There hasn’t been a lot of crafting (although I may have learned to knit two socks at once…) because I’ve been learning Dreamweaver – web design, etc… It’s pretty interesting and a fun way to get to play with design.

Fall is beautiful in the mountains though. And there has been a lot of enjoying the fall.
All photo credits go to The Boy this post.

it snowed all day friday…so we built a snowman! i love the pepper mouth. We’ve had so much snow the ski company has started uploading the new stuff so The Boy’s shots are first up!

I finished the matching socks for Baby Girl. It was super fun to knit little socks because they go fast! It’s definitely a little silly – matching socks – but her little chubby morning legs look a lot cuter in the socks than mine!

My mom sent Baby Girl some new clothes for fall. Of course, of everything she sent we are both most in love with this t-shirt from appaman.

Snow Sept 16, originally uploaded by cafe crafty.

It snowed here Saturday morning…. It had snowed on the mountains, but this was the first snow at our elevation (about 8,200 feet).

It was 38 degrees when we woke up…definitely a little cold for September – but this weekend was the Hot Air Balloon Festival. The Boy took tons of pictures! I tried to take Baby Girl in the balloon just for a 50 foot tethered ride, but as soon as they started the fire (it’s really loud!) she had Daddy grab her out. He was still able to get a picture of me which was nice. (I’m not in that red balloon on the right, but it was a great shot!) Baby Girl loved getting her face painted and playing in the bounce house at 8:30 in the morning.

The aspen’s are really starting to peak – the golden yellow is beautiful…so in came the snow to be sure we don’t forget what comes next!

My friend and I submitted our books to ‘500 Books’. They do books about everything – 500 baskets, 500 figures in clay, etc… It would be so fun to get into a book! 

Monday night I invited some girlfriends over to knit, eat, drink wine – chat! It was a lovely night. The Boy made the most amazing food. For starters we had sweet potato empanadas, wild salmon cakes and roasted edamame. For dinner he made fresh roasted acorn squash soup and handmade green chile tortilla soup (with roasted chiles from the farmer’s market!). The food was fabulous! I know we all ate too much. I made pear tarts too and almost everyone had dessert. There was a little knitting, some yarn winding and a lot of talking and drinking. After cooking for hours The Boy even took care of the girls so the mom’s could knit for a little bit. The whole night was really special. It was great to get back into knitting with fall just outside. I think we’ll do it again in November before the holiday rush.

As a side note – I’ve been crafting a little less – so I can devote more time to learning html and web design. The Boy gets some call for it in his business and I’ve really been enjoying helping with the design work. One of the biggest choices each time is picking colors – which I love! The ReadyMade blog linked to Eric Meyer’s blog today and a tool he created called the Color Blender. Plug in two colors (hex or rgb) and it shows you a spectrum in between – easy and fun!

It doesn’t rain here that much – except this weekend. It rained most of the weekend and Baby Girl and The Boy both had colds.

The scrub oaks on the hillside opposite our house have almost all turned – yellows, ochres, burnt orange – it’s really beautiful, but I don’t want fall to move to fast.

We spent a lot of time inside making up games, etc… Standard for winter, but tough on the imagination after having such an easy summer of always playing outside. We wrapped the table so we could all paint and draw. The Boy and I ended doing all the drawing while Baby GIrl walked away to play games. It’s funny how often we find ourselves playing alone while she’s moved on to other things.

I made a Fluffy Apple Pancake from one of the Moosewood cookbooks late one morning (11-ish).
It was really easy and delish! A great fall breakfast. (I was a little sad… when I took it out of the oven it was all puffy and beautiful. When I came back a few minutes later it had collapsed. It still tasted good, but it would be nice to keep it all puffy and lovely.)

With all of us around the house all weekend I was able to start knitting again too! Baby Girl has wanted a pair of socks to match mine ever since I made them last March. So the truth is that we spent most of the weekend trying the sock on. Every couple rows she would ask to put the sock on. She had great fun!

She even asked me to show her how to knit. She’s just 3, but I know some kids learn at 4 and 5 years old. We tried, but honestly – neither of us had the patience.

I love fall!

 
I am so excited to have a swift and winder. It just arrived today and I waited for Baby Girl to go to bed to use it. I love it!!!

***There were no directions with the swift and I thought I must be missing something because I thought it was a fuss…and then I realized I was beyond goofy…the second ball was much faster to wind then the first… 

I mentioned previously that I made some new gocco cards for a fundraiser for Baby Girl’s school. She attends the Little Red Schoolhouse 3 days a week.

It’s an actual 100 year old schoolhouse about a block from where I work. The arts center I work at sits on a 100 year old sheep ranch and the wife of the rancher was the teacher at the little red. We live in a small town with a lot of history.

I turned this picture into two screens for my gocco printer. I love making gocco cards – the simple clean lines and bold fields of color really appeal to my aesthetic. I also really like when the screens are a little mis-aligned.

Today on 43 folders (a site I love to pretend is helping me be better at work) Merlin linked to this way cool Official Seal Generator. I had so much fun coming up with a button for my site!

I so enjoyed participating in back-tack iii that I was sad to see the list in the end of those who didn’t receive anything. When they asked for angels to come in and make something for those that got left I was happy to do so. Nicole and Alison gave me Ampersand Duck as my angel partner. They also told me that I didn’t have to follow the rules. I hadn’t made anything yet from Hillary’s Put-Together book yet so I made the bunny. I’m really happy with how she turned out (and Ducky wrote a lovely post when she received my box all the way in Australia)!

I made the bunny all in orange wool felt and then gave her a green dress to tie on. The dress is a green flannel lined with red wool felt to match the shoes. I altered Hillary’s heart shoes to have flowers to match the ribbon on her dress. There are some detail shots over at flickr.

I am in love with premium postcard. I first saw it written up on the Ready Made blog. I had to try it right away. I upload a couple of pictures and write any text I want. Then they print it onto a postcard and send it out for me to any address I want – for 84 cents! I think it’s genius! Whenever I feel like I need to send a little note to friends or family I can make a really cute card in a minute or two without leaving my desk – I love it! This is the proof of the card I just made…

somtimes i’m sure i’m not making anything…and then i’m suprised to find i did…

our preschool had an auction fundraiser last week and i printed gocco cards of the school and made a pillow. here’s a sneak peek of the card… (in my back tack angel box on its way to australia!)

I’ve noticed with August here that a lot of people are taking a blogging break. With the craziest time of the year at work I feel like a break, but I had to post two blogg-y goings on…
I’m excited to be an angel for back-tack iii to ampersand duck. it’s been so fun to read her blog (especially since I make books too), and I’m excited to send something off to Australia. Silly – but true. So I’ve started making her a creature from Hillary’s pattern book (completely ignoring the original back-tack rules since they said I could). I have a couple different softies going at once, so Baby Girl and I will decide in then end which one goes to Australia.

I’m also excited to be signed up for Yarn Aboard II for my knitterly side – Amanda has to be the nicest person I’ve never met!. I’m thinking socks this holiday season…