piddleloop.com

Xmas vacation part one

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oh it has been good to get away. To close up the shop and pack up the bags and get out of dodge for awhile. So back in december right before we left for the east coast zander had his very first pre-school singing program. Even Uncle Nat came out from Chicago for the event.



you gotta love my sister for dressing him in blue. In a sea of red we could find him. Look carefully he’s singing Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.


The next day at 10am our flight left chicago without a hitch and we soon landed in Philly. To stay at Nat’s parent’s house, which is in South New Jersey just outside of Philly. There’s a lot of cats around in this house. I think there’s 4 or 5. Mr. Hairpiece



Puff


and little Crazy (i think her real name is Yushi) She was just a kitten when is aw her last. She’s real scared of people, but cause she’s so cute i had nat’s sister drag her out for a shot or two.


Meet Skoshie the dog


Nat slept and watched the Flyers play the Sabres Hockey games.


his mom made these


and i have a FO, it’s Foliage. Knit in Malabrigio worsted for a close friend for xmas.



nat tried to choose a record to listen to, do you see what a challenge it can be with his dad’s choices?


So we went to NYC rather than trying to pick just one record to play.

Jen & Nat 34th Street December 21 2007


some NYC type for you


mmmmm NY style pizza our favorite


mmmm helvetica


hey look near 34th street i saw a post office on wheels



the empire state buliding



mmm another reason i love the east coast knish and soft pretzels


i bought us some hats with earflaps from a street vendor


some lights in Bryant Park



and our annual tradition. EVERY TIME we go to NYC i do one of those myspace mode (hold the camera out take your picture) style shots of nat and i, in front of the ornaments in the fountain at Rockafeller center. Altho doing myspace-mode poses problems from time to time



nat!


we made our way to the tree, which was way crowded

and we did myspace-mode again for the snowflakes on Saks.



next time i post i’ll show you some philly and xmas pictures..i figured this big ass photo post was long enough. But i will leave you with my most favorite building of all.

Chrysler Dec 2007

Posted by Jennifer on 01/04 at 03:24 PM ♥ Comments (17)

Downtown Adventure or big ass picture post&trade

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Hi everyone! I bet you’ve been thinking, hmmm long time no big ass piscture post from hell! well my parents rule and gave me one of these for xmas:



oh yes that’s a Canon Rebel XTi, digital SLR. My parents are so cool and gave this to me early so i could take it to philly this week. Nat has the same camera, but a lot more glass (lenses) to go with his. So nat and i decided to take an adventure downtown. We’d ride the Holiday El Train. It was on the brown line this week. So on saturday even tho it looked like this outside:



yes it was snowing and blowing, typical chicago weather. Here’s a shot nat took of me being snowjen



and snow nat



So what’s the holiday train you say? why it’s a special el train that only runs along all the lines during the holidays. It has a car missing int he middle and santa sits in his sleigh with his reindeer, welcoming everyone aboard the santa express. Now santa is one brave soul, cause he is riding outside in the already blowing snow and cold. Poor santa. I hope someone was there every three stops to hand him off a hot coffee.
some type for you







the inside looks like this complete with elves handing out candy canes, xmas music, and FAKE ADS!





state street 5 pm Nat & Jen december 2007


we went to daley plaza to see the tree and the kristkringlemart thing where they sell european handcrafts for ALOT of cash. And sell hot pretzels, potato pancakes, schnitzel, and mmmm hot almonds with cinnamon coating. yum

The picasso had snow on him



The tree had these complete with snow

the city tree




and the poor train was pushing so much snow around the tree this was taken shortly before it de-railed.



we then went to the old Marshall Fields, now Macy’s and looked at the windows. They were done up as the Nutcracker this year. Outside there was this strange looking bike. It’s puppetbike! i suggest clicking on dance! and then selecting dance 3 that is similar to what we saw



when someone put money in the slot music came on and a puppet show happened!



these little tigers were so cute. They’d blow kisses at you if you tipped them and they’d dance to the music and hi-five people. I think more adults were charmed than children, myself included. They blew kisses to Nat when he tipped them. They also are missing an eye each. Poor lil tigers.
I think the snow totals for the day/night were around 8 inches. In northwest indiana where i live we got 11inches and really bad drifts.

A couple weeks ago i gave nat a lot of flack about getting a tree. He gave in and we got a really really fake tree.
here’s a few photos of our tree:

the stars behind it







some of my favorite ornaments:

my pig in a blimp




and my favorite glass one:



So i’m still getting used to the new camera. And now i will have to sew-for-dollars™ to buy glass. Or just borrow all of nat’s. So i leave for philly this week! And zander has his very first xmas pre-school program wednesday nite. So this week won’t be boring. And i’ll be eating cheesesteaks by the weeks end. So y’all have one warm, safe, and happy holiday!!  Thanks for hanging in there for yet another goofy big ass picture post™

Posted by Jennifer on 12/17 at 10:37 PM ♥ Comments (18)

and the lucky number is….

