tangy like grapefruit.

I bought this yarn a couple of weeks ago. After I stopped oogling it, I finally started to make something:

The start of a cowl, which I'm super excited about. I wanted to learn a new stitch, so I'm trying a chevron lace pattern, which you can find here.  The zig-zags are going to be vertical instead of horizontal, which bums me out a little... but since I didn't want to knit the cowl in the round, I'll be seaming the shortest sides together. Seemed easiest to me as I'm not following a pattern! And, if it's just not working as a cowl for whatever reason, I can easily keep it as a scarf & just add some fringe.

I've really been liking coral colors lately--this one is "grapefruit," which I'll admit is part of the reason why I chose it. It's like paint colors. The name just makes them seem better, right? That's how we ended up painting our old office a light baby blue... the hubs liked the name Ghost Ship. {I was glad when we re-painted it when Natalie was born. Now it's a light tan: Sesame.} :)

11 months & a tea party.

Time flies! Sorry I haven't been the best at posting projects lately--thankfully, last night's late night excursion at Archiver's with Leez has helped jumpstart the ole motivation once again. I worked on Livvy's First Birthday invitations... soooo fun.

For the time being, here are her 11 month photos--one more month till the big 1:

Liv's ad.or.able hat and scarf were knit by the lovely Leanne, who pegged Livvy's style to a tee. I'm urging her to start selling these in her Etsy shop; check it out, or e-mail her for a special request if you're digging them as much as I am.  Liv has been wearing her set for the last week and loves cozying up with the scarf. 

And of course, her partner in crime, the Dexinator. She insisted on him joining her for tea today, and even shared some of her treats. He happily obliged.

stitches on stockings

I've been wanting to learn how to embroider for a long time, but I've never taken the time to actually try it, until this last weekend. I started with Dex's stocking first, in case of mistakes... :) Simple chain stitch.

I did the same thing for Raul's name, except that I added whip stitch on top of it. I like the look of this a lot, as messy as my version is!

Now I just need to do Olivia's. I'm envisioning settling down with some hot cocoa and marshmallows and a good old movie for that; we watched It's a Wonderful Life when I worked on these two. 

Speaking of hot cocoa, here's a cute entry from knitting author Susan B. Anderson. I love the idea of spending time after school with your little ones, chatting and enjoying them. I watched a video of hers on you tube to learn the embroidery stitches--very helpful! You can see it here.

In other Christmasy news, I'm kind of dragging on the Christmas cards, but they're getting enveloped and addressed today. Liv has been busy with her own projects, including making some gooey handprints for her grandparents with daddy!

simple baby hat.

Knit for little Merjen.

anthropologie goodness

I love going into this store. {Who doesn't, right?} I had a keen eye for knit things when we wandered in the other night, and found these:

The cowls would be pretty easy to knit in a simple pattern, like the white one above. {Rib knit, K1P1, on 16" circular needles. I like the faux-stockinette-stitch look.} They also had some cute hats/head warmers:

 Is that daisy stitch, above? The knit flower is sweet--I don't see knit ones very much. I wonder how difficult/easy they are to knit.



Cute braided headwrap... I love the cream color, too. And as if things couldn't get any better...they also have a smattering of classic books with "smartly embossed canvas" covers. Love it!

At this point, I don't have one Christmas gift bought, or ready. But it's been fun to eyeball odds and ends to get some ideas, especially for homemade things. What are you making this year? Any inspirations worth sharing?

gryffindor & hufflepuff

Harry Potter Scarves

Pattern: House Scarves; Charmed Knits, Alison Hansel

Yarn: Simply Soft in Autumn Red, Black, and Sunshine

Needles: Circular size 7

They are finally finished: Scarves of the house of Gryffindor (red & gold) and Hufflepuff (black and gold). I began these puppies back in July...! Yikes. I needed to get these in the mail asap, so the pictures were taken in a hurry... but you get the idea. Knit in the round, and "sewn" together at the ends with fringe. This is the first time I've ever knit a scarf this way, and I absolutely love it; so thick, fluffy, and soft. I hope they show well at the HP movie premiere this week for my neice and her friend. :)

With my needles free {finally!}, I knit up a little hat for Liv during a movie the other night:

Just simple rib stitch and stockinette. Great timing, as the next day it snowed! It's odd to see her hair so contained, isn't it? While most people dread hat hair, I think it will work in her favor... it was amazingly tame when we took the hat off, haha. I have some leftover red yarn from the scarves, so I'm in process of making a little red beanie to match her coat, with a seed stitch rim instead of rib. Because baby hats make one feel accomplished. ;)

Projects come in waves, don't they? Soak up that motivation and run with it, baby.

the right bite

R has loved oatmeal raisin cookies for as long as I've known him, and I have yet to bake the perfect version. I just seem to mess it up every single time--they're usually these flat, oily discs of a cookie, and who wants to eat that?

