that this precious baby needed a hat.

I sent the blanket and hat off. And just felt so much that I wish I could do so much more.

When I knit things for people, I do it with a lot of care. Unless, a specific pattern is requested, I will easily spend 3, 4, 5 hours finding just the right pattern. And I walk around the yarn store looking for just the right yarn. It is important to me that I try to make things just right.

Yet, in the case of rough times, or bad news - knitting feels so lacking. It doesn't feel like enough.

But it's what I can do. So I do it the best I can.

The blanket arrived to my friend Heather yesterday. And the thank you note I received left me in tears. I think if I ever doubt that knitting is not enough, I'm going to go back and reread that.

Because when I knit, it doesn't magically fix things, or heal people, or repair broken hearts. But it does mean something, and that counts.

That is what I will hold onto. My gift in life may be the ability to knit. And while it's not curing cancer, or getting people on Mars, or making sure no child goes hungry anywhere, maybe just bringing comfort to people, or putting a smile on their face, well that is enough. On this day. In this moment. It is enough.

This is a lesson for all of us. We all have different gifts and talents. Use yours, whatever they may be, even if it doesn't feel like enough. You just never know who you will touch. 

If you have some prayers or good thoughts to spare for Heather, Nathan, and Olivia, I'm sure they would appreciate them. You can also watch Heather and Nathan (two very talented musicians) discuss this a little bit in this video. Thank you.

What's that? A hat?

I've been knitting a lot of hats lately!

The first batch went to a friend who recently moved from Chicago to Michigan. Due to treatment for her metastatic breast cancer, she has lost her hair.

So I whipped up some hats for her! She requested dark colors/black. So I made a black/light blue, two grays, one navy, and two black hats.

Anyway, without fanfare ... here are the hats!

 

 

 

 

Waves

It's been a bit of a long week around here. While I haven't had any more awful migraines, I've pretty much had a constant headache all week. Thankfully, the medicine I have has kept it from being more.

Earlier this week, I joked, that I was feeling so awful I wasn't even knitting. It's a good way to gauge how I'm feeling for sure!

While it's true that I haven't been knitting much this week, I did recently finish a blanket that I am just in love with.

This blanket was sent off to a beautiful little girl. Yes, I know it's blue. Yes, I know that little girls traditionally get much pink. No, this is not a statement on trying to blur gender color lines.

This blue was deliberately chosen for this specific little girl.

You see I met her parents kayaking last year. It was clear they love the water. It was clear they shared their love of the water with their children. And I knew, when the new baby arrived, she too, would be exposed to the water.

So, when picking out yarn, I was drawn to the blue. This shade in particular reminded me of my kayaking trip. So I decided, hey, why not go with blue.

After that I searched for a good pattern. I wanted something "pretty" as I felt blue was a bit untraditional. And that's when I stumbled upon this lovely blanket with cables and lace, I just knew it was the right one.

The cabling and lace reminded me of waves in the water. And I just thought this blanket with this pattern will be perfect, so I set off to knit it.

Now, cables aren't my favorite to knit, but I love how they look. This blanket is no disappointment there. The cables look lovely.

I'm so pleased with how this blanket turned out. I hope this blanket reminds the family of water!

Writing Tour Update

First, forgive me, as I'm a bit late to share this with you!

When I participated in the Blog Tour a few weeks ago, I tagged two fellow bloggers that I love: Angie and Carol Anne. I told you when they answered the questions, that I would share with you!

So here I am, finally remembering to do so!

Carol Anne wrote about it here.
Angie wrote about it here.

I hope you'll take a few minutes to go learn some things about them. I loved reading their posts and learning more about how they write and create.

On another note, I now have in my possession, things that both these amazing ladies created. When I was in chemo, Angie sent me this lovely piece of embroidery. I can't tell you how much it cheered me up and just made me feel so good inside. I was lucky that a lot of people wrapped their arms around me and often sent little notes, cards, books, scarves, gifts to me. And this is one of the lovely items I received. Before we moved, it was in our living room, so I could see it every day! We haven't found a home for it in the new house, but I'm working on it. I snagged a wall and talked to the husband about filling it with all sorts of lovely things that inspire me (as I can see it from my sewing/craft area).

