*BREAK!

Oh it's nice to be home and sleep in (and stay up late too ;-) ). I've already baked some coffee toffee bars. You all know what those look like. I've also been knitting away and finished Christmas gifts just in the nick of time. I'm working on my friend Nicole's socks now. They are toe up and are a little difficult at the heel part right now. But once I'm past that it will be smooth sailing.

Still no digital camera, so I will take pictures once I get to Best Buy and buy one. I so want to take a picture of my NEW beautiful YARN BOWL! I have a knitting bowl- it's so cool. It holds my yarn while I work on a project and I just love it. My mommy got it for me for Christmas and a matching mug :)

Now with a stupid little sore throat I had on Christmas, I have been drinking the tea away. Glad I got some nice flavors for while I am home :). Going to keep drinking that as I make some more baked goods. SUGAR COOKIES! I'm actually excited because I haven't made these before, at least not from scratch. I will be making my favorite though tomorrow night, the raspberry crumb cake, OMG YUM! Haha- stay tuned and hope to put up pictures soon!

<3 Carly

Procrastination

This is my favorite time to blog, or the time I most frequently blog.

It's finals week. I need to do my papers and study and I just don't want to. A person can only do so many all nighters and actually focus! Power naps are a different breed and when you are already running low on sleep, it just doesn't work.

Where is that easy button? Where did all the time go? Why are movies so addicting? Why are none of my usual tricks to get things done working? It's frustrating.

As I yawn, I go back to that work. I look forward to baking sweets and snuggling my cat over break. Oh yeah, and knitting :)

<3 Carly

November Break

Oh hey everyone. I love getting a full week off for Thanksgiving, but oh my gosh the amount of homework I have to catch up on. It's not even a break if I have that homework to get done. So I've been focusing on not focusing for the first few days, and now I really need to get my a$$ into gear and get this $hit done.

BUT what I did before hand is pretty sweet ;-)



I am a blondie again. I mean I have always considered myself a dirty blonde but now I'm pretty much a blondie. :) Haha, I like it =)

Well I'm distracting myself currently by my blog and laundry. I always try to focus when I'm doing laundry though. I find laundry relaxing. A lot of people hate to do laundry, but I so don't mind. I love it and having everything clean. Call me nuts, go ahead, but it's how I am ;-)

Maybe I'll squeeze some more knitting in between all my distractions and what not.

Have a great Thanksgiving!

<3 Carly

October

I feel so bad I don't blog as often as I'd love too. It's this damn thing called homework. There are so many chapters to read and things to site and read and site and read and read and oh my gosh thank goodness for classical music and score music or I'd just fall asleep the entire time.

I love reading, don't get me wrong. I've probably been over this before, I love to read, on my own. But when I'm forced to read (or highly encouraged) I just don't enjoy it as much. I also just want to knit lately. . . You get very addicted, and I'm sure all knitters can agree the "one more row" syndrome is hard to shake off. I just want to knit! I want to be able to write a paper and knit at the same time. I have so many projects I want to do for Christmas gifts but it's impossible with all this homework. I want breaks so that I can knit, but I'm being such a procrastinator that I'll probably have to use those breaks to focus on papers and homework/big final projects. It's so annoying to have to schedule time to knit, but thank goodness for the knitting club I created. I can knit with all my friends! It's very fun to share such a great hobby :)

Ok, I went shopping this weekend and got some beautiful yarn. Soon to be gorgeous projects.

Back to homework :-P

Be back soon I hope-

<3 Carly

Downtown Swing

Oh I love it down here. I'm still having problems accepting that I have homework to do and can't knit all day long, haha. Due dates are the only thing that get me going. I'm such a procrastinator it's horrible. I have friends that procrastinate as well, I like to think of ourselves as professional procrastinators. I'm actually supposed to be doing homework now, but I'm blogging. Who doesn't love a good blog?

I'd also like this time to show you my gorgeous flowers :)



&&& as another side note, that I don't need a guy to get me flowers. I get my flowers all on my own. I work hard, I like flowers, I am going to buy myself some flowers. I also have no problem with my residents buying me flowers if they so choose to do so (I really like flowers residents! Haha- you said you'd get me some!).

I also have finished a hat in my procrastination. I'm calling it my Baby Moss Stitch Hat (but it can totally be altered to fit a larger head, according to gauge and size of the person that will be wearing it.)



