In progress: Shhhhh…

It’s a surprise!  But I can tell you it’s a hat. For someone. Not for me, and not for baby A. I just cast on today. Oh, the suspense is killing you, right?

I’m knitting it as part of the Warm Up to Winter knit along (KAL) over at luvinthemommyhood. If you want to join, you have until February 8th to do so. Just click on the handy button below for details.

Now, can I get my project done in time? I’ve come down with a serious case of ‘startitis’ and have three projects on the needles right now in what I call the ’5% club’ — I’ve just barely started them and my Ravelry progress bars are all set at 5% completion. (I even have a sewing project very much in progress, to boot.)  I keep getting distracted by some new project that must be done right now and tossing the current project aside in favour of the new, shinier one. I think I have the knitter’s equivalent of the ‘eyes too big for your stomach’ thing. What would that be? Eyes too big for your borderline-arthritic finger joints? Doesn’t have the same ring to it…

But this KAL should keep me going. Deadlines are good for that. Plus, when this hat is done, it’s being sent out in the mail to its recipient (there is also a deadline for that, but more on that later). So my motivation may need to get comfortable hanging out with this one thing for a little while instead of doing its usual ADD thing.

Edit: Here are my other two ‘in progress’ babies:

Liesl by Cocoknits

An attempt to copycat my favourite (purchased) hat. See how far I got? So brave.

They all look sort of similar, don’t they?

Ah, baloney!

Abalone: (/ˈæbəloʊniː/) — I ate it when I was in China. It’s a delicacy. It… tasted like rubber, quite frankly. But I congratulated myself on being an adventurous eater and kept its beautiful shell as a keepsake. That’s my first story about abalone.

Here’s the second:

I know what you’re saying to yourself: “This doesn’t look like a marine gastropod mollusc!” And you’d be a very astute observer to say so. It’s a sweater.

The pattern for this sweater is called Abalone (by Beata Jezek). I love the idea of this pattern. I love the pictures from the pattern designer. I love the shape of it.

Except it kind of didn’t turn out quite right. I know, I know. It’s the worst when you knit an entire sweater and it isn’t what you hoped it would be. (Especially one that required, at one point, that I pick up over 300 stitches…)

Here’s my list of gripes:
- The math confused my poor (then-pregnant) brain. The designer offers stitch counts for a size small and then requires that you figure out your size based on your measurements combined with percentages of those stitch counts. It’s a free pattern, so I don’t feel like us pattern-readers are owed anything in terms of being spoon-fed the math, but still. This tripped me up more than I think was necessary. Or maybe pregnancy hormones + simple math = epic failure.

- It ended up a fair bit wider (across the back) than I was shooting for.

- Picking up stitches along the diagonal bottom ‘corners’ (where the increases were done) worked fine on one side, but had these strange sort of pock-marked holes every other stitch on the other side. I assume this is due to subtleties with how the increases were done (both were just M1 as opposed to mirrored decreases such as k2tog/ssk), meaning that the ‘holes’ through which the stitches were picked up were a bit different on one side.

- The i-cord bind-off looks great but is really time consuming, and mine ended up too tight, resulting in my curved bottom ‘corners’ rolling in or out instead of laying flat. Extreme blocking helped, but only so much. This kind of ruined the drape, and it was hard to tell that it was too tight while it was on the needles since the work was all bunched up on the circular needle.

- And one that’s entirely my fault: I knit it with undyed 100purewool, which, as lovely and soft as it is for 100% wool, ended up pilling like crazy almost instantly. I don’t think it was quite the right choice for this project. I’m still learning about how to match yarns to projects. And so we’ll call this a “learning experience,” I guess. (And a good impetus to buy a nice wool shaver. I got one for my birthday and I’m like a woman possessed, removing lint. I think I enjoy it a bit too much.)

But forget all those gripes. It wasn’t all that bad! It’s still definitely wearable, and is oh-so warm. Here are some more photos!

Behold curly corners! Ah, baloney.

A wise supervisor/mentor of mine used to say “today was a day for learning” when the day was a bust in all other respects. So this sweater is maybe the same. A project for learning!