Another thing that will be going on that wall is this lovely cardinal photograph. Carol Anne took this picture and sent me a copy. As I said before, I love her photography and I'm SO excited that I will have one of her gorgeous photographs hanging on my wall. As a bonus, cardinals are extra special to me, so I couldn't ask for a better photograph to put on my wall. It just arrived at the end of last week, so I need to get it framed so I can get it hung!

This connection that I have to both of these woman, who I've never met in person, is real and is deep and I'm so grateful for it. This is the beauty of blogging, of being on twitter, of social media for me - it's the connections I've made with other people. They are priceless. Sometimes things are so different, and yet, there is always something there to connect us. Sometimes there are a lot of things there to connect us and we can joke that we must have been separated at birth! Sometimes I like to joke that my computer is really important to me because all my friends live in it, and while they all don't, a good number of them do. I've got some pretty amazing people in my life because of the internet!

A wee bit of crocheting

While knitting will always be number one in my heart, I do sometimes like to take a break and get some crocheting done. I especially like to do some crochet for baby blankets, and so I whipped this lovely blanket up a few months ago.

This blanket was especially important for me to make. I can't say why here, but I can say this: all the stars aligned and the making of this blanket was perfect. And will always feel a bit special to me.

Even though this blanket is going to a little girl, I wanted to make it gender neutral, in case that little girl gets some siblings someday and mom will want to wrap the next baby up. Also, I looked at the gift registry and saw the bedding they picked had a lot of brown in it. It was both, but the first reason sounds so much more romantic, right?

Anyway, this blanket whipped up pretty quickly. I added one more repeat of the pattern so it would be a bit bigger. (I do that a lot because I want these blanket to last for longer than the newborn phase). It was an easy pattern to follow and nice to make. I did misread the pattern at first so I had to restart it once, but thankfully I figured it out pretty quickly!

I love this blanket. Here are the details:

• Pattern name: Peter (you need a ravelry account to view it. Which, if you knit or crochet you should have. And it's free, so win-win!). 
• Yarn used: Caron simply soft ... I think 4, I didn't pay attention
• Hook: H
• Modifications: added one more repeat of the pattern to the width of the blanket

Overall, I'm really pleased with how this blanket turned out! 

A bit o' knitting

Pine Forest Baby Blanket

These days, it seems like all I knit are baby blankets and shawls. Mostly because I have been pretty much knitting blankets and shawls.

Thankfully, I love knitting these two things. And since it seems like everyone I know is having baby this year, there are lots of blankets that need to be made.

One blanket I knit was for a little girl who will be arriving in October. This precious baby will be her parent's first baby, which is a pretty special time for everyone. Every baby is special - I know, and I don't mean to imply something else - but a first baby is different because there's so much you just don't know yet!

Close-up of the stitches

Anyway, I decided to make the Pine Forest Baby Blanket (side note: you must be a member of ravelry to see this. And if you knit or crochet, I highly recommend you join, especially since it's free. And no, no one is paying me or comping me or anything to me to say this!)

I knit it up in Caron Simply Soft. I use this yarn often, which some of you have picked up on. It's soft, it's pretty, I've found it holds up well, and most importantly to me to give to parents-to-be, it's machine washable. Because who has time to hand wash and air dry a baby blanket with a sweet new baby in the house? Well, I certainly didn't.

I also knit it with a size 9 needle (one up from what the pattern recommends) and I added extra stitches to make it longer. I cast on 144 stitches and was really happy with it. I don't know how many rows I did, I just went until the yarn almost ran out (4 skeins) and when it looked big enough, but not too big.

I'm happy with how it turned out, though I'm not sure my pictures do the blanket justice.

My son holding it up for me!

The fun thing about this blanket is that I knit it EVERYWHERE. Mostly because the shower was coming up and I was running out of time. But this blanket was worked on at the pool, at the library, at softball games (both professional and when my daughters played), at lacrosse practice, in the car (not while I was driving, in case you think I'm that crazy!)

