More knitting

I've been on a total knitting kick lately. Little man has been a bit high maintenance, wanting Mama and nothing but, so its been harder to get invested in anything that demands large chunks of time. I also really enjoyed knitting that last pull over for Jack so that's sort of fueled my knitting fires.

For some reason, I have this issue with Jack's clothing/accessories. I really have trouble with the fact that my child actually grows. Its not the whole "I can't believe my baby is getting so big" kind of trouble, though that crosses my mind daily. The kind of trouble that I have is not realizing that he has gotten physically larger to the point that I am continually stuffing him into things that clearly make him look like Chris Farley in Tommy Boy. I had one of those moments last week when I noticed that the little bear hat he always wears was beginning to resemble a yarmulke. To the yarn stash! I grabbed a couple of leftover bits and used my favorite go to hat pattern for stash busting, Jane Richmond's top down hat tutorial.

It only took a couple of naps and one stint in the waiting room at my doctors office. This is my first successful attempt at intarsia. I'm pleased with the result especially considering I made the pattern up on the fly and I like the way the colors came together too. I think it looks like something I might have worn at Jack's age, very early 80s. I really wish I'd remembered to switch to a smaller needle when knitting the brim, as it looks a little sloppy and the whole hat is a bit big, which I guess is a theme with me lately, but better big then small when making for kids right? And Jack seems to like it.

Varying degrees of fail and win.

I've recently completed a couple of projects, unfortunately they did not all come out completely as planned. Exhibit A: The Child's Placket Neck Pullover from Last Minute Knitted Gifts. It's a lovely pattern, well written and easy to follow even for someone who had never done raglan sleeves or a placket neck. It only took 2.5 skeins of Vana's Choice from Lion Brand. Yes I know its trashy and I am a little embarrassed but 1, I'm too cheap to buy cotton and 2, I have felted every wool sweater I have ever known. It's a good choice for me. It also washes surprisingly well which is great for kids clothes since I refuse to hand wash anything and will inevitably throw everything we own in the dryer at some point (read 2) but I digress.

I did not swatch this project first. Let this be a lesson to us all. When changing both suggested yarn type and gauge, go ahead and swatch. Ive already got a second one on the needles though and he'll grow into this one eventually. (I'm realizing that these photos don't do justice how huge this thing is on him, but maybe this helps, he is a large 17 month old and this sweater came out at the 6-8 year old measurements) So its a sizing fail, but a definite experience win.

The second completed project is a lovie for a little boy that Ive been meaning to get to FOREVER. His mama asked for my help recreating one that had been destroyed. Pretty simple, or so I thought. Let me tell you, these minky and sateen blankies are tough to sew. They are diametrically opposed and super bitchy fabrics. Seriously, they hate each other. Also the minky hates irons as evidenced by that top left corner. Jeeze, thanks for telling me in advance minky, WTS? I totally winged this one. I eyeballed some rectangles making the sateen about 3 inches wider on all sides than the minky, slapped them together and machine sewed around the perimeter about a quarter inch in (insert plenty of swearing at this point). Then I ironed the sateen's edges over about a quarter inch and folded and pinned just inside the sewed line. Finally I hand stitched the folded edge of the sateen to the minky. This really didn't take long, maybe 2 hours total. Pretty good for all that hand stitching right?

I guess it doesn't look THAT bad, though the bunching is killing me. I can see it in this photo and it is making me crazy. Despite my grumping I was informed by the mama that her little man basically had a happy baby heart attack over it. So I guess that makes it a win?

The third thing I guess isn't really much of a project and isn't really mine to take credit for but it was such a win that I had to share. CRISPY FRIED SHRIMP! They had those bags of frozen, uncooked shrimp on sale at Safeway last week so we grabbed one. Dinner rolled around the other night and we decided to make shrimp tacos. Bruce, who has no fear in the kitchen (blessing and a curse) made a flour, cornmeal, cayenne pepper and salt dredge and an egg/milk wash. I'm sorry I cant post a recipe, Bruce is wont to literally throw things together. Luckily, they often the look like this.

