Old and new reading

I’ve been reading through these two mags dreaming of my next project.  I liked the juxtoposition of the old and new patterns and layouts in these two books.  There are some wonderful little gems in each one.

Hats — See I told you I had been doing something

So I finally had a moment to get my s#*t together and upload and organize some photos.  I’ve been meaning to post the hat I made for my husband for some time now and here it is finally.  He received this hat actually pretty early on in the winter considering the previous attempts at making a hat for him were horrible.  I know, you’re saying “seriously dude, it’s a men’s hat.  That’s really not that hard.  What the f%$k where you doing.” Well I don’t know they just stunk and even though there is something kind of funny about insisting he wear them because he loves you and you made them even though they are horrible and look funny on him.  I thought that might actually look bad on me so I released him from bad hat wearing duty.

So here’s the good one.

And no I didn’t make Mazie’s sweater.  But it is handmade and absolutely adorable.  I picked it up at Crunchy Granola Baby. Insert shameless plug here: Crunchy Granola Baby (owned by my good friend Jennie) is a great place for all your natural baby needs. AND their website (designed by my very cute and talented husband) is a great resource.

It’s the Jacques Cousteau Hat pattern by I found on Ravelry translated by Kaisakaisa.  It’s a great hat to knit.  Completely mindless and quite soothing.  Once you establish the rib and then place the markers for the decrease there is no thinking at all until you’re done.  Love it.  My father in law got one of these for Christmas this year too.

So I needed a new hat.

This is the Side Slip Cloche Hat from Boutique Knits by Laura Irwin a book in which I am IN LOVE.  I think I might have to knit up every item in here.  Also let me just say that I’m not in the practice of posting photos of myself, especially like this one with sort of a goofy look on my face, but I wanted to show you the hat and Robbie was kind enough to get some photos of it for me.

It’s not quite like the pics in the book.  Laura’s seems to be a bit rounder at the top.  Maybe my head is just bigger or something, but I do like the way it turned out.  I have to admit that I NEVER would have picked out this yarn (Rowan RYC Soft Lux) just from seeing it in the skein, but when it knits up it’s quite beautiful.  It has little gold threads running through it and would normally be a bit to “jazzy” for me, but maybe I’m trying to step up my game or something.

Spring fever projects and my creative space

Thought I’d share my a couple of my spring fever projects today and what’s in my creative space.  Truthfully not feeling all that creative today because I’m SICK AGAIN! I’m going to have to scrub my entire house with Thieves Oil to disinfect it as I’m sure we are just recirculating these bugs.  However, it is a relatively warm day here (50’s ish) and sunny so it’s lifting my spirits.

Spent way too much on yarn yesterday, but excited about the projects on the docket.  These lovely pastels are for some bunnies I’m making — One for the bunny contest at Seed Stitch Fine Yarn and the others to fill Easter Baskets.  I’m not going to give up the pattern I’m using for the bunnies until after the Seed Stitch contest.  Don’t want to tip my hand.  When I’m done, I’ll show you the finished product and share the ingenious pattern I found online.

The sage green, which is hard to see the exact color way in this pic, will be for this great pocket zip vest from my new Debbie Bliss book. How cute huh?  Thought I’d make it in a gender neutral color so should we have a boy in the future it can do double duty.  I think Mazie will love stashing all sorts of treasures in these pockets.

All this yarn is Rowan All Seasons Cotton and I LOVE it.  It’s my first time knitting with it, but has a nice hand and is easy to knit.

Stepping back, I’m also spending the morning on the computer seeing what others are doing, finding inspriation via my tweeters, and looking forward to reading my new Mix Tape, which arrived last night.  Yahoo!

A little knit softie for my baby

I’m so excited about the completion of my latest projects.  I’d be even more excited if Mazie loved it as much as I do, but she does proudly tell anyone who will listen that “Mummy made this”, which is quite nice.

Below is the finished product, a very cute knit doll from a Debbie Bliss pattern.  I used a bunch of yarn remnants from my stash, not all Debbie Bliss.  The doll’s dress is made from left over yarn from a sweater in the same color I made for Mazie so she and her doll now match.

This one was so much fun to knit and I think she may end up with some little friends in the coming months.  With the left over yarn I still have I can see many different color variations and personallities.  Super fun project.

On my needles

After having finished my first pair of socks, I quickly started another pair.  I think I’ll always have a pair of socks going.  It’s an easy travel project as I can fit it into my pocket book and take it on the go.

This is a Regia superwash sock yarn.  I think the colorway is Galaxy, but I’m not positive.  I don’t think this pick does the colors justice.  It’s quite a lovely mix of brown, rusty orange, mauve, and a steele blue.  Lovely, can’t wait to see the finished product.   You can kind of see the way the color will show in the final fabric, looks like it will be almost like a wood grain.  Yarn picked up at Seed Stitch Fine Yarn here in Salem.  The most wonderful shop if you’ve not been in and worth a field trip if you live anywhere in New England.

My Creative Space

Playing along again with Kirsty at Kootoyoo.  My creative space (which I share with my husband) is chaotic this week.  This is a pretty crappy picture, but seriously at 6:15 this morning I couldn’t muster any better.  You’ll get the idea.

