kro designs

These are a gift...honest! I made them for my friend Karen.  Well, not for Karen, but for her beautiful baby Solomon.  Karen writes about her comedic life as a mother of 5, yes... 5 ,  in her blog Graceful like a Chicken .   And what does a mother of 5, who has all the baby gear on standby from  kids 1-4 want for a baby gift? Diapers and wipes, of course . What do I choose to make for her?  Rooster shoes! Get it... Rooster...Chicken...Boy Baby.... ~I need a different hobby, don't I?!~

We've set up a whiteboard where the kids are more than welcome to put up baby names for hubby and I to think about. According to our youngest his top three are: 1.  Berlin  (he's been reading about WW2, for pleasure!?) 2.  Rerun (he's addicted to the Peanuts gang) 3.  Tortilla Chip (one of his favorite meals is supper nachos) Can't blame him for being creative!

Pregnant for the first time in 8 years I didn't think things had changed that much when it came to baby gear. Pack N' Plays, exersaucers and sippy cups were standard gadgets.  But it seems mom's are always coming up with easier and more efficient baubles to make a job easier. This time around I think I found at least on thing that is going to suit me. My cousin Molly had a 3 month old baby when I last saw her. She had this straight jacket type thing around Maisy. Brilliant!  A snuggler that didn't require wrapping and re-wrapping a baby in a recivieng blanket that it kicks out of. I found a Kwik-Sew pattern and went to work. Gender neutral colors..of course!   No, I didn't over buy the polar fleece.  The pattern called for 1.5 yards. All I needed was half of that because... ...I decided to do the trim in contrasting fabric.  I knew working with double thickness fleece was going to drive me crazy even before starting the project.  And I didn't look ...

My parents live in South Dakota for the summer and fall and during the winter and early spring they live in Colorado.  A lot...no exaggeration here...a lot of people look at me funny when I say that.  Why wouldn't they go some where warm?  Well it is warm in Colorado, compared to South Dakota in the winter. Unfortunately, I can't fly or ski this February, so in desperation I turned to my archived pictures. Some of my favorite moments...  The quiet ride up!  Love this bookstore !  Cozy up!  They have a great selection of fibers!  Young Men!  I always go to whatever class the Delectable Mountain Quilt Guild has to offer.  First tracks on the mountain. I love the corduroy!  Teachers. Maybe next year!

Every week for the month of February, I subbing for a fellow teacher at a school in Minneapolis.  Most of these girls have been learning to knit since September so I'm not really teaching, just guiding these days. She just learned to knit today Love knitting in the sunshine!   She knits vertically. Whatever works for her. <p><p><p><p><p><p>&a...

In honor of my sister's birthday today, I thought I'd give her a present from my point of view. She is a self proclaimed worry wort . She didn't sleep for month because she was worried that the pine trees in their front yard were going to fall down on the house. So she chopped them down. I also suspected she would be worried about me going to Costa Rica while pregnant. So I didn't tell her I was going until about a month before leaving.  Just enough time for her to do research on the 5 star resort we were staying at.  Making sure there was running water and roof over our heads. I think we did just fine. So I've decided to give her a list for her birthday. It is entitled... Things my sister never has to worry about! ~~ To make sure it's above freezing before spraying the front door with Windex.  She lives in Georgia.  ~~  Shopping for sports briefs.  She has two daughters.  ~~ Of ever having an "Opps" They are both "fixed...

You can blame my mother. I do. When I was a kid she used to cut up junk mail letters in thirds and put them by the phone for messages or for grocery lists because the back side is "perfectly OK" Now after she prints something and has no use for the paper she flips it over and puts it back in the printer to print on the other side. I pulled the print on both sides of the paper trick when I first was married.  Once, hubby printed a 15 page document for work using "used" paper.  He was not very happy as he was rushing out the door. Now I have a more "Martha solution" to the used paper problem our family has. When I print off coupons from the internet sometimes they are one per piece of paper.  After cutting the coupon out it seemed to be a waste to recycle all this white space.  I use my paper cutter to trim them to 5.5" x 8.5" stack them together and staple 3 times at the top. Then I cut my decorative paper to cover the staples...

You might be a crazy crafter if... ...you have two knitting projects going at the same time, on the same set of needles. Either out of necessity or laziness. ...you have a bin labeled "ribbon scraps". ...you label your bins. ...your friends call you "My Martha". ...people call you from the craft store for help. ...you think that a 1" x 12" piece of orange card stock will be useful one day for some project. Yup, that's me!

I always head to the produce section at the grocery store first, except the other day when I already had rotting fruit in the bowl at home to use up.  So I took a short cut to the meat section and stopped by this bin of books sandwiched between the tacky hats and cold meds. What made me stop was truly divine intervention. Earlier that week I stopped by a specialty yarn and fabric store, Crafty Planet before heading to class and found this book Boho Baby Knits by Kat Coyle Loved it and almost bought it for 28 bucks! But there it was, at the grocery store, in with all the other bargain books for $4.99! Providence I tell you! I checked out and immediately went to buy some yarn. And started my first project out of it!

My youngest was downstairs watching TV before breakfast.  I tell him breakfasts ready at which time he races up the stairs and sits down at the table next to me.  He reaches out to grab my hand and says with a very serious expression, " Mom, are planning on having life insurance for the new baby?"  A little shocked at the subject and scared of what topic we'll have to tackle before my first cup of coffee. I respond, "Yes, and I also have insurance on you and your brother."  He replies back, "With Gerber life insurance did you know your policy can grow up to $100,000 and you can take out cash from it?" Umm... Two things: 1. Are you watching too much television? 2. What parent is sitting there watching the Cartoon network in the morning to see these types of commercials?

Just because it's Valentine's Day I'm sure the boy's teachers will have thier fill of chocolate.  So I put together a gift that isn't so sweet to show our appreciation. I packed up three travel organic lotion bottles in cellophane and tied it with some red and white ribbon. Then traced their hands and had them cut them out and embellished the packages with hearts from an old school craft project.  Hope they like them!

One of my students asked me how to knit a heart.    Here is the pattern I came up with: Using size 7 needles and superfine yarn** (I started at the bottom point of the heart) Cast on 2 stitches Row 1: K all sts. Row 2: K1, yo, K to end of row Repeat Row 2 until there are 20 st. Divide row in half using another needle or safety pin as place holder Start with connected yarn end Next Row: K1 k2tog, yo, k2tog k to end Continue until 4 st remain K4 sts bind off Repeat for other side of heart top **use any size needle and yarn you'd like I just had these handy I think it jazzes up my blah winter coat for the weekend

That is what my now 11 year old used to say. Scary how time does fly away! His birthday was Monday and being the wonderful mother I am, knew exactly what I was going to give him. I just waited until the day before to go and buy it. As you may know we are a sporting family: basketball, soccer, baseball, football, no basketweaving (yet) And always on the run with equipment helter skelter. So I bought Tyler this... An equipment bag with our logo on it already.  I asked how long it would take to embroider his name on it.  1 week... Yeah...that's not gonna work. Since I spent  #$%%$#$ much money on an embroidery module for my sewing machine 4 years ago (and have used 5 times since) I thought I'd dust it off and give it a try. Literally, dust it off.  Isn't that disgusting!! After running to the store to buy the special black thread needed, I centered everything up with the machine embroidery hoop. After double and triple checking positioning, I pressed t...