Journal Your Christmas winner!

It's kind of unbelievable that tomorrow is already December 1st, huh? I'm stoked to begin working on my Journal Your Christmas book for this year ... which brings me to the class giveaway.  :)

Random.org picked number 11, making Emily the winner of the class pass to Journal Your Christmas! (Emily – email your full name and email address to jgeigley [at!] gmail [dot] com and Shimelle will get you all set up to get started tomorrow!) Congrats to Emily and thanks to everyone who played along. Happy (almost) December. 

happy birthday to the bloggy

My, how time flies. This is my 500th blog post and the four year birthday of hey! jen renee. Which is just weird. Happy blog birthday to me!

So it seems like a good time to say thanks. Thanks for stopping by, scrolling through or saying hello. I've met so many ridiculously cool people through blogging. I'm grateful for the friendships I've made and the multitude of things I've learned from this creative community. You guys are rad.

Blogging is such a weird thing. I'm not a writer. Sometimes I have no idea why I carry on here. But this place has become my little online home where I can live out loud, share my nerdy hobbies and post pics from the latest concert that I've been to. Whatever ... right?

Now's a great time to say hi if you've never said hi before. No, really. Tell me how you landed here, if you've been reading here awhile or even if it's your first time. Tell me if there's something new that you'd like to see here. Sometimes I check out my recent visitor activity or look at my visitor map and am astonished at the places people come from. Are you a mom, a crafter, a knitter ... a metal head? A metal head who knits and crafts? I like to know these things.  ;)

Whoever you are, thank you for reading. I'll save you some cake.

a giveaway!!!

Every December, I look forward to Journal Your Christmas, a fantastically cool online holiday project by my pal Shimelle Laine. Back in 2007, I decided to give J.Y.C. a try and now it's become one of my favorite traditions. (You can see a mix of my 07, 08 and 09 pages here.)

The cool thing is that once you join Journal Your Christmas, you're in for life. You sign up and pay once, and get to enjoy the experience year after year. It's more than just making a page a day. You're documenting the season, the memories, the music, the food, the feeling, the nostalgia, the preparations ... along with thousands of people from all around the world. You can make it into a scrapbook, or you can use it as a writing project with just a journal and pen. Either way, you're going to end up with something that brings back the magic for you (in your quest to 'take back Christmas,' as Shimelle says) and keep your memories fresh for you and others to look back on years from now.

Want to join in the fun? I'm giving away one free pass to Journal Your Christmas and all you have to do is leave a comment here telling me what you're looking forward to most about this holiday season. I'll pick one winner tomorrow morning, November 30.  

** Also! Don't forget about the Cyber Monday deals in my shop today. 15% off all hand-knits, all day long.   :)

enjoy 15% off - happy cyber monday :)

Hey all! All day today (Monday November 29th) until 11:59 PM CST, enjoy 15% off on anything and everything in my Etsy shop. Just enter promo code HEYCYBERMONDAY at checkout for your discount.

Hand-knits make fantastic gifts for your best girl friend. Your mom. Your sister. (Or, duh ... yourself.) Happy small business weekend/Cyber Monday.

turkey day + market day black friday

Hey, turkey ... hope you're having a great Thanksgiving. 

Today I'm feeling ever so grateful to have a husband who gets even more rad each and every year (this is technically our tenth Thanksgiving together.) And without a doubt, every day I'm so grateful for little Lo, who is learning so much and growing up so fast it makes me dizzy.

I'm stoked to spend the day (and this whole weekend) with family, enjoying the good company and the pie and the cranberries and the turkey ... and the pie. But of course, you know I'm also busy winding these gorgeous skeins of yarn into these.

So I can knit lots of lovely things for Market Day Black Friday.

I've been stockpiling the very best colors of Twinkle Soft Chunky yarn so I can make piles of these super soft cowls for the sale.

And I've been mass-producing smaller cowls in every color of the rainbow. If you want neutrals, I've got 'em. Brights? Got those, too. (At $25 each, these make really great gifts!)

This is going to be the biggest and best Market Day ever. Not even kidding. You really can't miss this. We're at a brand new, bigger location this time around – The Pappajohn Center next to the sculpture park in downtown Des Moines. There are going to be 60+ crafters (see the photo gallery here,) parking meter fairies, coffee and hot chocolate, free gift wrap courtesy of Art Noir, free Mars Café coffee coupons with your purchase, and free Market Day canvas totes for the first 50 shoppers. You can find the event info on Facebook or check out the Market Day website for all the info. (Or read Market Day co-founder Scott Rocketship's thoughts about being local-minded.) Come out and see us (and bring your whole family.) We'll be there from 9 AM - 2 PM. See how good it feels to do your holiday shopping local + handmade. Shop local, be awesome. (But most importantly, Happy Thanksgiving.)

crafty

I had the opportunity to review Martha Stewart's Encyclopedia of Sewing and Fabric Crafts on Craft Critique last week, and I've been all kinds of inspired after reading it.

