04. Love

04. L O V E: Muscles showing love the only way he knew how.

How Neat is N.E.E.T.?

Stephanie from N.E.E.T. Magazine reached out to me last month for a brief interview about none other than Princess and Muscles! How could I resist?



Head over to N.E.E.T. Magazine and read the March issue. It's jam-packed with fur babies, so you know it's totally worth it!

STUFFED

When I first started this blog I was obsessed with swap-bot. Eventually I had to wind down because I couldn't afford all of the postage, and now it's been over a year since I last signed in! To motivate myself to get back on the bandwagon of crafting adorable, small, albeit useless things, I decided to post some of my past creations :)

The guys above and the turtle below were all 2" or smaller; the smaller, the better!

Amigurumis were actually how I started crocheting more regularly. I called this little pooch Guccigurumi because it's supposed to be my uncle's Maltese, Gucci!

Unfortunately none of the groups I was a part of are still active on swap-bot, and most of my family is totally not into this sort of thing, so I can't even make them as small holiday gifts! Maybe I can swap with some awesome crafty bloggers? Right??

Extreme Weather

For those of you who live under a rock, or say, Florida, we've been experiencing some EXTREME weather in the world. Chicago got hit by its third largest blizzard and I loved every minute of it. Thankfully we didn't lose power or anything. Walking the dogs was a bit hellish during the actual storm but the day after was AWESOME.





Everyone in Chicago had the day off work because the streets were packed with 20" of super fun times. I was really excited to finally put my hat to good use while playing outside. Muscles LOVED the snow and Princess just looked adorable hopping around in her old age.



After every walk Muscles came in COVERED IN SNOW BALLS! SO creepy cute.

The worst part of the whole ordeal was our crappy back door's inability to keep the snow out. The wind was FIERCE so we had to clean up snow inside our apartment!


It's still snowing & I'm in love with it. It's going to snow tomorrow too! Oh, Chicago ♥

Christmas Photo Explosion!

Well you guys, I'm a terrible blogger. I even lost my first follower! Andrew was in the Philippines for about 2 weeks and he took his Olympus and Canon with him; I was left with my webcam/phone, both of which don't count in my book. So—to make it up to you—are you ready for a Christmas photo explosion??

Our little celebration was really sweet, and filled with a bunch of firsts. Last year the pups stayed with Andrew while I went home to NY, so this was Muscles' first real one with presents and everything. It was adorable to watch him rip open his gifts while Princess waited for the goods. And since this was my first Christmas in Chicago, it called for my first Christmas tree!

I made this using Dollar Tree bulbs + a wire hanger!

My 1st tree with tons o' gifts!!


Muscles sniffing out his gifts & ripping 'em open!


Princess & her gingerbread nomz


Best rings ever?!

Crocheted for my mom :D

!!!


TIM & I are twins!


Crocheted coffee cup sleeves for my mama (+ mother Earth lulz)



Andrew's crocheted cowl

We also gave my mom a nice collection of teas and one of those Starbucks look-a-like coffee mugs. She was super sweet and gave Andrew a few things for his cameras from Photojojo, plus an awesome camera lens mug. I got the back issue of Crochet Today that I wanted so bad AND a year subscription!! She totally spoils me, like seriously. I got The Complete Book of Sewing too! Now I have zero excuses for not sewing all day, every day.

After opening our gifts we lounged around and eventually headed over to Andrew's uncle's house for an absolutely delicious meal. It was the best. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday and in the new year I PROMISE TO BLOG MORE OFTEN. LIKE ALL THE TIME. PROMISE.

P.S. My Christmas tree is a huge deal, like you don't even know. I'm totally going to write a post dedicated to it and its ornaments because I love them SO MUCH!!

Distractions

I'm bored with crocheting the acorn shrug! Emily's, from seymour, turned out great so I should probably shut up and finish mine already, but it's just SC for 137sts over and over and overrr. I enjoy patterns that make me think a little so I took yet another break to work on these puppies...

...for my puppies!
Nothing super complex but it was a nice change of pace. Princess has the most obnoxiously heavy-handed (pawed?) walk ever. Her toe tappin' is the equivalent of Andrew stomping his way up the stairs in his cycling shoes. These baby booties from Lion Brand seemed like the perfect solution so I modified the pattern a bit to fit tiny paws (which are shockingly smaller than baby feet). Her death claws still tap! I'll need to add padding or something to the soles.


Muscles on the other hand is a total ninja. He'll creep up on you without so much as a peep. While I was crocheting the booties he kept eyeing them, so I stuffed one and stitched it up for him.

My luck has been terrible lately! Hopefully November will be awesome. On top of all the rotten crap that has happened this month, I was applying to a design position when I realized my website had been hacked. Yes, HACKED. I don't know what's up with me and October, but my site is back up now.

Being KNEAD-y

I've been kind of obsessed with bread this week. I think the sourdough we picked up from Dill Pickle Food Co-op is to blame. It was so amazing, I probably got it in my head that I could and should be making my own. I found an awesome pizza dough recipe that was SO easy I can't believe I hadn't tried it before. I topped it with grated parmesan, fresh mozzarella, shaved asparagus I'd tossed with a clove of garlic (minced) and red pepper flakes, scallions, a touch of truffle oil, squeeze of lemon AND eggs (I know, I put eggs on everything). Andrew & I died. One bite and it was over, pizza heaven. We don’t even own a pizza stone or pan, just used the back of two cookie sheets and it worked beautifully. Originally I'd planned to make one and share it but upon telling Andrew, he immediately informed me he'd be eating one entirely to himself. I'm so glad I made two! We had enough left over for lunch the next day :)

Even Princess couldn't resist


mmm...
I decided the next logical step would be to make a loaf. I don't have a stand mixer or a bread maker but apparently there's no need for 'em anyway! Thanks to Jim Lahey and The New York Times (way back in '06), I found this insanely simple recipe for no-knead bread. I'm a bit late to the game, oh about 4 years, but whatever... It still works and I can't believe I've made homemade pizza dough & a loaf of bread all in the same week!


Tastes surprisingly similar to sourdough!
I let it rise for an extra 6hrs, totaling a full 24hrs. It was hard to just let it sit and be patient but it was well worth the wait. I finally pulled it out of the dutch oven around 1am and allowed it to cool overnight. The moment the 7:15 alarm went off, we jumped out of bed & started slicing, not so much as a "good morning" was uttered between us.

Tonight is the opening night for category 5 racing (beginners) and I'll be watching alone because Andrew is participating!! I'm so freggin' excited I can't even stand it. I really hope it doesn't get rained out ;(