I'd like to think that as that blanket traveled around with me, that someday the baby who uses it will get to travel often, but yet not too far from home. That she might get to do a lot of fun things, have great times, and create some memories with her family and friends! I don't know if it's silly to think this way, but it is how I think and it makes me smile. Well, knitting in general makes me happy, so thinking good thoughts is just a bonus!

Blue!

So, I told you there were lots of babies coming soon and I had been busy making baby blankets!

Shortly after Christmas we had a double baby shower to go to - two of my cousins, both expecting, due very close together! One cousin knew that her and her husband would be welcoming a baby boy, so I set out to make a nice blanket. I used some of the same blue/white mix I used to make some blankets last year because I loved working with it so much. I searched ravelry for the perfect pattern and landed on this lovely crocheted blanket!

The yarn is bernat baby - the main part is a blue/white mix and the border is just blue. I worked with I think an H hook? I'm not 100 percent sure on that, but it's probably close enough!

This pattern was nice - easy to remember and I think turned out lovely.

The second blanket needed to be unisex because we weren't sure if there would be a little boy or girl coming. I had a yellow blanket that I had made last year, just waiting for a baby who needed it. So I washed it, wrapped it, and found it a new home.

Unfortunately, I didn't take pictures of this blanket. It was knit from a book I own (and have made several blankets from). I knit it with two strands of yarn - one yellow and one white, so it's nice and neutral but not bright yellow.

Now I have a blanket to finish for a girl who was born not too long ago and am eagerly awaiting another baby's birth. I'm not sure if there will be a little girl or a little boy to knit for, so I'm going to try to make two blankets and give whichever one works best!

I love all these babies coming. I love making beautiful things for the littlest among us. There's something about it that makes me happy - it's life affirming really. New babies, families growing, so much happiness. It's lovely.

Phantom of the Opera

First let me say, I am the luckiest mom ever. For real.

Phantom of the Opera is currently in Chicago. I LOVE Phantom of the Opera, which shouldn't be too hard to imagine because I love a lot of musicals.

Phantom holds a special place in my heart though. When I was 8th grade - in a new school, in a new district, after leaving all my old friends and feeling kind of lost and alone - I was in choir. I had been in choir at my old school and loved it and knew I wanted to do it at the new school as well. For one of our concerts we sang Music of the Night. I didn't really know about musicals, plays, etc - I mean, I knew they existed but I didn't get it yet. But, I thought this song was so beautiful. When I learned it came from a show with more songs? Well, I checked it out further and fell in love. This led me to learn about other famous broadway musicals and started my love for singing them with dreams of seeing them live on stage someday!

When the husband and I were still dating, he took me to see Phantom. It wasn't my first trip downtown to see a stage production, but it was an important one. I know that musicals aren't my husbands first love, or even in top 10, but he took me. He went with me. He would do it again. I already knew he was my true love but that just cemented it.

Anyway, fast forward. Last year we saw Phantom was coming back to Chicago. I had little hopes of seeing it - a lot happened last year and so I didn't even consider trying to see if I could get tickets to go.

Christmas morning. My 14 year old had been telling me leading up to Christmas that I was getting the best present ever from her (you know where this is going, right?). I honestly thought I was getting a Doctor Who shirt (like my 11yo got me) or something similar. So I opened her present and it was a ticket to go see Phantom of the Opera with her!

I was SO excited. It was just going to be the two of us. We just had to wait until Feb 1, the dates she was able to get tickets to, to see it. Now, my daughter has never seen it and didn't really know the music - just what the commercials showed. She had been avoiding it, wanting to hear it for the first time in the theater.

So almost 3 weeks ago, during another snow storm, we boarded the local train and went into the city. We went to a fabulously great dinner - where we were the only ones in jeans, but they sat us so the dress code wasn't strict, but we felt slightly out of place. We indulged in the most decadent dessert and then headed to the show.

Let me tell you, the show does not disappoint. If you live in/near/close to Chicago, call and try to get tickets somehow. They did a fabulous job! The actors and actresses - amazing. The singing - perfect. The orchestra - perfection. The dancing - beautiful. This is an amazing production of the show. Granted, I have only seen one other production, but this had it's own spin on it. Sometimes I get nervous seeing something the second time when it's a "new" production because it could be too different. But this was done perfectly - not the same, but not so much change that you felt they did it just to be different. It made sense and was done so well. I loved the set - how it rotated to be different rooms. Just so amazing!

