Owari - The End

You guys, this year is finally over. I'm typically not one to wish for anything to just be over but this year- I'm so glad it's over. It wasn't a bad year by any means, no no no. It was a great year! So many wonderful, amazing, thrilling, life changing, and awesome things happened this year. It was in fact, probably one of my fave (if not my fave) year of all time!

Here are a few highlights for me:

First thing I did was release a super cute knitting cowl pattern~ Etna.


Aaron and I went to Osaka Japan for my birthday and and saw my fave Japanese wrestler live:


We found out we were having a baby!


I have enjoyed my growing belly:


Released another cowl pattern~ Mina:


Aaron and I celebrated our 12th anniversary and went to a Nine Inch Nails concert:


We found out we were going to have a baby boy in April:


And opened up an Etsy shop~ TheFoxShop:


Tons of things happened in between~ Rinoa turned 12, went to Bumbershoot Music Festival, worked a butt-ton, hosted lots of fun events at the store, got a bunch of knitting done... I mean it's been a great and full year! 2014 has a lot in store for us, and I'm excited to welcome and embrace it all.

Lastly, I want to say thank you to every single reader~ Thank you for stopping by and reading my blog. Thank you for taking time and leaving me comments. Your words and thoughts are super encouraging to me and I love reading them. ♥

Happy New Year everyone!!!

Baby Dean's Lullaby

Aaron and I decided we would like to raise our kids bilingual, to the best of our abilities. English is our native language, but over the last few years we have been teaching ourselves Japanese and speak it to each other whenever we can. Our last two trips to Japan have really been great for learning, practicing, and reinforce our knowledge. When we filled out the US Census we put down that English and Japanese are both spoken in our household. d^_^b

Recently, we made Baby Dean a little playlist on my iPod for him listen to and there's a few quiet Japanese songs on it. One song in particular Dean seems to respond to is this pretty one from a show called "Macross Frontier" that I've decided will be his lullaby. The song is called "Aimo" and it's short and sweet, and even though it's in Japanese, the lyrics are pretty easy for me to learn.

Here's a version with the Japanese lyrics and then the English translation~


What do you think? It's really melodic and soothing sounding, I think. Plus the lyrics are beautiful. Whenever the song comes on in the store (and there's no customers around) I will stop what I'm doing and sing it out loud so he can hear me sing it. (On a side note~ some customers totally walked in on me doing that today haha!)

Do you have a favorite lullaby? Is it a traditional one? Or from a Disney movie? Is it made up? Is there a song you want to sing to your kids when you have them? Let me know what you think so I have a good variety of songs to sing to Dean. ♥

Christmas Kitty


The past few years I have picked up little holiday outfits for Rinoa.  This year I snagged her a Christmas tree dress.


It's a bit small for her, so it's more a vest than a dress.  She's so happy about wearing it, she's scratching the couch in front of me out of spite.


Last year Rinoa got this pretty outfit.  Doesn't she just look THRILLED?! Haha!

Maaaaa~ please take this ridiculous thing off me. Noooow~ hmph!

There is actually one thing she's cool with~ this little collar and bell~ 

 
It's so wonderful and festive, until bed time when she's doing her nightly rounds and she just jingles the entire time... Not so enjoyable then. It's just a day time collar.

Tonight I got feisty and put on a little mini cowl I made on her.


Doesn't she look lovely?  It makes her mane fluff up and she looks kinda like a lion.  She looks all snuggly and warm~ ready for a white Christmas and a visit from Santa.  Let me tell you, she's ecstatic for Santa to come!  Her stocking is hung and ready for goodies!

Works In Progress

My husband made the comment the other day about how happy I've been lately. Part of it is the holiday season, baby, and us celebrating out 12 year anniversary, but the main reason he thinks this is because I have been crafting a lot lately. Doing all that knitting, opening up my Etsy shop, and making lots of holiday treats has really been a good thing for me, he says. This just gives all the happys. *^______^*

I wanted to show you just some of the stuff I have been working on this week.



This is a second draft for a hat design I'm working on. I might release this one or I might make the hat and sell it on the shop. We'll see how this turns out. My hair stylist had this super cute white garter stitch hat on and I am just pinning for one of my own so hopefully this works out.


This is a modified version of the Sharo cowl knit in chunky yarn. Once I'm finished with it I'll be posting it in the shop. It's a really pretty cream color that this camera didn't pick up super well.



A scarf I finished the other day that'll be up on the shop soon. It's hard to tell in the picture, but this is two different colors of yarn~ one is a light vanilla color and the other is a super light linen color. They're super pretty together I think.



Just some of the pretzel mess goodness I made the other day. There are also a two bags of pretzel rods that were decorated also.