Baby “Link” (Legend of Zelda) costume

Continuing on with my recent theme of wildly outdated and/or seasonally inappropriate posts, here was what baby A wore for his first Halloween (at 3 months old). He went as Link from the popular Nintendo game The Legend of Zelda. As a gamer with a hardcore case of video game nostalgia, this was my husband’s top pick for a costume for A. I was set on sewing him a good costume for his first Halloween, but wanted to keep it relatively straightforward so I actually had a hope in hell of getting it done. It’s tough to find sewing time with a newborn around. I know, shocking news.

The tunic and hat were sewn from a thrifted men’s long-sleeved polo shirt:

Large and green. Perfect for the chopping.

One sleeve was cut off and became the hat:

Chop chop!

Using one of A’s hats to get an idea of width.

I hemmed the bottom edge after I took this picture.

… and I used one of A’s existing shirts to trace as a quasi-pattern for the tunic part.

Had to take the pocket off, since it was going to get in the way of the magic.

I just made it a bunch longer so it was, you know, tunic-like.

After this I just sewed up the sides, underarms and shoulders. I left the collar edge raw and cut a little slit in the front so A’s head would fit through. Baby heads are surprisingly big.

The boots were also salvaged; this time from a brown knitted sweater (that our a-hole cat had chewed a hole into, rendering it scrap fabric instantly). They were based off of a pattern I found somewhere on the internet, but have since lost. (Sorry, blog. Bad linking karma for me.) I cut the boot pattern pieces out of one sleeve and serged them together (making sure the knit stitches didn’t completely unravel). The sash and belt were cut from the other sweater sleeve. Much faster than knitting them, I tell you. The “gold” belt buckle was a simple crocheted circle using some yellow cotton yarn I had leftover from the Republic hat. I machine sewed it on to the belt, then attached some hooks and loops to fasten the belt in place (hooks and loops were all I had on hand — velcro would have been better).

The pants were the only part I didn’t make, so no exciting story there. I think they were from American Apparel? Who cares. BORING.

We took A to a family-friendly Halloween party at our local community baby/parent centre, and of course no one there knew what he was supposed to be. But that’s not terribly surprising, I guess, since most of the other babies in attendance were far more easy to identify (a pumpkin! a cat! a dinosaur!). I might have seen a glimmer of appreciation from one of the other dads well across the room from us. Nerds usually aren’t the most outgoing folks, so I may never know for sure.

But you know what? Obscurity be damned; he was one cute frigging Baby Link. Frig! Right? Frig.

Pixie boy

“Squashie”: knitting model extraordinaire

Time-travel with me, will you?  The year was 2011…

When I was still all kinds of pregnant last summer, my pregnant Ravelry pals organized a secret swap. We’d put together a fun care package for a randomly-drawn fellow preggo that had something in it for the mama and the baby-to-be. The package I sent was to my friend, C, who was expecting her eighth (yes, you read that correctly) baby. (Seventh boy, to boot!) I included a bunch of fun stuff for her (some local honey, some wool roving, some earrings, a silly kid’s book, etc), but the item I made myself was this goofy/adorable (goofdorable?) blue pixie hat.

This is the second time I’d knit the Stella Pixie Hat, and I love how this one turned out. This time, as a more experienced knitter, I had wised up enough to know that I should follow the recommended needle size/yarn weight/gauge written in the pattern. And lo and behold, it actually turned out… (gasp!) to be baby-sized. Success! (My last one was big enough to fit my own head… but oh well, a giant toddler bean will do it justice in the future, I’m sure.)

Baby J: much more lifelike

And doesn’t it look great on her little boy? Back when he was a newborn (when this picture was taken — if you look closely you can even see his little newborn peely hands!), he had the perfect squishy old man face to make him look like a garden gnome in it. Now, he was born in the summer, in the southern US, so it wasn’t exactly seasonally-appropriate back then, but hopefully it’s getting some wear this winter now that things have cooled off. Thankfully, it’s super stretchy so will last him a while.

Enjoy your hat, baby J!

Shannon cowl

So, for my last installment of “check out this shiz I made for Christmas!” (which should really stop now, since it’s January and all), I present to you the Shannon cowl I knit up for my dad’s girlfriend. The pattern is one of Jane Richmond‘s recent releases and knits up so fast, you want to make a billion of them. Thank you super-bulky yarn and giant needles. The perfect Christmas craft for the frazzled knitter.

This is kind of a neat one for me because I recently joined up with Jane and her knitty pals at their weekly knit night. One of the other die-hard knit night members there is Shannon from luvinthemommyhood, after whom this lovely cowl pattern is named! So I know both the designer and the namesake of this cowl pattern — how cool is that? Fairly, I’d say.

