Have a great last day of the year!

Mine will be spent here at home...likely with a cup of yummy hot chocolate like this one.

Have a safe New Year's Eve everyone.

Hats, Hats, Hats!

I have been knitting on my Knifty Knitter loom like a mad woman since before Christmas. Now that Christmas is over the ones that were gifts have already been given so I can feel free to show them here.

Fun, fuzzy, colorful hat for my niece, So. She looked so darn cute in it too!

Simple, classic black for my grandfather.

This cute little number (it is newborn size) was knitted on the Knifty Knitter by one of my friends. This was her first knitting project ever! (And how super sweet of her to make her first project one for my babies!) She did a fantastic job!

It is neutral so they can take turns wearing it! :)

My presence on this blog may be spotty for the next few weeks. I'm going to try to post here as much as I can because I have LOTS of stuff to show you and posting here really is cathartic for me. However, there are some things going on in my family (in addition my issues and the bed rest) that come first. Please continue to pray for my entire family during this tough time. God is amazing and I know he can do wonderful things for us!

Merry Christmas!

Hope you all have a safe and happy holiday!

If you have some crafting time this snowflake project is quick, easy and produces great results. The snowflakes made following the instructions turn out much larger than I expected (the one pictured above hanging over our dining room table), but can easily be modified to make smaller snowflakes (like those below that I made into Christmas ornaments). I'm thinking of trying to make these with felt to use as more durable, reusable Christmas ornaments!

Enjoy!

A favorite project.

I was going through some of the pictures on my Blackberry today and realized that I had taken these pictures of a zip pouch I made for my Thankful Things Swap partner with intentions of blogging about it after I knew she had received it...but then I guess I forgot about it!

I made this little zip pouch out of some linen and red hounds tooth decor weight fabric I already had in my stash. The best thing about it...the monogram! I love ANYTHING that is monogrammed.

I had plans of making up a bunch of these to give as gifts this Christmas but didn't get to it...oh well...there is always next year!

My first full day of bed rest at home

Well, it is officially over...my first full day at home on bed rest. I have the best husband in the world (REALLY!) and an awesome family and I wouldn't be able to do this without them.

My day was spent in my bed (of course) with a couple hours here and there in the recliner in the living room (for change of scenery and to interact with others). DH brought down a little set of plastic organizer bins from our office to sit near my bed so I could neatly arrange my projects and to-do's. My sister Leap and niece So came to visit and brought some plastic bed table / lap trays they picked up at Michaels along with stickers and rub-ons to decorate them. We spent a couple hours this afternoon decorating our bed tables and Leap took them home to put a clear coating on top to protect our sticker work. I can't wait to get my table back now :) So also brought a calendar for me to mark off the days (to prove to myself I am making progress daily and working toward the best goal of all - healthy babies!) which they picked up at Michaels. It has a space where every month you can draw your own picture for the month and she made an awesome little picture with some stickers for January. Every time I look at it it makes me smile. I loved being able to spend time with the both of them this afternoon.

My parents stopped by for a visit too...that has been the best part so far of all this bed rest stuff...I love seeing my family and normally with my work schedule it is hard to do that.

I'm so in the Christmas movie mode. Watched Home Alone (a favorite) this afternoon while loom knitting and then watched Fred Claus this evening (it was so-so). Saving the best movie of all time (National Lampoons Christmas Vacation, of course!) for Christmas Day!

DH is still trying to find the software for my camera so I can install it on the laptop to be able to add some pictures to posts. Maybe tomorrow.

Best of all...I'm 25 weeks! Whoo-hoo!!!

More bed rest...

First of all...thank you all for your well wishes, thoughts, prayers and encouraging comments in my last post. You all are truly awesome!!! I can't express what your comments mean to me.