This felt garland for Lo's room was made from one of the projects in the book, and I have a quilt project in the works. (Well, sort of ... it might have to wait until January.)

If you want to read the whole review, you can find it here!

And last week, the Moms Like Me section of the Des Moines Register ran a little crafty story featuring me and Lo! I didn't actually see the paper version until today (thanks EmC!) and thought my little girly looked pretty sweet. You can read the article on the web here.

making the season bright

I'm feeling so very inspired by bright knits this season. Here are just a few brilliant Ravelry projects and knitting patterns that have made their way into my faves folder.

This tiny sweater by botaneige is perfection. I never knew garter stitch could look this cool.

This Missoni Inspired chevron blanket by Kelly Kingston is insane. Who wouldn't want this hanging over the back of their Eames rocker?

Loving these super rad Heartless Wristers by Mandy Powers. (The photo is pretty great, too, right?)

These stripey mittens by handepande not only show off some great color combinations, but they also were a total stash-bust project.

Dying over the cuteness of this Dress to Impress sweater dress/romper from the new Stitch and Bitch Superstar Knitting book. Ugh ... so cute.

And I'm swooning over the Stem and Leaf cowl by Betsy Farquhar in this crazy color combo. What ... you wanted more? I do have more to share ... another time. (Hope all of this color helps inspire you a bit today.)

so ... you want to learn how to knit?

Meet my most recent group of lovely new knitters from the Knitting for Beginners class at Ephemera in the East Village.

I had an awesome time meeting and chatting with this fun group of first-timers, which included an avid crocheter and the adorable mom and daughter team in the photo above. (Which is a great idea, by the way ... I love that they decided to take the class together!)

And here's the graduating class of fall 2010, ready to go forth and knit lots of holiday gifts, I predict! If you're interested in upcoming knitting classes, be sure to check out the class schedule at Ephemera, which is a lovely place to take classes of all sorts this winter. Our next beginner knitting class starts November 16th. Contact my friends Arin and Karen to sign up!

p.s. Knitting classes make great gifts!  :)

Yo Gabba Gabba is AWESOME.

Saturday was the big day! Our little fam drove to Kansas City to see Yo Gabba Gabba Live, and we had such an amazing day. We spent the first part of the day at the Plaza, and then the show was at the AMC by Midland downtown in the Power and Light district, which is such a cool area.

When the lights came down and D.J. Lance Rock stepped out, opened up the boombox and our favorite friends were standing there, I seriously had a tear in my eye because I could tell Lo loved it so much. We all loved it!

(See?)

We saw lots of our favorite characters, like Archibald the worm and Gooble. The stage show was fantastic, we loved the choreography, and D.J. Lance Rock did an awesome job heading the live show.

As you'd expect, there was tons of dancing, we heard all of our favorite songs and the graphics and lights on stage were completely rad.

The Super Music Friends guest stars were the talented ladies of SHEL. (They sang a song called Blueberry Rubber Band, which has become Lo's new favorite song.)

And the one and only Midwest Diva Leslie Hall performed the Peanut Butter Stomp.

 We love Leslie and were so stoked to see her 'go crazy!!'

Biz Markie blew our minds with some killer beat boxing and did Biz's Beat of the Day with kids from the audience. Which was adorable.

 And our kiddo was mesmerized from start to finish, soaking it all in. She truly loved it.

There was a balloon drop, bubbles, dancey-dances, confetti ... the works. What else could a kid want?

Our favorite part of the show was Brobee's Party in my Tummy. Love the song, love love love the costumed characters. They went all out!

 But then, sadly, it was almost time to say goodbye. (I think everyone was sad it was over.)

Lo waved to Brobee, Muno, Plex, Foofa and Toodee as they each sang their part of the goodbye song and went back into their boombox home. (We explained that they had to go back home to California to make more awesome episodes ... it's tough to say goodbye!)

Such a perfect ending (and D.J. Lance even came back on the screen a couple of times to say goodbye again.) Our whole family had an amazing time and we can't wait to see them on tour again someday. (Thanks, Yo Gabba Gabba, for an awesome time!)