This project was neat (do the kids still say ‘neat’ these days?) for another reason: I successfully knit cables for the first time ever! Very exciting. And given how simple this pattern is (along with the huge yarn/needle situation), it was the perfect way to learn how. I don’t know why I’d been putting off learning cabling for so long. It only looks fancy — it’s actually very easy to do! So well done, self, for learning a new skill. Back pats for me.

Here is another shot of me wearing the cowl before I sent it off in the mail. I think the cowl’s rich red wine colour is a bit truer in this picture, though I still manage to resemble an albino giraffe.

Well, with that I’m officially embracing the new year. Hello 2012!

Tutorial: Ergo teething pads

My kid drools. A lot. Whether or not this is caused by teething (he has sprouted his two bottom teeth in the last 6 weeks) is up for debate, though clearly he’s got both going on these days. He puts anything and everything into his mouth. Anything that crosses his little mouth’s path seems to be fair game for a good nomming.

Naturally, when we carry him in the ErgoBaby carrier, he sees those puffy shoulder straps as two big built-in teethers, and goes to town on them. This soaks them instantly. So instead of constantly washing the carrier (not recommended by the manufacturer), I figured I could sew up some strap protectors easily enough. Ergo sells some made of terrycloth for about $20 a pair, which I personally find impossible to justify as a person who owns a sewing machine.

So here’s my version. Took about 10-15 minutes. Sorry I didn’t get any photos of the in-progress steps — I was a woman on a mission and wanted these done, stat.

Materials:

• Terrytowel washcloth
• Scissors
• Velcro (hook & loop tape)
• Sewing machine & thread
• Serger (optional)

Step 1. Start with an old washcloth you are no longer using. Cut it in half so you have two identical rectangles.

Step 2. Serge around the edges of each half. If you don’t have a serger, do a zig-zag stitch or finish the edges however you like.

Step 3. Cut 2 lengths of velcro a bit shorter than the width of the short end of your rectangles.

Step 4. Attach the velcro to your terrycloth. Ensure that the soft velcro piece is sewn to the opposite side of the pad as the scratchy piece (so when you loop the pad around your Ergo strap, they will grip together). I did this hastily, using adhesive velcro (which helped to hold it in place for sewing). You can see the ugly stitches that resulted from my haste. (Oh, motherhood…)

Also: I folded one edge over about an inch or two before sewing on the velcro. Part of this was laziness (couldn’t be buggered to measure and cut it), and part of this was my idea that it might anchor the velcro better to have it go through two layers. In retrospect, I think measuring the piece properly (using your Ergo strap to eyeball it is fine) would do just as well — you don’t need both layers. Plus, my wonky fold is not great. When you do this, do it better than I did, please.

Here is the pad folded to show both velcro’d sides.

And joined together, as it would be on the Ergo:

And in place on the Ergo, fresh for the nomming:

So there they are. Possibly the best upcycling of an old washcloth into something that would otherwise cost you $20, amirite? Baby A’s verdict: om nom nom!

Skin brightening toner

It was a Christmas miracle. My dear pal, Anya, was my randomly-chosen Secret Santa gift recipient for the second year in a row, guys. The powers that be were like, “Jana, one year is insufficient! You must get Anya another secret gift!” and I was like “okay!”

Thankfully, Anya is just about the most easygoing person I know, and she loves all kinds of stuff (and has a nicely organized Pinterest account, to boot), so she’s a pretty sweet name to draw for a gift exchange like this.

Some may remember that I used my knitting powers to craft up Anya’s Secret Santa Surprise Scarf last year.

This year, while I didn’t knit for her gift, I did make part of it! I mixed up a batch of Shwin & Shwin‘s lemony Skin Brightening Toner, which Anya had helpfully pinned (so I knew she’d like it). I even made my own label for the bottle, using the image from the original blog post. Though I realized that I spoiled the “secret” component of the gift exchange by printing my name on the label. I forgot that our group of friends typically open our gifts and then try to guess who gave it… oh well! Mama brain strikes again? How long can I go on claiming that?

Unfortunately, baby A was not coping so well at our Christmas party, so my husband and I had to take him home early. This meant that we missed out on the big gift exchange portion of the evening, and so I didn’t get to see Anya’s reaction live and in person! Lame!