Here you’ll see a sneak peak (bottom left hand side) of the party favors in progress for Mazie’s birthday party this weekend.  I’m not going to spoil the surprise in case anyone’s kid will be the lucky recipient of one of these, but you’ll hear all about them post party festivities.  Also on the table is my cherished canvas tote bag, given to me as a bridesmaid gift (seriously one of the best bridesmaid’s gifts ever) by my friend Nicole.  It’s served me well in that it was my work tote when I had to lug along my breast pump, work shoes, notebook, etc. for a year and now has become my knitting bag.  I try never to keep too many skeins around, but mostly knit one or two projects and then go back for more.  I find it makes me feel less overwhelmed by stuff.  Anyhew I’m currently working on this fabulous knit doll for Mazie from a Debbie Bliss book.  Again more on this one to come soon.

Ok also on the table are these:

I picked up these lovely little spools of ribbon several weeks ago at Michaels.  They are tiny little spools of ribbon, perhaps 2 inches in diameter and the ribbons are about a quarter inch wide. I fell in love at first sight - so cute and color coordinated -  I just had to have them.  [Again see my obsession with ribbon here.]  Now I’m at a complete loss as to what I should do with them.  So here I seek your help.  Please, please give me some suggestions on how you might use these little lovelies.  You can offer up your suggestions in the comments section.  Maybe someone else will be inspired too.

A dose of spring in the winter

I’m so excited about the completion of my latest project.  It was my first attempt at making a pair of socks.  Just a simple knit three purl one rib and a stockinette foot, but look how great they turned out.  I’ve always heard people say there is nothing like a hand knit pair of socks and you know what?  They are totally right!  They feel so good on my feet.  One is a little bigger than the other because I was a loose knitter at the beginning of my sock adventure.  However, once you put them on, no one is the wiser and my feet don’t seem to notice either.

This yarn (I’m sorry I can’t remember what it is or find the sleeve) is such a lovely dose of spring color in the middle of winter.  I’ve already started my second pair of socks.  I’ll give you an on the needle preview soon.

This is another nutty week in our house.  I’m only just starting to recover from this HORRIBLE bug plaguing me for the last couple of weeks.  Mazie’s birthday is tomorrow and I can’t believe she is turning two.  I’m having a harder time with two than I did one.  When she turned one I thought oh this is so great she’s one, but two seems like such a big milestone for me.  It seems like a transition from having a baby to having a kid.  Part of me feels like oh my god she’s been here for two whole years and the other part feels like I can’t believe she’s only been around for two years.  Life would just not be the same without her.

Party festivities will commence this weekend and she is very excited.  She keeps talking about how at the party we’ll have cake and ice cream, balloons, all her friends will come, there will be presents, and we’ll sing and dance.  Seriously, could you ever ask for more than that in a birthday?  What a great thing to be turning two and to be surrounded by singing dancing friends and family who are all eating sweets.  Anyhew, lots of preparations in the days to come.  I’ll share the results with you in the coming days.

It’s the simple things in life

I’ve been interested in the hand knitted wash clothes phenomenon for quite some time but was inspired to give them as a gift from the Purl Bee tutorial. However, as a gift for a non-knitter I thought it would be more practical to make them out of a wash and dry yarn rather than a hand wash and lay flat yarn.  These were made with Mission Falls Marino Superwash.

I think it takes a special gift recipient to appreciate the work that goes into something so everyday, but made with love. These were a gift I’ve just given a lifelong and childhood friend for her wedding shower. I hope they bring a little bit of joy during those every day moments.

I think I’ll make some of these for us out of Euroflax.  Stay tuned.

A snowy day

This December has been another record snowfall for us in the Boston area. We had a lovely snow storm just before Christmas and we decided it was time to take Mazie out to play. Although lots of fun we did give ourselves some parenting demerits because we’d not yet purchased boots for her. So we had to go with the old frugal New Englander method of wrapping her feet in plastic before we stuck them in her sneakers. I know great parenting, but subsequently many folks have told us that their parents had done the same and they have now turned out to be normal. And yes, we now have some lovely warm boots for her.

Anyway thought this was a perfect opportunity to share with you some warm hats I made for Mazie and I this year. Poor Robbie, both my attempts at hats for him flopped so he’s still wearing his oldy but goody store-bought hat. Hopefully third time will be the charm for him.

Mazie’s is a creation of my own. Basically a lot of stitches on long circulars and then quickly decreased in the first few rows to form the ruffle. Then knit like a simple hat. Mine is a pattern I found on Ravely by Rachel Lufer. My version turned out a bit pointy-er on the top than the actual pattern is. Rachel’s pattern is wonderful, however input from the peanut gallery is not. When knitting it the peanut gallery suggested to me that it might not be deep enough so I increased the crown a bit by inserting a few rows between decrease rows. The result: the hat is a little too deep and a bit pointy in the crown, but I love it just the same. Knit from some lovely but itchy handspun, I added a fleece band inside and it’s made it quite toasty and wearable. I definitely recommend giving this pattern a try, but not listening to input from the peanut gallery when making it.