And Here Is Some Knitting

As I mentioned in a previous post, even if I couldn't really enjoy reading while I have been recovering from surgery, at one point I was able to knit basic things.  One of my goals while I was going to be home from work was to knit a little sweater for an upcoming great-niece.  My niece and her husband who live in San Francisco are having a baby girl, due on September 19.  I am not all that sure that they will be thrilled with hand knit items, as they didn't seem thrilled the year I knit everyone socks and sent them for Christmas (well, maybe they loved them, but I never heard one way or another), but since I have knit things for the other great-nieces and nephews, I was going to knit something for this baby.

Normally, I would wait until the baby was actually here, and I was certain the package had been received, but since I know that my niece doesn't read much at all, much less read my blog, I decided to go ahead and share now.

So here you go.

Project:  Arielle's First Sweater
Pattern:  Yoked Cardigan by Hannah Fettig (Ravelry link)
Yarn:  Blue Sky Alpacas Worsted Cotton, colorway 627 Flamingo
Needles:  Size 8US
Modifications:  None
Comments:  This is a very fun pattern to knit.  Though basic, you do have to pay attention.  There is a lot of purling, so if you are one of those people who will do anything to avoid having to purl, this may not be the pattern for you.  For whatever reason, as I was knitting it, I decided it needed to have navy blue buttons.  The ones I ended up finding are not a dark navy blue, but they are a darker-than-baby-blue, and I like the way they look.  This is the first Hannah Fettig pattern I've knit, and it's really well-written.

The little sweater is on its way to California as I am writing this, where hopefully it will be put on the kid at least once for a photo!  :-)

After the Fact Baby Sweater

Back towards the end of February, The Tim forwarded me an e-mail from one of his brothers, announcing that there was a new family member.  The Tim's oldest niece Laura, and her husband Lee, had a baby girl on February 8, and named her Fiona.  There were a couple of pictures from the hospital, and of course she looked red and scrunchy, with dark hair.

This was a complete surprise to us.  The Tim's family is not known for being particularly close, even though some of them don't live that far from us, and thinking of it, I guess we should be glad we found out as soon as we did - by comparison, his brother-in-law who was the best man in our wedding, died in January, and no one bothered to tell us until March ...

But I digress.  We had a new great-niece, and I wanted to knit something for her.  Since I had had so much luck with my great-nephew Parker's Owls Vest (Ravelry link), I wanted to try another project other than a hat.  A few of my friends had knit the Garter Yoke Baby Cardi, by Jennifer Hoel, with varying types of yarns and modifications, so I thought I'd give that a try.

I poked around the stash, since I'm trying not to buy yarn until I've used some that I already have, and found a skein that I thought would do the trick.  So I sat down to get started, and once I could finally actually start casting on the correct number of stitches and getting started without messing up, I was on my way.  And I was very pleased with the result:

Then I was able to find some really adorable wooden buttons, with  a teddy bear carved into them.  (There are no pictures, since I couldn't get any that showed the detail, you'll just have to take my word for it.)

I think it's so cute!  I sent it in the mail, and about two weeks later got a lovely note from our niece thanking us.  She said she thought it was beautiful and admired my handiwork, but never mentioned trying it on the baby - which makes me think it was too small.  But, them's the breaks when people find out after the fact that a baby is on the way, right???

The color was hard to really capture with my limited photography skills, but it is really more of a pinky-lavender, with the occasional dot of blue, which I thought was nice for a baby without being a) too babyish, and b) too girly.  Though I'd originally bought the yarn for socks, I thought it made a lovely little sweater.

The details:

Project:  Fiona's Sweater

Pattern:  Garter Yoke Baby Cardi, by Jennifer Hoel

Size:  newborn - 3 months

Yarn:  Dream in Color Smooshy, colorway Wisterious

Needles:  size 4US

Modifications:  none

Comments:  This was a very straightforward pattern, and fairly easy to knit.  The resulting sweater is really cute, and I think it's one of those that could be made to be adaptable to any yarn, or design (one friend I know made the yoke stripes, which looked fantastic), or personalized for just about any baby.  The Smooshy yarn is superwash, so it is also nice when you don't know how likely the person is to handwash anything - and I'm doubting that many new parents want to spend time handwashing baby clothes.