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37. Random Number generator picked number 37. The winner would be Cary! I’ll see if it will fit in an enveope i have and it will go to the post tomorrow with the last of the packages and some of the moustache factory’s packages!!

I’d like to thank you all for dropping to say happy bloggidty-blog-blog-o-versary and stuff. It was nice to see some new people come out of hiding. I’ll now have some new blogs to read. Thank you, and say hi once in awhile i like to say hi back.

Well we got 10 feet of snow over here in NW Indiana. I hope to have some pictures up for you maybe tomorrow of our adventure ont he Xmas El Train on a very snowy saturday. See you tomorrow!

Posted by Jennifer on 12/16 at 11:36 PM ♥ Comments (7)

stuff and things and a contest

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Hi. Where have i been you say? Hiding under a pile of bags. Wendy and I finished sewing up 30 pocuhes today to add to the 16 yesterday for probably our biggest update in a long time for tomorrow. I don’t know when yet. I’m a little stressed out. I just can’t do it. I just can’t call a time yet. Please forgive me for that. To make up for it. I’m having a contest. To celebrate two things that passed. My five year bloggidty-blog-blog-aversary and to celebrate 3 years of sewing. So first you all want to know the prize don’t you?




It’s LEONA by Ruby Sapphire on etsy

and here’s the info on the yarn:
LEONA Handpainted RUBY Superwash Sock Yarn

Handpainted in Shades of NAVY, BLACK and BRIGHT BLUE

Our yarns are dyed with professional quality acid dyes.

Our RUBY yarn is our softest line of handpainted fibers.

It is a superwash merino wool sock yarn.

This yarn is an excellent choice for the knitter who prefers all natural fibers.

Approximately 4oz./ 114 grams/ 550 yards

2ply light fingering weight

100% Merino Wool

Machine or Hand Wash

Lay Flat to Dry

What do you have to do to win? Any of you who have read my blog over time know i have serious irrational fears. First i will define irrational fear in my terms. It must be something that you KNOW cannot possibly happen, but will only happen one day to you. And just you because you are unlucky and stuff like that can happen. So here’s my list:

1. touching my belly button makes me vomit. Mostly because i have this great fear it will come undone, and my guts will come flying out like one of those joke cans-o-snakes.

2. when someone throws a lit cigarette out their window while i’m driving and i see it, and i drive over it. i close my eyes and wait for my car to explode.

3. i will not ride one of those city busses with an accordian on it. It WILL turn the corner and the 1/2 i’m in won’t follow.

4. i will not walk up open backed stairs. I have to run. I think something will eventually grab at my ankles.

5. my best friend in high school had an old VW Rabbit. It had cherrios sized wheels. One time she was driving fast and said what if my wheels flew off like cherrios?? I always kind of fear little hactch back cars.

Ok so what you have to do is leave me a comment. You MUST tell me one of your irrational fears. Irrational as i defined above. And i will take everyone’s names and draw one to win. I might come up with a second prize too if they are good.

the contest will end dec 15th.

Posted by Jennifer on 12/06 at 11:02 PM ♥ Comments (49)

This and That

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Hi. I hope you all had a nice holiday. I was busy and then some. We are super thankful for the successful etsy updates. We’d like to make sure you know how much we thank you. It helped repair or broken serger, it had been dead for the past 11 months. Thank you everyone.

Ok i’m busy sewing up our next update which should be thursday or friday of this week. It will be Piddly Bags. Some japanese fabrics, some regular fabrics, some limited edition screened by an etsy person fabrics, and some sheeps! so be sure to check it out. Now on to a special announcement.

We will have two 4 x 6 pouches that are going to be listed in our update, these two bags the entire proceeds will go to Alyson of Yo-yo knits for her dog Bitty. He needed to have a very expensive surgery to save his Bitty lil butt and quite frankly i was sad to know how it tore Alyson and Travis up to have to put it on a credit card around the Holidays. So please buy these two little pouches when i get them up with the update and know that cash will go into the large donation i’m making this weekend. My group on Ravelry is made of 92 really awesome individuals. I put the call out that one of our own members was in need of some cheering up and was torn up about her poor lil Bitty.
Every little bit helps and it should make her feel good that a bunch of people out on the internets can help out just with a dollar or two and help out a girl in need. I’m so glad our group has yer back Alyson.