Unfortunately though I'm back in the bed. This past week I did take it easy but I was still working my 14 hour night shifts. The first half of the week went very well...slow and steady. However, the past two nights it all broke loose. We were slammed. So after I finished my third c-section in a row last night (one of which was an emergency) I noticed my back was hurting more than the typical being on my feet all night aches. Then there was the pelvic pressure. I can honestly say I did contemplate going back to the call room and lying down and assuring myself it would all be okay (doctors truly are the WORST patients). However, I knew something was wrong and I knew I had two little babes to look after. So, I marched myself over to triage and told the nurses they had a new patient - me. The outcome - I was contracting every 2 minutes. So now it's back to bed for me with tocolytics to stop contractions and steroids for my babes to help mature their lungs. Needless to say, 24 1/2 weeks is still way to early...so we need your prayers more than ever. We want to buy as much time as possible before their birth!


Since I will be in bed (thank goodness for wireless internet) a lot in the future, I will be able to blog more (keep on the sunny side, right?). However, unless DH will help (as I am sure he will) most of my posts may be kinda pictureless. Sorry. This little blog may take a little turn also during this time. Since I, The Stitching Surgeon, will temorarily just be a baby incubator there will be no stitching and no surgery unless something drastic changes. Since I can't climb the stairs to my sewing studio my sewing projects will be on hold (unless they can be sewn by hand). I do have some knitting up my sleeve, plan to read some books and perhaps I will even search the web for some other kind of new craft I can teach myself while I am in bed (true knitting with knitting needles and not a loom like I do or something like that...) Anyone have any ideas???

This is what bed rest will do to ya...

Sorry for the absence. My doctor had me stay on bed rest this past weekend after a test which can help predict preterm labor came back positive. All is well now though...except my husband says I didn't get a "Get out of jail free" card with the recent good news that I in fact do not have to remain on bed rest. So, I am heeding the advice I often (daily) give patients and I am learning how to take it easy. No more trips to the mall before my 14 hour night shift or cleaning the entire house top to bottom during the weekend for me. Nope. Now, I am confined to the couch or bed on my hours/days off work. And let me tell ya...after only having to be on bed rest for a weekend (3 days) it is no easy job. It is serious hard work. I now have an enormous amount of respect for those patients that I have seen spend 6 - 8 or more weeks on bed rest! Again, this is why I am taking it easy now...so I don't have to do that!

So what is a girl to do during all that time on the couch/bed...knit. Knifty Knit to be exact. I've made this cowl you see above, baby hats, a baby blanket for baby boy (I'm working on baby girl's), washcloths and I still have plans for many other things to make. I will take more pictures soon and show you all those projects. I have big plans to make a hat to match this cowl. I can't wait. I love this Knifty Knitting stuff.

This past Sunday we celebrated "Happy Viability Day!" with some ice cream cake. 24 weeks! Whoo-hoo! Sorry about the bad picture...taken with the BlackBerry...I was at work when DH brought the cake so we could celebrate and I never have a good camera there!

Please remember to keep me and my babes in your prayers and thoughts! We always need 'em!
Have a great day everyone!

Holiday happiness

Don't you love it when you can take something like this...

and turn it into this...

Our tree has been up for a little over a week now and I am lovin' every minute of it.

I have some advent wreath pictures/advent blogging to catch up...perhaps later today or tomorrow...also still need to blog the cute little trio of trees. :)

Enjoy the season everyone!

Baby, it's cold outside...

Snow...icicles...18 degree weather...
I love it!

Lot's of "making" going on over here...it's a shame I can't post 99% of it because some of those who view my blog would then know what they are getting for Christmas. However, I took some time today to make a cute trio of trees that I must photograph in better light tomorrow morning to share with you.

Hope you are all having a very merry weekend!

It's like a mini-factory over here

I set up my embroidery machine and while it is working I am hard at work on my Bernina.

I'm just "sew" efficient.

Holiday Pillow

One button tufted holiday pillow complete. I love the neutral-ness of this pillow. The ivory background and gold snowflake design (found in my stash) will easily allow me to use it all the way through January. Now...to find time to make another...

Creepy...

While working to winterize our back yard on Friday DH discovered this lurking under one of our fountains...

Of course, then he called for me and the camera!

Take a closer look...