Aaron and I tag teamed my dinner bento tonight. He made me a peanut butter & strawberry sandwich and sweetly arranged my berries, while I sauteed some green beans in olive oil, miso paste, and red pepper flakes. There's also a tiny bite of a Starbucks Cranberry Bliss Bar in there for dessert.

Today I picked up some really pretty blue and lavender yarns today that I'm super excited to knit with. Once I finish up with these I'll be working on some more cowls. Maybe a hat too. AH! I just had a GREAT idea for another new hat design. Must hurry up with these projects!!

Well I have only eaten half of my dinner in the hour it's taken me to write this post so I'm going to go eat. Have a great night everyone! ♥

TheFoxShop Is Now Open!

Hey everyone! My Etsy shop, TheFoxShop, is now open! Please check out my selection of knitted cowls, beanies, and hair bows.


I will be adding stuff to the shop every so often. There are two cowls in needles right now so those will be probably be added sometime this week or next. Also, if there is something you are interested in but not seeing in my shop let me know, I'm very open to do special orders.

My shop will not be closing for the holidays since I have to work every day between now and... after New Years probably. Short of Christmas Day I mean. So I'll be out & about and able to get to the post office.

Well, thanks for stopping by everyone. Have a great day!

Holiday Music Mix

Every year Aaron makes a huge Christmas music list for the store's iPod, and I always look forward to it. This year the list is over 200 hundred songs with all our favorites and a few new ones we've discovered this year. It is such a happy list and it makes me love being at the store that much more.

It really gets me into the holiday spirit! So much so, I wanted to share it with you. Here's a playlist of some of my favorite songs that I think you'll like. It's an eclectic selection of songs~ ranging from traditional to new music, and 8-bit remixes to Japanese. Please listen and enjoy!

Christmas Mix 2013 by KnittedFox on Grooveshark

What are some of your most favorite holiday songs? Do you have a yearly playlist or set of albums you listen to?

DIY Lip Color

My stubbornness knows no bounds sometimes, and yesterday it was in my favor. I had the evening off and I was determined to get some fun time in along with my responsibilities. Earlier in the day I saw this video by Michelle Phan on how to make your own lip color by using up your old make up and I just had to make some for myself.

So I cranked up the music and snagged the materials:

■ your fave clear gel lip balm
■ old lipstick, blush, and eye shadow
■ metal spoon
■ candle lighter
■ tooth picks
■ some type of container (I used emptied eye shadow containers)


Put a good amount of lip balm in the spoon. With the tooth pick scrape, scratch, add the colors to the top of the lip balm. Use the candle lighter underneath the spoon and melt the balm. *note: this will blacken your spoon pretty hardcore- it washed off my spoon though.* Stir the color into the balm, mixing well. Once it cools (it takes a few seconds) try the color on. Add more lip balm or color as desired; melt and mix again. Once you are happy with the color, carefully drizzle it into the container and let cool. DONE!

I made two different lip colors:



A bold pink blush and a light sparkly nude made a bright sparkly pink.



A coral and kinda nude pink lipsticks with sparkly nude eye shadow made this really pretty lighter coral color~



Experiment with different colors and varying proportions of color vs. clear lip balm. Oh, and a little lip stick goes a l o n g way. I threw away one attempt because the purple-ish pink lipstick I used was cah-ray-zy bold. Definitely play with it and find that perfect color. Don't be scared of the color! Play with it! This is such a great use for shades you don't use anymore or colors that have cracked and are in pieces.

This little project maybe took me 30 minutes to do start to finish, which was great since I only had a little play time last night. I will probably do this again since it was such a fun little project.

Have you ever made your own lip balm before? Did you add anything special? I'd love to hear about other blogger's experiences with making homemade make ups. Let me know your thoughts!

We Are Having A...




Little Dean Fredrick is going great and growing well, according to the tech doing the ultrasound. He weighs just over a pound and looks pretty darn healthy. Our families are just as ecstatic as we are and have already started buying Baby Dean a few necessities.

He's been kicking me around today at work, silly goose! Today I noticed I felt a bit more forward heavy than I have before. Grow baby grow! Hehe!

I hope everyone had a lovely weekend! We had Thanksgiving 2.0 with Aaron's family yesterday. Mmmm! Any big plans for this week? We have been without phone and internet at our place for a week now so we'll be marathoning The X-Files and I've been knitting for my Etsy shop. Have a good one friends!

Baby's First Picture


Bam! It's my baby!

The only thing I can think to say is this baby makes my day!