Here's the pattern:
I used size 5 dpns and 2 skeins of yarn (double threaded/2 colors)
CO 80 sts
*K2,P2 for two rows,
P2,K2 for two rows*
Repeat these four rows until the piece measures about 4 1/2 inches to 4 3/4 inches (or however long you want it to be, maybe you want a fold so go longer for that)
the decreases;
(I started my decreases in the P2,K2 row, so try to end right before that if you want to follow these decreases)
*P2,K2,P2,K2,P2tog,K2,P2,K2,P2,K2tog*
Knit a round (in pattern)
*K2,P2,K2,P2tog,K1,P2,K2,P2,K2tog,P1*
Knit a round (in pattern)
*P2,K2,P2tog,K1,P1,K2,P2,Ktog,P1,K1*
Knit a round (in pattern)
*K2,P2tog,continue in pattern, P2,K2tog, continue in pattern*
Knit a round (in pattern)
{I hope you have the pattern here, the sequence of using the double moss stitching}
*P2tog,continue in pattern, K2tog,continue in patter*
K a row of pattern (should be single moss stitch)
*K2,P1,switchstitches to P2tog*
Knit a row of pattern
*P2,K2tog*
Knit a row of pattern
*K2tog,P1*
Knit a round of pattern
*P2,K2tog*
K2tog, P1
thread through.
sew up the seems!



I'm really proud of myself for coming up with these decreases, but if you have any trouble, please let me know!

Now instead of knitting (which I so want to do right now), I must continue to do homework and get back into the swing of things. Until next time,

<3 Carly

Downtown Heating UP!

Oh my gosh has it been a hot first week! LOVE living down here, but the building I live in DOES NOT have air conditioning. I love my little city room, but oh my gosh has it been hot. I truly have no idea how I fell asleep some nights. I woke up sweating, took a shower, then started to sweat again- haha. This is how you live until it's cold and then you just get to wear warm knits and snuggle (I CAN'T WAIT!).

I finished yet another project :) The little booties that got it all started. I forget if I mentioned that I made more booties for girls at my work. They're a hot item. OH and I just remembered I got another order from someone at school when I was sewing in the loose ends on these. LOOK HOW CUTE!



Adding ruffles definitely makes these a selling point. They're soo cute already and just putting that ruffle on makes it the cutest thing for girls. The order I got from here at school is for a boy so I'm thinking back to the original pattern, just plain and simply adorable.

1st week back at school (besides my melting room), was good. I like to wait a week or two before I really know what a semester is going to be like but I like it so far. Lots of books though. They totally killed my wallet with the books. EVERY class had to have the book. It's insane! I spent $640 on books, then my one professor is actually letting me use his text book from a previous edition so if I would've spent more on that it would've probably been closer to actually spending $800. THAT'S TOO MUCH! Can we please remind textbook companies that they sell their textbooks to poor college students? I'm not made of money to spend solely on textbooks. I like food!

Food brings me to Rib Fest. OH my gosh so good. I was waiting all weekend for it :) Got to go with my good friend Danielle. I tweeted a picture if you want to check it out ;-)

http://twitpic.com/6gnlri

Well I guess I should get some homework done. It's still weird getting back in the swing of things. Summer classes totally aren't the same and I will never do that again (remind me not to do that again).

<3 Carly ;-)

Back Downtown Junior Yr

You forget how beautiful the city is, but not really. I've missed my little room in the city on my own. It's really home. I'm now going into my junior year at Point Park and that means that for 2 years I've lived 9 out of the 12 months in one year, so 18 out of 24 months downtown. I'm truly a city girl. It's what drew me into my school anyway (my home).

I'm not good at writing (or spelling for that matter; thank god for the red squiggles that tell me I'm wrong on this), but I like to just write what I'm feeling at the moment. I'm in love with the city living and my friends down here at the same time. Not all of them are down here but I love being able to share this with them when they visit me. It's the best feeling the city living, I can't say how many times I love it. The sides are probably endless but this city is gorgeous. $0.25 for 5 minutes in a meter ($3.00 for an hour- 8am to 10pm they watch the meters now. $42 for the whole day or suck it up and pay that $30 ticket). Everything at your fingertips, the coffee shops, the food, the places to just relax and the architecture.

I love Pittsburgh.

Now I'll show you some knitting that you've been waiting to see.

This baby blanket was a great summer project. The yarn was exquisite, the pattern was simple and easy to remember (I hate carrying around a pattern book and papers, even though I know I need to at times).



This lovely baby girl came EARLY! I so could've finished in time, but she totally wanted to come out a week early.



I got a bunch of yarn from Bloomin's when I just couldn't stop going and knitting. It's definitely the best store out there. I've been to others now so I can say this. There's no other shop that gives the same vibe and openness.

I finished my first sweater. I need to blog this. The picture is going to be bad. I want to be in it when I show it off. I can't WAIT for the day that someone asks me where I got it and I can say "I made it". I just can't wait!



Now still in training so I'll be back to update later.
<3 Carly ;-)