See that red hourglass on the underbelly of this HUGH black spider. Take a look at this picture I found on the internet...

It is a Black Widow Spider!!!
I was freaking out...I hate spiders. Especially dangerous ones like this one that can cause painful and medically serious bites! But of course...that didn't stop me from snapping away with the camera. Don't worry...I kept my distance...I used the mega telephoto zoom lens. :)

Post-turkey frenzy

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with lots of good food and time with family and/or friends. We had a wonderful holiday. It is hard to believe but this is the first Thanksgiving I have been able to celebrate with my family in 3 years! I am usually always the one on call on Thanksgiving Day...so this year being surrounded by those I love was an extra special treat. Plus, we had a huge Wii-fest after the turkey...it was great fun.

Since then, it has been a flurry of activity here at my house. I did venture out for a while on Black Friday (though I did not go to the mall...that place was a zoo!) to visit the sales at Jo-Ann's, Michaels and A.C. Moore to pick up some supplies for the many projects that I must finish before Christmas. Then, yesterday afternoon we went to pick out our Christmas tree - our annual day-after-Thanksgiving tradition. Gosh, does it make our house smell fantastic! We are letting the branches settle out and then we will decorate the tree this afternoon/evening.

All the while, between running errands all day yesterday we managed to clean more of our upstairs office and my studio, hang all the Christmas lights outside and start winterizing the back yard (more on that later...what we found during that adventure deserves a post of it's own). DH even made delicious pasta for dinner!

Well, I'm off to start working on a new advent calendar for us. I only have 2 days to finish it!

I'm thankful...

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Before rushing off to all the dinners with family and friends today I wanted to take a few minutes to reflect on this past year. I have been so blessed and I am so thankful for many, many things...health, family, a loving husband. I am especially thankful for my two little babies on the way! I decided to look back at some of my photos of this past year and put together a little post on some of the things that I am very thankful for this past year. Here goes...

2008 in review

I am thankful for the places I have been and the things I have seen...

Peruvian Countryside

Machu Picchu, Peru

Aguas Calientes, Peru

Great Smokey Mountains National Park, Tennessee

Camden, Maine

I am thankful for time spent with family...which also usually involved great food...

My grandmas "30-day" cake...mmm

Shepherd's Pie...one of my husband's favorites

Making brownies with So-so

I am thankful for my new camera and the way it (and this bloggy world) has made me look at documenting my life in an entire new way...

Egg delivery truck in Lima, Peru (non-refrigerated!)

This photo by my amazingly talented sister.

I am thankful for my kitty Chloe...she always is so loving and silly...

Bird watcher

Trying to sneak up on the camera

She is so funny when she lays on her back!

I am thankful for my sewing machine and all the crazy projects we share...

Teaching my nephew to sew

A softie...yes...it is a uterus with ovaries :)

I am thankful for the biggest blessing of the year...

We presented this picture to our in-laws as our way of announcing our surprise!

How cute are they??? This was taken last week and it is a picture of their two little heads resting side-by-side. A and B are labelled.

I hope you all have a wonderful holiday...and take time to be thankful.

So, what are you thankful for???

Thankful Things Swap

Who doesn't love pulling in their driveway and seeing a package sitting by the front door???

I recently participated in the Thankful Things Swap (my very first ever swap...and my swap partner was a newbie too!) hosted by Adrienne. It was so fun! My swap partner, Curiouser & Curiouser, sent me the most amazing package of stuff she is thankful for...just take a look at all this awesome stuff!

A pack of assorted stationary, cute little stickers, handmade pushpins made of buttons (so sweet!), cookies, lotion, lip balm, grossgrain ribbon, a "green" shopping tote...

a mixed CD of really great songs, cute glittery little box (that now houses my paper clips on my desk), a handmade little pouch for my purse... It really was such a great experience. The swap made me really think of creative ways to express things I am thankful for...and reading my swap partners little cards attached to each token was really cool. It was like an early Christmas. I loved every little thing in my package.

It was all over the top. I'm loving this swappin' stuff.