More details soon! <3<3

12 Year Anniversary & Nine Inch Nails

November 17th marked the twelveth year of me and Aaron's first date. We actually both still celebrate the 17th every month like we're still in high school cuz we're silly like that. *^__^*


Aaron surprised me after we got off work by taking me to this new place that opened recently, Fire Artisan Pizza, and we had a lovely time. This place is way too hip and trendy looking/feeling for our area (which was actually really nice), and they played nothing by indy music that made us feel really nastalgic: Modest Mouse, Death Cab, Grizzly Bear, Fleet Foxes... it was like we were 22 again, haha!

One of our all time favorite bands, Nine Inch Nails, was playing in Portland on November 18th~ so we decided to take a little anniversary day trip. Portland is our number one city to see shows in, and since it's only 3 1/3-ish hours away, we were able to get away from the store for the day to go see the show.


We LOVE road trips and day trips! Rocking out to fun music in the car, singing like we're up on our own stage, laughing, and taking pictures the whole way~ it's just wonderful!


I have this unexplainable love for windmills. Don't know why, but I just do. On the way to Portland, there are a few portions of the high way that have hundreds of windmills. They're kinda hard to photograph cuz they're a ways off the highway, but Aaron was able to snap me one awesome pic.

Half way to Portland we stopped in Hood River and had lunch at Full Sail Brewery. As expected, lunch was great!


After lunch we headed straight to the venue in Portland, and ended up being numbers 29 and 30 in line!


This meant we were able to get ON. THE. RAIL!!


Never before had we been so close to a band at a concert! It was sooooo coool! That's actually an understatement.

OHMYGOSH IT'S SO INSAINLY AWESOME!!!

Nine Inch Nails is known for putting on quite a visual performance, so after a few songs we moved back a bit so we could get a better view of the entire stage. Also, we aren't as young as we used to be and we could only handle so much of people getting overly excited and pushing... Aaron is the perfect gentleman and shield for me. ♥♥♥



The performance was excellent, the light show was fun, the new female soul backup vocalists were mindblowingly awesome, and we were treated to four songs we had never heard live before!

While Nine Inch Nails are known for their rocking, they have some of the most beautiful quite instrumental music I have ever heard in my life. In fact, my most fave song ever is by them and is the first song our baby heard when we put headphones to my belly:

La Mer

So overall, we had a ball spending so much quality time together yesterday! We got home at 2:30 in the morning, so it was a long day, but totally worth it. We'd do it again in a heartbeat if we could!



Blog Hop and Tutorial

Happy Thursday everyone! How is your week going? I hope it's going by swimmingly! Fall is here and I LOVE it! The red/orange/yellow leaves everywhere, the crisp air, the smell of fires in chimney's, pumpkin and cinnamon scented everything... it's just wonderful!

If you are stopping by here from

Chantillysongs Blog hop

The Totally Awesome Blog Hop ~ Welcome! Thank you so much for stopping by my blog!

A quick blurb about me: I have been blogging on and off for 10 years now, my 144th month anniversary with my husband is on November 17th, we're expecting our first baby in April, we own a little shop called Sunken Treasures Games, I knit, love Japanese pop music, have traveled to Japan four times, constantly on Twitter and Instagram, enjoy astrophysics and wrestling, and am smitten with my cat. A long blurb about me can be found here. *^_^*


One thing I used to post a lot on my blog was makeup tutorials. Colorful and fun eye shadow combinations are a fave of mine. I'm a no-hassle sort of gal so I don't like my routine to take forever, so I post quick and easy picture tutorials for looks I wear. The following is a tutorial for the eye shadow look I've been wearing every day for about a week now~ it takes me a whole minute I think to do it. I think I'll start posting more of these again. d^___^b

Pinky beige/Blue/Gray Eye Shadow


No eye shadow to eye shadow.

First off, I use brown eyeliner and mascara, and they are perfect in my opinion~ they give you a bold, dark color without that blaring black look. If you have dark or naturally thick/long eyelashes, brown really helps prevent that "tarantula" look around your eyes. If you have lighter colored or thin/short eyelashes, brown helps give the illusion of naturally full lashes without a harsh contrasting black eye. If you've never tried brown I highly recommend it! The Maybelline mascara I use was on sale at Fred Meyers last time I was there.

The products I use in this tutorial: a misc eye shadow palette from Walgreens (w/pinky beige [A], bright navy blue [B], and a silvery dark gray [C]), Avon Glimmerstick Diamonds eyeliner in brown sugar, Maybelline Colossal Volume Express Smoky Eyes in Scorching Brown.




Add the A to just your eye lids and then along the outer half under your eye.


With B, line the outer third to half of your eye, starting thick on the outside and quickly thinning out at an angle. You maybe need to do this a couple times to get a slightly bold color. Next add just a baby bit to the outer corner of your bottom lash line. Just enough to add some color, don't totally line your eye.