So with that please visit her etsy shop and purchase some fiber from her to help out their surgery bill. OR please check out her blog she has a major de-stash sale going on to help raise funds as well. OR if you want to send a dollar or two in paypal i have a fund, my ravlery group and wendy and i are contributing to her this weekend. You can leave me a comment and i will get you my paypal address so you can have your dollar or two passed along. Every bit helps.

Posted by Jennifer on 11/27 at 10:36 PM ♥ Comments (6)

two quick notes

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oooooh i’m really glad everyone seems to like Cary’s sheep markers as much as i do. :D Glad to be an evil enabler whenever i can. First up! The contest over on my little ravelry group is ending tonight. there’s a ton of prizes including not shown a set of markers from Aija and Zero markers (stacked pearls) and an embroidered sheep keyring/stitch marker holder by Cary. You can enter in two ways. Show us just how much and what you have stuffed in there or the weirdest thing you have in your bag,

Here’s a sampling of the prizes:

Mini Book Page paintings by nat:



sweater clips by Katy:



Sock Yarn From Lesa:



Sock yarn or baby knitting yarn, clorway is clear sky



pens and post its and notebooks



buttons



I’m hoping to have an update for tomorrow but i think it will most likey be for wednesday since it’s raining out and i don’t think photographing will work today. (reminds me i need to build a light box in our basement)

ok second i want to thank Robyn She has a shop called Robyn’s Nest She has a sock club she just started and she sent me a package the other week. In it was the october club kit. And it was really really beautiful colors. I think she sent this along cause she knew how much i loved orange and how the universe was just trying to knock me out for a K.O.





soooo pretty!





Thank You so much robyn for your generous gift. It really really cheered my week up. SO please feel free to join with a last minute entry into the little contest over in our group. ANd i’ll be back with more once i finish sewing eleventy billion bags..thanks again to alyson of yo-yo- knits for letting me rip her off with that word..still…stuck..in…my…HEAD!

Posted by Jennifer on 11/12 at 12:09 PM ♥ Comments (9)

Felted Embroidered Stitch Markers

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I now have photos thanks to Cary, on what my markers i am buying for the shop will look like! Her etsy shop can be found here!


As you can see Cary made these really special. She took into account piddleloop colors of baby shit yellow, brown, orange, olive green, blue and brown..and if you look she even did a special tribute to Wendy. Black and white markers, due to wendy’s constant classic black and white prints we always try to bring to you. So very thoughtful and cute. wait it gets cuter…


I am purchasing 4 embroidered sheep markers for our bags!! I’m seriously wondering just how does she embroider on these tiny little felted balls? but they look absolutely adorable and like i said before very very unique!

Posted by Jennifer on 11/10 at 06:18 PM ♥ Comments (10)

New look and etsy friday

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Hi everyone. Sorry about the lack of posting, i was in a funk this week. Lacking motivation, i feel like i’ve lost my mojo. So please take a look around, click yourself out of bloglines or your rss reader and take a moment to look around. there’s new stuff to see. Nat re-desgned my template for fun. Thing is he doesn’t design for Internet Explorer. So if you see something wonky or weird can you tell me and tell me what browser yer using, so i can have nat fix whatever it is. Thanks i’d appreciate it.

Now. I’ve got 2 brand new etsy shops for you. Kelly of Pattern Tamers finally got her shop up and running.
I really think these would make great gifts for that secret pal, or your knit nite peeps for xmas. Simple in design and very functional..perfect for every knitter you know.

Second new shop would be Cary. And her shop has some really really unique stitch markers. She felts beads and then embroiders on them! how unique is that? Plus her markers are rally affordable for the uniqiness. She will soon be one of our featured stitch marker people on our bags too. I don’t have any of her markers yet to post pictures of so please check out her quirky markers. Also she says she has made some with SHEEP on them. yes SHEEP. (maybe she needs to try chickens for all you crazy chicken people out there…you know who you are!)

And the best and cheapest for last. Weighing in at a whopping 5$, behold the cup cuddler.


Mamadama Designs has these little inventions and i just LOVE it. I stash it in my purse or bag and when i get my ginormous hot tea from whereever i just slip this on. The fabric keeps my hands warm too. And WEINER DOGGIES too boot.


Now i know there’s got to be someone on your xmas list you could make happy with 5$!! Ok, i hope to bring you an installment of “Rock, Paper, Scissors, Pterodactyl” tomorrow complete with pictures, we’ll see if i can make that happen..if not i can try on monday. Have a good weekend and don’t forget to alert me to any “weirdness” going on in yer browser.
now let me sign off all gossip girl style
xoxo
jen

p.s. thanks Oiyi! i fixed Cary’s link!

