Baby Strawberry Hands

Several months ago, while Sister was still pregnant (but very close to due), I decided that Baby needed a pair of thrummed mittens that looked like strawberries. Then we could call him Baby Strawberry Hands -- which sounds vaguely like Edward Scissorhands, but much cuter.

I improvised the pattern, using the leftover Cadenza from the Red Bear, but didn't write it down. I made the first Strawberry in one night (maybe two?), and then it took me longer than I'd anticipated to sit down and work on the second one, so I had time to forget what I'd done. And then the first attempt at Strawberry #2 was terrible, so I frogged it and started over... well, my nephew is now three months old, and I just finished the second Strawberry today. And this after making a concerted effort to finish!

But SO CUTE!!!! He may have already outgrown them, I don't know. He is a BIG baby. But I'm popping them in the mail soon, and maybe he'll get a couple of days' use out of them.


I think I cast on two or three stitches and kfb-ed every stitch a few times, working in the round (size 5 DPNs). Then I just kept increasing randomly, adding the occasional thrum, and probably got up to around 100 stitches total. Then I started decreasing, also randomly. I also threw in purl ribs here and there along with the decreasing, so that the surface would have that irregular bumpy shape like a strawberry. (Inasmuch as you can make mittens look like a strawberry, that is! They're not very pointy/triangular.) I decreased down to 20 sts, all purls, and then switched to larger dpns and the green yarn, which is Jill Eaton Minnow Merino, by Classic Elite Yarns. I think I used size 6 for the first mitten, and 7s for the second mitten; it's hard to tell. Anyway, I did 6 rounds of k1p1 rib and then bound off loosely. I did a single-crochet chain to connect the two, so now they look like strawberries on the vine! And the vine can go through his coat sleeves.

Seriously adorable.

Be Jealous...I mean, be happy for me!

A couple of months or so ago, I showed up at my usual Sunday afternoon knitting group and there were new people there, which always makes me happy. On this particular day, I was absolutely giddy, and I think I may have scared a couple of the new people away. Whoops. Sorry, gals.

The cause of my giddiness (combined with a probable lack of sleep) was meeting a fellow knitter who, it turns out, also went to the same college as I did, and knew several of my old college friends. I haven't been feeling terribly homesick or displaced lately, but it's always huge to find someone with whom you click so immediately -- especially when you discover that you actually do have something of a shared history/experience, like going to the same college. We found ourselves calling across the table things like "hey, were you there the time that kid fell out the window of the Forum?" or "Did you know that the Pub is now closed? Can you believe that?!?!??"

Soooo, it turns out that this particular friend works part-time at Kaleidoscope Yarns. Scratch that: she worked part-time there, only on Saturdays... but when another employee left, my friend moved to working full-time. And then the question arose, "what are we going to do about Saturdays?" and, ever the helpful yarn shop employee, my friend said "What about hiring my friend HolyKnitter?" She showed up at Sunday afternoon knitting that week and asked if I wanted the job.

Um, YES.

Really, this would have been an awesomely fun opportunity no matter what, but it turns out that the job market in Burlington has not been so kind to Husband (he has worked an approximate total of three weeks in the past year), and we actually could use a bit of an income boost. I'd been wondering about second-job options, but hadn't actually looked seriously at anything, as Husband's job-searching experience has taught him that it's pretty difficult to find a part-time job around here that will allow "my other job comes first" flexibility... and, since my career is the ministry, it's important that any other job I do allows me to put it on the back burner if something comes up. I'm super happy to work on Saturdays, unless I have to do a funeral. Church comes first.

Thankfully, Jill at Kaleidoscope understands that, and is just happy to have me working at all. If I can give her the occasional actual-weekend-at-home-not-working, I'm glad to be able to help. If that means I also get to put my love of knitting to a use that benefits people other than myself, so much the better! (If that also means I get an employee discount... well, chances are that Jill is actually making more money off of me than if I didn't work there.)

So I've got a second job. And so far it's been great. I like my co-workers (I'm getting used to having co-workers again -- I'd just gotten used to having colleagues!), I generally like the customers, and I've already learned a ton, and I've also had a great time realizing how much I didn't know that I know! Also, our holiday party was dinner at the awesome sushi restaurant in town.


You never know what kind of surprises God is going to throw your way.

Teddy Bear #2

A friend of Husband's saw the red bear I was knitting for Sister's Baby, and asked me to make one as a gift for her knocked-up daughter as well (but in yellow). So I did. I used the same yarn as I did before (Colinette Cadenza -- really like this yarn), but on size 5 needles instead of size 6 so that I could stuff the bear a little more tightly without the stuffing showing through like it did with the red bear. This time, I got smart and knit the darn thing in the round, which makes it so much easier. The pattern is written for stripes, so there's seaming. But if you're not doing stripes, then the seaming is unnecessary. And a pain. Anyway, here's the result:
(in progress)




I had to finish in a hurry (about a week after running into the friend on the street and learning that I had "plenty of time," because she wouldn't be seeing her daughter for "a while," Husband came home and said, "M just called me, and she's coming to pick up the bear tomorrow because she's going to visit her daughter the next day." Ummm... okay!). I used this brown embroidery thread for the face because that's what I had -- but then realized it was not high-contrast enough. I rimmed the eyes in blue at the very last second (I was tying the final knot just as Friend walked up onto our porch), but didn't get a photo. Still, you get the idea, even with the bad lighting in this pic:

PIDGE!