I would recommend this pattern to any more-than-beginning knitter, since it is easily completed, and can be made in nearly any weight of yarn.

Most amazingly for me, this is the third FO I have for 2013 - which, considering that in 2012 I knitted 6 things and made a quilt, is already putting me on track to do better than that!  

You Might Want to Sit Down for This One ...

Because in this post, I am actually going to show you that this blog is not just a "pretend" knitting blog - yep, I've got something to show you!  And, wonder of wonders, there are others to come!

So if you are still with me, let me show you my last FO of 2012.  This was finished on November 11, but various photo sessions did not work out, so rather than show you The Tim wearing this hat that was knitted for him, it was time to rely on the old medicine ball ...

A few years back, I knitted a Turn a Square hat for The Tim for Christmas.  It was a big hit, and was the first time I had knit something with stripes.  At the time, I had no idea what the Jogless Stripe method was, so if you looked closely, you could see where one color changed to another.  Neither of us cared, and to some extent, neither of us still do.  (*Note:  Rather than link to a specific version of the Jogless Stripe demo, I'll leave it to you to choose from the many available if you just Google the term.)

Anyway, The Tim mentioned really liking the hat, and when I found myself with a) some yarn that didn't cry out to be anything else, and b) in need of a birthday gift, I thought I'd go ahead and knit another.  This time, though, I decided to give the Jogless Stripe method a try, and I must admit it does look nicer when the item is finished.

Anyway, here you go:

The top

The side/front/whatever you want to call it

The details:

Project:  Turn a Square Squared

Pattern:  Turn A Square by Jared Flood

Needles:  US size 5 and 7

Yarns:  Brooklyn Tweed SHELTER (gray) and Classic Elite Inca Alpaca (yellow)

Modifications:  None

Comments:  If you haven't  made one of these, you really should.  The pattern is free, you don't need a lot of yarn of either color, and it goes really quickly.  Plus, it's well received.  The Tim started wearing this one, and gave me his original one to repair, as it had become unraveled!  I asked him why he didn't give it to me to repair sooner, and he said, "Because I just like wearing it too much."

**********

And to "officially"close out 2012 (now that it's April!), here is a shot of all of the projects completed last year:

Not a lot, and not necessarily world-shattering, but a) I'm happy with it, and b) it's not a contest!

And now that we have closed out the last year, we can move on to things completed so far in 2013 ...

Some other time, that is.  :-)

A Long Time Comin'

Well, it's been a busy weekend Chez Ravell'd Sleave.  Yesterday was the 2nd Annual Faux Knitting Get-Together, held at my house.  I did this last year (you probably guessed that from the name of said event), and it was apparently a big hit, so people were asking me when it was happening again this year.  The reason it's a "faux" knitting event, is because some of the people are knitters, and some are not - but through Facebook, some of them wanted to meet each other, so I created the event.  I had a great time, and I think others did as well.

Needless to say, today we are all just taking it easy.  Jetsam, Pip, and Dug are exhausted (they were very busy yesterday!), and The Tim is at work, so I got some laundry started, and picked up my knitting while watching the Phillies lose.  (sigh)  Last year, after I made the cozy for my Nook Color, The Tim asked if I would make one for him.  And like most things, I took months to get around to it.  Then I started one that was allegedly a Christmas gift, but didn't finish it.  I did finish it last month, using a different pattern, and decided it was horrible-looking.  So I ripped it out, and started over with the previously used, tried and true pattern.  By now, The Tim had a Nook Tablet, but the size is basically the same.  He requested charcoal gray for the color, which was harder to find than you'd think.  

Anyway, when I picked it up today, it turned out I was only about 4 rows from the end - what an eejit!  But I finished it, wove in the ends, and added a really cool button that I had found on sale weeks ago at Loop.  I think he'll be pleased.  

This is closer to the true color of the yarn ...

But you can see the cable up the middle better in this photo.

And is this not an awesome button?  It's perfect for this - win-win!

Details are here on Ravelry, for anyone interested.  If for some reason you are dying to see the details, and don't have a Ravelry account, let me know and I can send them to you.  (But if you are a knitter, you really should have a Ravelry account - it makes life so much simpler in so many ways, and it's free ...)