Red Birch

I don't mean Betula albosinensis, I mean this:

I finally finished. I had plenty of yarn so I added a border. I think it gives it a more finished look. It is really big. Here it is pinned out on my king sized bed.

Here it is on my sofa. I need a bigger sofa!

The Christmas Crunch

I am happy to report that all gifts were completed! It involved a late Christmas eve and I ended up have to fix one after Christmas but it all got done.



Originally I only had one project. Last year I decided to make my brother-in-law a pair of Aaaargh-yle Socks. I never even finished the first one. This year I decided to finish. I made them from Dale of Norway Falk because I already had some and it is washable. I used gray as the base color with black and red. He loved them.


I would probably have been okay with just the one project but just before Christmas I found something I couldn't pass up.


My mom has a birthday right after Christmas so I try to get her two things that go together. I went to the local bead store and made her this necklace.





I figured I could find a shirt of sweater to go with it at the store.



One week before Christmas I go into the yarn shop to pick up a small item I needed. While there I see this yarn. It is Schaefer Yarn "Miss Priss" 100% Merino in the color "Spanky". I did not have the necklace with me but mt color memory is screaming perfect match. There were two skeins so I grabbed them. I ran home and started searching for something I could make with only 560 yards of wool. Fortunately my mom is slim and she lives in a warm climate. I searched Knitty and found a simple pattern with the simple name "W". Perfect!



The pattern was great! It was fun to knit and it came together fast. I was able to finish while United Airlines made us sit on aircraft that didn't go anywhere. Here is the result.




Want to know if my color memory was accurate?

I think it was pretty good.

Done!

The blanket is finally done! Here it is in all its glory.



One of the nice things about the pattern is that you sew fleece on the back so you don't need to worry about little fingers and toes getting stuck in the yarn floats. I was lucky to find a really good match.



I added the baby's name and birth date to the back.




I had a lot of fabric left so I made a matching bear using this pattern.



Stay warm Caitie!

A Tale of Two Blankets

I've been busy with baby blankets. I had one friend with a baby due in June and another due in September. I knew the June baby was a girl but the mother was not big on pink. I picked a very soft lavender and I was in the mood for lace. The parents of the baby are from the UK so I thought I would try and turn the "Rose of England" from Marianne Kinzel's "Second Book of Modern Lace Knitting" into a blanket.

I wanted a square blanket so I knit the main part of the circle and then tried to square it up with some short rows. It was a good thing I started the blanket early. I knew that once the rounds got to be over 300 stitches it would be slow work.

With well over 1000 stitches on the needle it was hard to tell what shape it would turn out. I ended up with more material than I needed on the edge making it a loose, drapey square. The baby kindly gave me an extra two weeks to finish so I did get it done before she was born.

It is a very large blanket. It could probably double as a shawl or maybe a tablecloth.

Blanket number two is very different. The baby's mother is a knitter and when she found out I planned to make her a blanket she asked if I could make the "Sleep Baby Sleep" blanket from "Nursery Rhyme Knits" by Teresa Boyer. She loved the blanket but felt it was beyond her ability. Always being up for a challenge, I purchased yarn.

At first glance I thought, "it's a fairisle pattern, I've done that before". This was not entirely true. I've done fairisle in the round so you don't have to chart on the purl side and there were always only two colors in a single row. This blanket is knit flat, gotta purl, and there are some rows with three or four colors. It is a real challenge trying to keep an even tension.

While the rows are not that long and it goes fairly quickly when I actually sit down and work on it, the trouble has been actually sitting down and working on it. So here I am again, baby could come any time, and I'm not done.

This is what it should look like when finished.

In a fit of silliness we considered changing the verses to see if anyone would notice. My 5 year old daughter suggested the following:

Sleep baby sleep

Don't poop in your pants

Sleep baby sleep

I thought that might stick out.

This evening I was pretty tired and ready to go to sleep at 9:00. My daughter was not. After a two hour struggle she was asleep and I was wide awake. With the brilliance (and complete silliness) that only insomnia can bring I came up with my own version of the blanket. It is much more modern and each progressive verse works for a different age.

If it weren't so hard, I'd make them both. ;)

Frolic and Detour, part II

Thanks for all the nice comments about the butterfly sweater!

Since so many have asked, I will try to explain how I modified the pattern.

I made the size 6 but cast on 64 stitches and, other than the bottom border, just knit straight until it was 13" long. Joanna is pretty long waisted so I like to add length.

At that point I added shaping as follows:
Rows 1 & 2:cast off 8 sts at beginning of row.
Rows 3 & 4:cast off 4 sts at beginning of row.
Rows 5 & 6:cast off 2 sts at beginning of row.
Row 7: ssk, K8, cast off 16 sts, k to end

decrease 1 more stitch at the underarm and 1 stitch every other row at the center until 1 stitch remains. Bind off.

I made both front and back the same and stitched them together before starting the ruffle.

I made the ruffle as one circular piece. I cast on 288 stitches, knit six rounds of garter stitch then did the butterfly pattern. After the pattern was done I added 4 more rounds then decreased by slipping 2 sts together knitwise, k1, pass slip stitches over. At the end of the round I had 84 stitches remaining.

On the next round I attached the ruffle by knitting it on to the body.

After that it was a few plain rounds so I had a place for the beads then 4 garter rounds and cast off.

I also picked up sts at in the armpit, k a couple rows and cast off so it would look a little neater.

I hope that answers you questions, unfortunately I'm not too good at writing things down.

Frolic and Detour

After spending a lot of time working on large projects I really needed something quick. I put the large things aside and looked for some (almost) instant gratification.

For Mother's Day, Joanna gave me this yarn:

She is certainly no yarn snob. I think it may have been the ducklings on the label that she really liked but I figured if it was what she liked she should get a sweater from it.

We looked around at some patterns and she liked the Monica pattern from Knitty but thought it needed sleeves. I suggested we have the ruffle go up over the shoulder and she liked the idea.

Not being able to make anything plain, we found a butterfly pattern Nicky Epstein's Knitting Over the Edge.

When I was picking up Joanna from school last week I saw a bead store had opened in the plaza where her school is so we went to check it out.

I found these little yellow butterfly beads and matching yellow seed beads.

I thought they would look great around the neck of her sweater.

They are a bit subtle but I like that. Here is the whole sweater.

Joanna was kind enough to take time from her busy schedule to model it for me.

She will be able to wear it to church tomorrow for her birthday!

The next question is, what do I no with the almost whole tube of yellow seed beads?

Back to the big projects!

Little Things

I'm still working on the Civil War Shawl when I can squeeze in some knitting time. I am on the edging! To speed things up I made a chart from the instructions. It is going a lot faster now.

I did manage to finish a couple small projects.

My Mother-in-law needed some mittens while she was here visiting so she and Joanna both got a new pair.