Possibly less lame is the rest of Anya’s gift. I paired the toner with two terribly cheesy (and trashy!) thrifted romance novels (which I really hope she loved, because one of them was all about chasing rainbows and the cover was even rainbow-coloured and full of clichés about how rainbows are so hard to catch… seriously amazing) and two jars of dark chocolate sauce that I hope she drank straight from the jar drizzled on something divine immediately.

Merry Christmas, Anya!

Honey Cowl

Now that Christmas is over, I can post about more of the crafty gifts I gave! There weren’t many, as I have that baby and all to reckon with, but this one was my favourite. It was a gift for my mum. And much to my delight, she ended up loving it.

There is a part of me that always worries about giving something I’ve hand-made. Will the recipient like it? Will he/she use it? (And, commonly, if it’s knitting:) Will it itch and therefore be the worst gift evar?

But she liked it. Hooray!

The pattern is the Honey Cowl by Madelinetosh. A lovely, simple, slip-stitch honeycomb. It was easily memorized and pretty impossible to lose my spot. I think those are two pretty important knitting pattern features for a zombie-brained new mum. My only gripe was that it took an age to knit. I thought my fingers might fall off near the home stretch, there, but I did it. I got it finished with just a couple of days to spare before Christmas. Win!

 

It was such a labour of love, that once it was done, I was a bit sad to part with it!  And it was so very very soft, too. And squishy. I’d make another for myself, but… remember the part where I griped about how long it took to knit? Yes. Yes you do.

Oh well. I have these photos to remind me. And a pleased, slightly-warmer-than-before mum who happily sported the thing all Christmas day (and the day after). That makes me smile.

 

Tutorial: Peppermint Christmas bath salts

Merry Christmas eve, friends!

I’m going to spoil the Christmas morning surprise for some of my giftees, but hopefully they aren’t up late on Christmas eve reading my blog. The appropriate Christmas eve activity is obviously drinking heavily waiting for Santa. Duh.

This year I decided to make some homemade bath salts for some of the gals in my family. And I have good news to share: it’s dead easy. Here’s how I did it:

Step 1. Assemble supplies: epsom salts, red and green food colouring, peppermint essential oil, dorky Christmas-themed containers.

Step 2. Divide epsom salts into bowls (in this picture I would guess there’s about a cup in each bowl). Mix several drops of each food colouring into the epsom salts. There is no formula for this. Just add more drops and mix around until you like the colour. Also mix in a few (approx. 4) drops of peppermint essential oil. The stuff is strong so don’t go overboard.

Step 3. Layer salts in alternating colours into your container. Bonk the bottom of the container on the countertop to get the salts to settle evenly. Don’t shake them around too much or the colours will mix. Layer the salts as close to the top as you can to avoid shifting the stripes if the container gets put on its side/shaken a bit in transit to the giftee.

Step 4. Put the lids back on your containers and give them to your lucky giftees!

I can’t wait to try mine out (I had some salts left over). I already put them next to my bath so I can soon bathe in the wonder of Christmas. I wonder if I’ll end up smelling like a candy cane afterwards?

I think these make great gifts. They’re simple, inexpensive, quick, very Christmassy (my whole kitchen smells minty now), and a nice way to pamper your loved ones. The epsom salts have muscle-relaxing properties and the peppermint is a calming smell. Deluxe.

Stocking for the baby

Here’s a festive post for you. I sewed a Christmas stocking for little A the other day on a whim! A whim? I’d almost forgotten what doing anything on a whim was like since A was born… but thankfully my husband was around to take over baby duty for about an hour so I could expend some crafty energy and get A’s stocking happening. It’s his first Christmas, after all, and he needed to claim his spot up on the mantle with the rest of us (heck, even the stupid cat has her own stocking).

Didn’t have time to do a tutorial or even photograph my process, but I basically made this sucker up as I went. I traced my own stocking and cut 4 pieces of white flannelette and 2 pieces of the snowflake fabric. I essentially used the flannelette as batting (since I had none) to give it a bit of structure. The rest was winged (wung?) and turned out pretty alright!  I wrote A’s name on the top white part of the stocking (not pictured) using black fabric paint (because this mama don’t got no time for any of those fancy shenanigans like embroidery).

Ta da! I expect that’ll be all from me until after Christmas (which is in… 6 days. GASP!), so… Happy Holidays, folks!