Salutations

Well, the winter weather is back. We were having quite a warm spell this last week, but reality set in the am. In the 20s, my children forgot how to dress for winter. I had to remind them to wear their hats and gloves. I went to UFO (unfinished objects) night at Knitting Today, it is a lys about an hour a way from me. They also have a web site, you should go there. It is a neat store. WE had Tofutsie Boot camp and I won the prize. I skein of Tofutsie yarn and a plastice carrying case. All in all a fun night. I also worked a lot on two projects. I am trying to finish a pair of socks that were a Christmas present and I am knitting with some beautiful alpaca silk that my brother gave me for Christmas. He is engaged to someone that owns an alapaca farm. This seems to be bringing me yarn goodness.... I am doing a beautiful lace shawl. I can't wait to finish it. I am taking a class on cables and beads and can't wait for it to start. Two things I do not know who to do yet. The class is a hat and we are using Dream Color Smooshie yarn in worsted weight. It is a dream to knit. I have to knit the first five inches of 2x2 ribbing. I cleaned out my sock yarn tub; lots of yarn; couldn't wait to start on a new project, but I promise myself that I will not start until Friend, Gina's socks are done, Friend Sheila's mittens are done; mil's socks are done. Ugh.. no goodnes for me until then. Now you know my projects and what is keeping me busy these days, well in the knitting world at least. I do have one new goal and that is to use my new cameral to begin to take pictures of all finished projects and to also learn how to put them on my blog. I am wearing myself out with all these goals....

My package arrived!

Wow, overseas swaps are a great way to practice patience!! I would like to extend a great big thank you to Gill


What a lovely package and just in time for Christmas!
Absolutely love the coffee bean stitch markers :)Love from wintery London, Ontario,

Nat

I OPENED MY COFFEE SWAP PACKAGE

On Christmas I opened my package from Allena. How lucky can a coffee knitter get? AND Allena was so patient while I waited for Christmas to open my package. Thank-you so much for Allena for being so patience. Here it is when I opened the box lid. One of the first items you can see is the Trekking XXL yarn which she was worried may not have enough blue in it for me. Well she needn't worry as it is just lovely and there is plenty of blue in it for moi! Again I must write I don't know what you are seeing color wise on your computer as my computer is wonky and I can't get it to show the colors correctly. I know what it looks like in my camera but sometimes even the camera and the computer colors don't jive.

You can also see the following yarn on the top of the box. It was hand dyed by Allena for me and the colors are wonderful. The colors I see when I look at it are aquas, greens and rusts. There are two skeins of it which is 100% Peruvian Wool and the color/dye lot is called Jelly Bean/2. Each skein is 220 yds and 100 grams to be knit on a size 7 - 8 US needle with a gauge of 5 stitches /inch. It is hand wash and dry flat. AND AND AND that is not the only yarn I received. I also received two skeins of Jane Ellison's Marisol Misty which is 100% baby llama. It is the deep blue tweed color despite the photo looking like a light blue. It is so so so soft!! I have been eyeing it since I took the Jane Ellison Workshop at Ram Wools this past fall. Of course, this being a coffee swap I also received coffee. HMMM HMMM The coffee she sent me was from a local roaster in her area and it is called Morning Buzz. It is beans which I can grind as needed.
I also received a very tall large mug which will be my new coffee mug now for morning coffee. I will let company use my previous favorite coffee mug. The mug came with a tin of coffee mints (red and white stripped candies) and a small packet of coffee). To go with the coffee I received treats. YUMMY Treats. Allena sent me almond butter crunch bars which are now gone, milk chocolate covered cappuccino beans which are almost gone, flavored Splenda which I have not only never seen but never heard of, and fudge covered graham cookies.

BUT that is not all I received in my package. I found in the box Gloves in a Bottle shielding lotion. It says it is like an invisible pair of gloves and skin care that works.

AND she didn't forget my Solara who also received treats. AGAIN, thank-you Allena. Will I join another Knitters Coffee Swap? You bet. I had so much fun shopping for my pal and receiving from my pal I will definitely join again if there is one.

Thank You, Diane!!

Look what I received in the mail this past week from Diane. What a great package! I have been surprised and spoiled. Thank you so much, Diane!!

Thank you Kitty!

Today I received my Coffee Swap 3 package from Kitty in Switzerland!!! I was so excited because I have been waiting to see what was coming!
In my package was: Scottish traditional hand baked shortbread, Highland Coffees "Costa Rica Tarrazu" coffee, a very awesome ceramic coffee mug made by Kitty's husband Joe , a bar of "Green & Black's Organic Milk Chocolate" and a bar of "Green & Black's Organic Maya Gold" (which OMG is awesome! It is described as "dark chocolate with orange & spices"...freakin' awesome!!
I also received two balls of "Lang's Soft Shetland Wool" one ball in green and the other ball in blue (very soft! I love wool!), a set of Vintage size 6 knitting needles (very cool, I will have to find more!)...
A Hello Kitty tin coin tube (goes quite well with my growing collection! Did you or Joe make the ceramic buttons inside Kitty?), 2 knitting related buttons and a Vintage coffee card (OMG Kitty has the coolest hand writing, I'm so very jealous!)
Thank you very much Kitty for my great swap package! It was great having you as a first time swap mate and learning so much about you and your lovely family!

**check out my blog for more pics!**

Thank you Corinne

The postoffice delievered my package to a vacationing neighbor in error. I received it last night. Thank you Corinne for being a wonderful partner.

Swap package arrived.......

Chrissie & I decided to send our packages later as she is in England for Christmas so when I got in from work yesterday there was a lovely surprise waiting for me.. my parcel from Chrissie.Wow what can I say, what a fab swap package, Chrissie really chose well, check out my blog for pics. There were 3 different types of yarn, one of which she had spun & dyed herself , how fab. Some circ knit pics, yipee!!! some bamboo needles, and best of all a knit pics case to store the knit pics in.. especially great as hubby has bought me the interchange knit pics set for Christmas....
Lovely hazelnut coffee, some dark chocolate which is my fav, some lush cookies and a cute coffee mug. Thanks so much Chrissie, it was all fab...You couldn't have chosen better, Hopefully Chrissie's parcel will be with her very soon, depending on royal mail that is!!!!
Angie

Hope everyone is having this kind of day!

Housekeeping ;D

Hello ~ its been a crazy week around here and its not over yet. There is still major cleanup for our backyard and our computer ~ its still running weird, but we are getting life back in order. I've spent the weekend doing some house cleaning and nethousekeeping to ensure my part of this swap ends properly. I believe I've made contact with all of you who have been trying to reach me. I'm really sorry that this ice storm made it impossible to reach me or be responded to ~ especially my dear partner, Elizabeth P. If you have been trying to reach me and still haven't heard from me, please email me at asimplifiedlife at hotmail dot com. Thx again for your patience.

Have a great week!

Mine made it too!

I knew my partner had mailed my package and it finally arrived on Wednesday(? I think it was Wednesday) I found it when I was leaving to go buy stamps, isn't that somewhat ironic? Anyway, it is a wonderful package. See?

I will put a more complete description on my blog momentarily but suffice it to say that when Gill posted my package, we were in another holiday season. Check out the candy that she sent, they are little jack-o-lanterns! Very tasty little morsels they are too LOL Thank you Gill for a wonderful swap. I look forward to seeing what you do with your new laceweight yarn. Good luck in your new job.