I hope your Christmas was lovely. Mine was pretty great, complete with successful Christmas Eve services, a delicious oyster omelet on Christmas morning, great presents from Santa (gold eyeliner! Just what I've always wanted! Santa reads Vogue, you know.), and dogsitting my sister's awesome dog for nine days. Hilarous photo of the dog in front of the Christmas tree will happen sometime after I get the file off of my phone and onto the computer.


I've had some pretty strong urges toward Startitis lately. While knitting the Cloud Socks, I also made a pidge in two days out of some lovely Blue Sky Alpaca Super-Bulky Hand Dyed wool that I bought at the Kaleidoscope Yarns Anniversary Sale this summer. Gorgeous slightly-irregular blue.

What is a pidge, you ask? I definitely had to ask. I'm glad I did, because "pidge" is now my new vocabulary word for the winter. I thought I knew about most items of clothing, but a pidge is something new. It may be a New England thing, I'm not yet sure. Anyway...

A pidge is kind of a cross between a cowl and a scarf. It's a rectangular, like a scarf, but so short that it has to be buttoned around your neck, close like a cowl would be (except that a cowl is cylindrical). My friend Aubrey-who-never-updates-her-blog-anymore introduced me to the concept, and now I am seeing pidges everywhere I go. LOVE the pidge! (Also, "pidge" is fun to say. Pidge pidge pidge!)

There is a kitty in this picture. He's yawning, which is pretty funny. Also, Husband likes to take pictures of ME rather than pictures of the hand-knits, so...yeah.

I modified the GC Cowl pattern (Rav link), and used some hand-turned buttons that I bought at the Vermont Sheep and Wool Festival this fall. I crocheted little button loops so as not to have to figure out how to put a buttonhole inside the cable. I was knitting with super-bulky yarn on too-short metal needles, and that was irritating enough without trying to make vertical buttonholes inside a cable in addition.

Oooh, pretty buttons.

The finished pidge used two skeins plus about two yards of a third skein of the Blue Sky. It's seriously irritating to graft on a new skein just so you can finish the bind-off row.

I've wet-blocked the pidge once already, and it's still fairly curly. I may wet-block a second time and actually pin it a little bit stretched-out, or I may just let it go.

PIDGE!

YARN!

My college friend Kate was destashing, and I bought a box of yarn from her. The main scores were some ancient Lopi and some not-ancient Peace Fleece, both enough to make sweaters. Also, some random label-less chenille. There were some other items in there, some of which were awesome, and some of which will probably sit in the bottom of my stash forever. I don't understand these people who destash. But I will totally buy their yarn from them. Enjoy the unwrapping pictures!

HAT!

Husband actually asked me to make him a hat. Husband rarely expresses a great deal of interest in my knitting. He is supportive, yes. He indulges me in my yarn tourism whims. But he is a man more interested in functionality than aesthetics, and when I say things like "would you like me to knit you a hat?" he responds, "I already have a hat."

But when he lost his (store-bought) hat a few weeks ago, he asked me to make him another. I immediately dropped everything and knit him a hat. Ask, and ye shall be rewarded for asking.

When he lost his mittens at the mechanic, I found them a week later. I did not respond nearly so kindly to the lost mittens. And I took this tendency-toward-forgetfulness into account in my yarn choices for a hat, too. He definitely got the light brown wool-acrylic blend that was a "bonus gift" in a box of destashed yarn I got from a college friend this fall. I don't care if he loses a hat made from splitty 80's acrylic-blend cheap-o yarn.

Basic pattern:
Yarn is pretty basic worsted.
CO 120 sts on size 7 needles. PM and join to knit in the round.
k2, p2 rib for 3 inches -- enough for a nice brim to fold up over the ears
switch to St st - k2, k2tog around once. (90 sts.)
knit in St st for about 7 inches.
*k8, k2tog* ten times, keep decreasing at same places every round until you have 5 sts left.
Pull yarn through remaining 5 sts and weave in ends.

Seriously???

It took me something like six years to get over Second Sock Syndrome and knit two at a time.
...four weeks to knit the pair.
...two days to lose one of them!!!

It's too late, though. I've clearly gotten the bug, because I've already cast on for another pair. Sigh.


And I have faith that the lost shall be found. One of these days.

Cloud Socks

So I've been busy making socks. This two-at-a-time thing is genius. The first pair took me eight months (i.e., knit one, wait eight months, knit the second). The second pair took me four weeks, and that was not even knitting every day.

Here they are, my Cloud Socks:


Cast-on 20 stitches using Judy Becker's Magic Cast-On
Eventually switched to an uneven seed stitch (2x2), with some swaths of stockinette randomly in there for a "cloud effect" that you can't actually see at all.
Ann Budd's short-row heel from IK sometime in 2007? ("A better sock from the toe-up")

Looooove.