Sitting there, in the Cadillac Palace Theater, my daughter by my side, both of us having a great time. It was priceless. Except, it wasn't. My daughter saved up and spent her hard-earned money to take me. She's 14. She doesn't always want to be seen in public with me (which I get, I remember being 14), so it was even more special to me.

The night was perfect (even though we actually lost the tickets they mailed to us, had to call and have them reprint for us to pick up at the box office and I thought I was going to have a panic attack and die when we realized the tickets were lost but now we have a funny story to tell so it all worked out in the end). My daughter got to see Phantom for the first time. I was reminded of why I fell in love with it when I was almost the exact same age she is right now. I'm not sure it gets any better than that.

These memories. This is what I want my kids to remember in 30 years - these moments that were so perfect, even in their imperfections. Not that I yelled too much or was sick too much or waited to long to do the laundry, but that we could go and enjoy Phantom (or whatever other shared love we find) and have a great night.

Baby blankets

There are quite a few babies coming soon and so, I've had to buckle down and make quite a few blankets!

This, of course, makes me very happy. Because babies - are so cute and are even cuter when you aren't the one waking up with them during the night. And because I love to knit. I've been crocheting a bit too. I'm excited to report that crochet is starting to feel more and more natural to me. I'm not sure it will ever be as natural as knitting, but it's getting there which makes me smile!

Anyway, a friend expecting a baby girl recently had a shower. I poured over patterns at etsy and picked just the right blanket to make her. Then I picked a second just the right blanket to make her, since both patterns called out to me!

First up is this darling blanket. The pattern is free and can be found here. However, I cast on 137 stitches to make the blanket larger. I used caron simply soft in pink and a size 10 needle and was so pleased at how it turned out!

{Please note: I forgot to take pictures so I literally took the ones I'm sharing in my car like 15 minutes before the shower started. So they aren't the best, but hopefully they aren't the worst LOL}

The second blanket was a ripple blanket with 3 colors. Again, I found the pattern on ravelry. However, I won't link to it. The pattern was wrong - something was off. I don't know enough about crochet to know it was wrong, but I knew enough to realize it was off. The decrease/increase (to make the ripple effect) weren't lining up, so I had to do a bit of tinkering to get it, but I pulled it off and I think it turned out so cute.

Again, I used caron simply soft yarn - I like this because it's soft, can be machine washed/dried and usually I can find the color I want! I used an H hook I think and two rows of each color.

I'm so pleased with how these blankets turned out! I would make them again in a heartbeat. They were fun to make and didn't take too long. I also think they both look great! If I had a little baby, I'd wrap her up in them in a heartbeat!

A few of my favorite things!

I didn't make much for Christmas this year. I just knew I needed to be pressure-free and while I love making things to give to people, it can be stressful to finish everything on time! Plus, with my energy being non-existent, I was worried I just wouldn't have the energy to finish things.

I did manage to make two blankets though, and I LOVED them both. It was hard to give them away, but alas, I managed too!

The first blanket was crocheted. I had worked on it for almost two months. It is my first granny square project and I might just be in love with granny squares now!

The pattern I used can be found here {note: you must be a member to see it, but membership is free}. The pattern is actually for a baby blanket, and this blanket did not go to a baby, so I actually made 4 blankets and put them together to make the blanket big enough! I also changed the edging ever-so-slightly! I just love how this blanket came together. And there will definitely be more granny squares in my future!

I knitted another blanket too. This blanket was for a grab-bag gift exchange and knit up pretty quickly (which was good, since I started it very close to Christmas LOL!)

The yarn was variegated and the pattern came on the yarn package. It was quick to learn and one of those patterns that you don't really need to look at!

Again, I made the blanket larger than the pattern called for, which was good. I don't think I would have been happy with the size if I had just followed the pattern 100%. I'm actually working on a twin sister blanket right now. Not quite sure what I will do with it, but I'm sure I'll figure something out!

xoxo,
Brandie

P.S. I pre-wrote this before surgery so the blog wouldn't sit empty!