The Magic Of A Heel

It’s amazing how small things can give you a sense of accomplishment when you have a newborn. Let’s face it, I’m not getting a lot of knitting done. This is the result of a commitment to cloth diapers (= lots of laundry and clothes line time) and being up almost every hour for two hours at a time due to a commitment to breast feeding. My sense of accomplishment with respect to knitting this week is because I turned a heel on my second-ever-knitted-in-my-lifetime sock.

Jeez, the colours are terribly displayed in these photographs.


My parents managed to hold off on the home bug until Thursday when, much to our dismay, they decided it was time to head back East. We are greedy and are hoping to see them again at the end of the month in our new home in Nova Scotia. Over the weekend, we hosted our good friends M & S and also managed to have C over as well on Saturday night. We were ‘bad’ parents and stayed up really late chatting. Bad for us as Iain had a great sleep while we chatted and laughed and he decided it was time to eat when we were getting ready for bed at 1:15 AM. It will take us several days to recover from that! We also managed to spend this afternoon with other good friends, J & M. It's been hard saying 'adieu' to so many close and wonderful friends.

The time is quickly passing. We leave Kanata/Ottawa this week – the movers come on Tuesday to start packing and should be finished by Wednesday. After house cleaning and meeting with the lawyer on Thursday, we leave on Friday morning in our 1988 VW camper van with two adults, one infant, one Border Collie and two cats for locations East. Therefore, you will notice a gap in my blogging over the next couple of weeks as we are moving to another province and I will not have computer access for a little while. However, have no fear! Once we are connected to a computer again, I'll be back!

Happy knitting and blogging! I can’t wait to catch up with you all again soon!

PS My blogaversary is coming up in August. Guess who is moving to the land of the Fleece Artist?!?

PPS Now I’m busy trying to decide how many knitting projects one girl needs for a 2.5 day road trip…with a newborn...who is breast feeding. Perhaps I'm a little naive about the amount of knitting time I may have...Hey, a girl's gotta have dreams!

Eleven Years Ago Today...

…My father, then the rector of St. Peter’s Parish in Upper Gullies, Newfoundland, married DH and me. It’s been a wonderful eleven years. We were married on another beautiful July day, much like the temperature today in Ottawa (the thunder storm yesterday broke the humidity – hallelujah!). We celebrated our wedding in my father’s church and our reception was held in The Bungalow, Bowring Park, St. John’s – a place I remember fondly as my friend and I would go swimming at the pools there together when I visited her and her family in St. John’s. In those days, L and I used to buy ice cream from the concession at The Bungalow.

I’d get married to DH again in a heartbeat. Happy 11th Anniversary, DH!

I had hoped to post to my blog at least once a week after our baby was born. Here is post number one, post-natal. I’m going to apologise in advance for all of the news I’m missing from my other blogging friends. I think Iain has some type of device put on this computer as, if I go anywhere near it, he gets upset. To be fair to Iain, he is having one fussy period a day for about 4 – 5 hours. Other than that, his nights have been pretty good with three to four hours solid sleep in between feedings. I can deal with that! However, for the moment, it does mean I may be a bit out of the blogging loop. I miss you all dearly and will read up again each chance I get.

Iain Daniel turned one week old yesterday and, I can tell you, that the week has been filled. And not just the week, most of the 24 hours of each day! Here we are enjoying a 4:00 AM feeding.


I mentioned that my parents and my in-laws were visiting. They have been fantastic with helping out in every area around the house, allowing DH and I to concentrate on our new baby. MIL turned into the grand conductor and, together with assistance from FIL and my parents, hosted a baby shower for me two nights ago. As well as a celebration of Iain's birth, the event provided the opportunity to see some friends that we won’t likely see again before we move to Nova Scotia at the end of the month and all Iain and I had to do was show up. Iain did very well and was only a bit fussy. It was incredibly hot and humid with over 30 people in our little house. I thought everyone did very well not melting into helpless pools on the floor. And the air conditioner was on bust! We were overwhelmed with our family and friend’s generosity and it was a lovely evening.

As you ‘new first baby’ veterans can probably guess, stringing two words together right now is a challenge, let alone two pointy sticks. However, if Iain continues to snooze on DH’s arm as he is doing right now,


I might get a couple of more rows of my sock knit. That’s about as much as my addled brain can handle at the moment!

Thanks to all of you folks, as well, who offered warm wishes and welcome to our little boy. We are quite smitten with him. I just know he’s a little knitter in training!

We Have A Boy!

DH and I are proud to announce the arrival of Iain Daniel!

Iain was born on July 4, 2007 at 12:19 AM at the Ottawa General Hospital. He weighed in at a hefty 8lbs 6.2 ozs and, about, 19 inches in length. We really enjoyed sharing the experience with both sets of grandparents in attendance (well, in the waiting anxiously room type of attendance).

DH, baby and I just arrived home yesterday to a front door graced with blue balloons and flowers throughout the house! It’s so nice to have two sets of grandparents here – we’ve been spoiled with house cleaning, laundry fairies and great food.

More news to follow as we get used to this very great (and wonderful) addition to our family.

While I've Been Waiting...

...This is what I’ve been working on. It’s a pressie so I don’t want to give too much away. However, here are a couple of glimpses.


It’s amazing how much more confident I’ve become with knitting techniques since beginning this project. I started it in May 2006 (and chose a pattern a few sizes too large just in case – smart Patty!) and am clueing up the final stages now. The pattern incorporates embroidery with yarn. Luckily, I’m a bit of a veteran in that arena so the embroidery, while slow, is going well. I re-taught myself how to do a three needle cast off (I even had to go back and ‘re-enliven’ the stitches I had originally bound off) and now have more practice on the mattress stitch for sewing up seams. The embroidery has to be finished before I can sew up the sleeves and I still need to knit on a collar. Once it’s gifted and received, you will see it in all its glory!


Baby considerately waited until after Canada Day so that DH, MIL, my parents and myself could go to Parliament Hill and see some of the festivities. A family friend from Edmonton was demonstrating her silver smithing (gorgeous!) so we were able to see her and her work at the Edmonton, Alberta cultural display. After returning home for supper around 6:00 PM, we left again around 9:00 PM to find a good vantage point from which to watch the Parliament Hill fireworks. Our last Canada Day in the Nation’s Capital was quite nice.

Even nicer was the fact that, when we came home for supper, DH’s father was waiting for us as a surprise! Now all prospective grandparents are in attendance. However, I think Baby might have performance anxiety as we are STILL waiting!