Then take the eyeliner and line the outer third of your upper lash line and the outer eighth to fourth of your bottom lash line.


Now take C and carefully go over just the areas you used eyeliner. As for mascara, I only do the outer half of my upper lashes and outer third of my bottom lashes in an "up and out" sort of motion (starting by going up but then out towards the sides of my face). I feel like it fans out my lashes better.



There we go! Super easy and pretty look that takes no time at all!

In other excited news~ I finished a knitting project last night. It's a Sharo Cowl made with some hand dyed & spun wool I was given as gift. It reminds me of Fruit Loops lol!


Cowls have been my favorite accessory this fall so far. They work with just about everything I wear and keep me snuggly warm. If you follow me on IG I think I'm wearing a cowl in just about every pic for the last week or so hehe!

Do you have a favorite fall accessory?

Take care~ ♥♥♥

A Day Off, Clothes, and a Busy Day

Yesterday I had the entire day off. It was glorious!

Being a business owner means my time off belongs to the store if the store needs it. So I relish the moments I have at home when and don't have to worry or think about the store. Aaron had the day covered, so I got to stay at home. In pajamas. Knitting and watching movies. It was a much needed mental and body rest day.

While I spent the majority day lounging, I was still fairly productive. I started knitting a hat for my friend Cody who made my new blog header (thanks again Cody!), ate multiple bowls of cereal, got 100% of clothes washed, dried, and folded, and watch Hellboy 1 & 2 AND a Lupin the Third movie.

I took the opportunity to go through all of my clothes. Every. single. piece. and separated out the clothes that don't fit me anymore. All the cute little fitted tee's and skinny jeans were starting to make getting ready in the morning hard, so I wanted them out of my drawers and closet. Two big bags and one suitcase later (jeez!!!) all the clothes I stare at each morning are now only the items that will fit over my growing belly.


Mini Sunbow pictured can be found here.


Did I mention next week we get to schedule the ultrasound to see what gender our baby is?!?!?! AHHH!!!


I cannot tell you how much I love it when Aaron photobombs my impromptu photo shoots at the store. Love it love it love it! He's such a funny guy and makes me laugh from the bottom of my heart. Blessed~ I am so blessed to have him as my husband.


My favorite shirt, our store's mascot Seilah Barbossa, still fits me! Yay! For now anyways...


Noble Cowl pattern can be found here.

Can you tell I was feeling a bit feisty that day? $1 fashion glasses from Target and a fishtail braid pinned back. BAM! Watch out world!! Hehehe!

Speaking of the world, I'm pretty sure everyone in the world stopped by my store today. We were constantly busy the majority of the day. Tons of people buying and selling tons of stuff, our 5th arcade cabinet was delivered and installed, and a customer had a birthday party here. Good busy!

It's three minutes until I close the store, but I'll be here until the wee hours of the night cuz we're hosting a LAN party with our friends from high school. I'm armed with a Subway sandwich, an iced coffee, and a change of clothes with slippers so I'll be set!

Hope you all are enjoying your weekend! Take care!!

Joy In My Heart

There is so much joy in my heart today!

This morning I felt my baby rolling around. Before this it's just been little kicks and flutters, all side to side. This was up to down... up to down...


Next Tuesday we get to schedule our ultrasound to see what gender our baby is. SO EXCITED! Then I'll be able to start knit baby hats, clothes, and blankets, buy stuff for the baby area, paint... the works! My dad is really into wood working so he's going to make my baby bed. Time for me to start planning the baby area. Yay!


Another thing that is super nice, is that the person in front of us at Starbucks today paid for my drink. How wonderful is that? The whole "pay it forward" thing is really great!

There is quite a bit of stuff going on in other news in life (all of the stressful variety) but you know what? It's all good. Aaron and I have each other and we have an awesome support group, so I'm not going to worry too much about it, and focus on the awesomeness life has to offer. We are so blessed!!

I hope everyone has an awesome, awesome day! <3

Instaweek


Blueberry EOS lipbalm!? YES!


This man's beanie on an episode of X-Files is incredible! Yarn shopping is in my future.


I commandeered some new mascots!!


I was commandeered by the Empire!!


Sean dressed up as Gumshoe from the Phoenix Wright games while we handed out candy at the store.


Rinoa was the best watcher for Trick-Or-Treaters! She guarded the candy and let us know when people showed up.


Aaron was soooo excited for the new arcade cabinets we picked up for the store~ Ms. Pac-Man and Side Arms. d^___^b

Hope everyone enjoyed their Halloween! Did you go trick-or-treating? Did you have lots of kids come to your home for candy?

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