Posted by Jennifer on 11/09 at 12:51 AM ♥ Comments (17)

Beads, Clips, and tu-tus

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Friday after pre-school we went to my friend Kayt’s bead shop she works at.



Kayt is like a worker bee.



She had zander sorting and counting beads



STOP AUNTIE JEN STOP


What was she working on?





Why she’s working on sweater clips! THAT ARE NOW LISTED IN HER ETSY SHOP!! I think these are my favorites make sure you READ the description.

The weekend the universe was trying to tell me to leave chicago…i had picked up my new glasses. I picked up two new sets of frames for super cheap. A brown pair and an orange pair. Nat took some pictures for you to see.







Like them? I love the orange ones, they look more red in nat’s photo but i assure you, they are my favorite color. The brown ones i like a lot too. I an’t believe they were being clearanced out. Here’s a picture of Zander playing with Simon, nat’s kitty.



and last but not least. Lucy Dog in her tu-tu. We got her a tu-tu because if you scratch her belly while she’s tanding she sticks out her back paw like a ballerina. SHe’s done this ever since we rescued her. As wendy says that tu-tu was the best 11 bucks spent at target.



Isn’t she just the cuuutest thing?




Nat and i saw the Darjeeling Limited, and did anyone else see this? Is it just me or did that one song that plays at the end..sound a little too much like an Indian intrepretation of a Yo La Tengo song. It was and still is driving me crazy. Nat looked it up and they said he borrowed songs from existing movies…but you know since he had Bowie sogs done in Portuguese he’s clever enough to have pulled a fast one on me.

Posted by Jennifer on 11/05 at 12:35 AM ♥ Comments (13)

Dia de los muertos, stuff, things, and etsy friday of course!

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Guys, seriously, thanks for all your comments and hellos and notes. I spent the day hiding under my blankie watching a movie or two, and all of them really did make me feel better. I think i tried to thank most of you but then i got back on the serger and i apologize if i didn’t get a reply to every single one. I did appreciate every note, you guys know how to cheer someone up after a craptacular weekend!!

It is Day of the Dead! We have a few day of the dead and loteria inspired bags in the shop!

Ok let’s back up. Halloween. Here’s Zander as Venom, scratch that it’s BLACK SPIDER-MAN AUNTIE JEN!



I spent Halloween at my neighbor’s house. They had to go to a wedding so i baby sat Kelso. And handed out candy.



Note that baby toy. See how he is 400 times the size of it? He won’t walk over it. When he would bark he would literally scare the crap out of the bigger kids who came to the door. “what do you feed that thing?” “Small children, see any that are lost?”

Bad self portrait of us



He has a luxary bed!


How about some shrines? It’s Day of the Dead. I took these at an old celebration for all hallow’s eve/all saint’s day/ dia de los muertos in logan square a long time ago.









Ok. You know you want it. Etsy friday!

First up, a new stitch marker person! Yay. As some of you know we like to have little details on our bags. One is a stich marker for you to remove and use, usually advertising someone out there on etsy. I always buy the markers for y’all. So we now have Ana of Entrelac



She gets the prize for the most elaborate set up for markers i’ve bought yet. I always ask for cards to match the amount of markers i buy from you. And Ana out did herself making them look super cute for you. She has included all different kinds to dress our bags up!



Next, my awesome friend Katy maker of jewelry, sweater clips, and other fine items in here. Has made for me some awesome HELLO KITTY markers!



And if it can’t get better..it does! If you haven’t visited Middle Earth Yarns yet, you simply must. Cairi’s yarn is so super soft, squishy, and very very pretty. Very worth that long wait for my freelance check to come.



premium merino sock yarn in coffee cream, and pumpkin mmmmm orange and brown (total piddleloop colors)



sample in tiger feet

I also got some more markers from her to dress bags up.







I even got special markers for the brown and orange birdie bags we have int he production pile



Cairi wants y’all to know:that she will have some other yarns going up which are UK blue faced leicester priced at 20$ US, but seiously folks her luxary yarn is worth every penny of that 24$ US.
Her stuff is coming straight to you from Scottland, Land of Nessie!! How cool is that? You know you love the lochness monster! (well at least i do!)
Ok. So check out all these fun etsy people, some near and some across the pond. Their stuff is worth saving up for! And have a good weekend. I’ll be sewing up a bunch of knitting needle skull bags and hopfully seeing the Darjeeling Limited with nat.
xoxo (always said x,o, never hug and kiss..type nerd remember?)
jen

p.s. i hope to have a picture of Lucy Dog in her Tu-Tu for y’all. She is adorable. And how often do you see a basset hound in a pink tu-tu? Gotta get a picture in the daylight hours for you!

Posted by Jennifer on 11/01 at 10:22 PM ♥ Comments (10)