 Oh god, it is so good. Is your mouth watering right now? These were so delicious it was kind of ridiculous. We added home made tarter sauce, corn tortillas and shredded cabbage. Mmmmm. This was of course the big win of the week. We'll be making these again for sure.

Best hat in the world?

I love projects like this. It was conceived and executed within 48 hours. It's getting colder around here and I wanted to add a hat to Jack's hand made Christmas presents. Of course it couldn't be any old hat. Ive had this super soft fuzzy yarn in my stash forever. When I came across it, looking for inspiration it jumped out and screamed "Yeti". Right in my face. Rude right? But it couldn't be ignored.

I used Jane Richmond's top down hat tutorial and this ear flap hat pattern as reference. The face is craft felt, a couple of mis-matched buttons and embroidery floss. I'm so excited about how it turned out. Now, on to slippers for mom!

Knit pants for fall.

I know, its sweltering hot in Seattle. By sweltering of course, I mean 80 degrees. It IS the PNW after all. So you may think I'm a little nuts to be knitting pants but my reasoning is 2 fold. First, I am using knitting as part of my post-op physical therapy regimen. It's actually doing wonders, in small doses of course, for my wrist/hand mobility and strength. Second, I wanted to get a jump on the knitting season. I always seem to find myself up to my ears in projects I wish I'd started over the summer. Not this year! This year I'm being proactive! I chose this pattern.

It only took about a week of evening in-front-of-the-tv type knitting. The pattern was so easy. My only complaint would be that not every step is spelled out completely. For instance, you'll end up casting off a couple of stitches in the crotch area before you divide to knit each leg. The pattern doesn't actually tell you to sew these stitches up during the finishing but its pretty self explanatory.

My consensus is that you must knit these for the baby in your life immediately. Super easy, super fun and as you can see super super adorable.

...and back again

I got a little overzealous with the crafting as soon as I got the braces off and I'm a bit laid up again. Boo!


It was mostly the knitting that did me in. Oh sweet knitting. How I missed it. I finished Jack's beret. Here he is in all his indiferent Franco glory. And then I tried to knit a pair of slippers in like 15 minutes and ignored the fact that my wrists were aching. I know... I'm an idiot. So I'm on a self-imposed knitting hiatus till February at the earliest, and an all crafting break till the end of the weekend. But its not all bad. This gives me time to get my video game on. I am going to try to play so Red Dead Redemption here in a few minutes and Ive been trolling the intertubes, looking for stencil ideas. Hopefully Ill be back next week with a few new things. Probably sewn items.


I've been working on a quilt repair I want to share with you and some more kicking bags for Jack (he's almost outgrown the cashmere one already). Fingers crossed I'm back to normal on Monday. On to the wild west!

Busy with Baby Stuff

As you can see the belly is growing. I'm still tired, but I got tired of being tired and have forced myself to get back into a crafty groove albeit not as prolificly (thats a word right?) as I would like. I have managed to make a few things on my list for Jack. The first is the LOOP baby toy from Ravelry. I keep reading that little babies like high contrast stuff so I did up the main ring in black and white and the smaller ones in red and gray. Hopefully it will be something texturally and visually interesting for Jack to enjoy right away. To be honest, I have no idea what newborns are interested in so I guess we'll just have to see what he thinks.


Ive also finished the baby sophisticate finally. It was sitting around waiting for buttons FOREVER and I got sick of it mocking me. I also made this bunny from the pattern I found here. I HIGHLY recommend this one. Its super fun to make, quick, easy and oh so satisfying. I stuffed a couple of jingle bells into the body to make it a little more interesting for Jack. Bruce has been calling it "Jack Rabbit". So cute.


I also found time last night to make this coffee cake. I found out half way into mixing that the applesauce in my fridge had gone bad (sad face, why can I never use that stuff up fast enough) so I subbed in canned pumpkin and it was delicious. Ive had 4 pieces already and intend to eat several more this evening. Delish!