I'm getting closer, however. I finally realized that I overmix the dough with my mixer, and I also don't follow high altitude directions. Mixing with a wooden spoon and adding more flour yielded this tasty batch. {Most of you are probably saying "duh."}

But I'm new to this cooking stuff, so bear with me. I don't know how many batches I've tried, but it's been many, and I'm a little embarrassed I didn't tweak my technique sooner. Maybe I didn't care? "At least I baked SOMEthing," was probably my thought as I bit into poor-excuse-for-a-cookie-that-I'd-eat-but-hubby-wouldn't-touch.

Suddenly I'm home with a baby with time to try new things and a desire to please my husband. It feels good to break my old mold and actually care why I'm not getting the results I'd like with something as simple as a cookie. You bet I care, because I'm mom now! And aren't moms supposed to know these things...? I don't want my baby's friends to come over years from now and refuse a cookie. So baking R's favorite is a great place to start. Yesterday was a great time to bake, too: cloudy, rainy, drizzly, crummy... The kind of day I love because we don't get enough of them here, as my grass can attest!

Anyway, I halved the recipe and increased the flour to 1 cup, and when they were done I brought one up to Raul in the study for approval. He tasted thoughtfully and nodded, which I knew was a good sign; the batch years ago with way too much salt had a much different face to it... :)

Olivia and I also ventured out yesterday to meet a couple of friends for lunch, and Liv sported the flapjack hat I knit last November for the first time:

Isn't that such a Charlie Brown face? She wasn't such a fan, but warmed up to it once nicely bundled in her carrier. Sigh. I so love this girl.

handmade for baby - part 1

Friends and family have made some cool, comfy things for our little one, and I wanted to share them with you. I'm glad baby is due in March, our snowiest month, as she'll have lots of warm blankets and cozy things to curl up with. Above, my friend Danielle knit three adorable bibs! What a fun surprise to find these in our mailbox last night.

Below, a knit hat I received at my shower, from Etsy.com--I love the color, and the beadwork.

My friend Jennie is a master crocheter, and while she is a wonderful teacher and has tried to teach me a few times, I haven't been the best student... (I'm a knitter to the core, I guess!) She made this little blanket that will be easy for baby to tote around with her, or curl up with during a nap--I believe it's made with Homespun yarn, so it's super soft.

She also made this adorable little elephant... I'm loving the purpleness of these gifts...

And speaking of the best color ever, here is a small afghan made by my friend Sara. You may need to click on the pictures to see this yarn a little better--it's lavender tweed that is warm and lovely. Thanks, Sara!

serenity now

My mother-in-law B loves the color red. I think for the last five or so years, I've given her something with red for her birthday, or Christmas... and I was wondering if I was pushing it by making a huge red afghan for her birthday this year, but decided to go for it anyway. I'm glad I did. She immediately recognized that I had made a scarf for her out of the same yarn a couple of years ago, and she wears this scarf a lot, so I was hoping she wouldn't mind more of the same. She didn't. :)

This pattern, #19 from the Big Book of Afghan Knits, was super easy to figure out, but time consuming. It's one of those patterns where you are psyched to begin knitting, and then you realize how long it takes to do just one row, and before you know it, you're rolling your eyes and throwing your head back, murmuring "serenity now!" Which is ironic, as this pattern is called "Serenity"...

I began this back in October, and just finished it last week. Despite the slow-go, I really enjoyed knitting up an afghan for the first time in my life... I'd love to make another one, now that I know what to expect. There are 24 patterns in this book, all of them lovely, and they vary in complexity. I think I chose the easiest one to begin with!

I used Simply Soft's Autumn Red on size 17 needles. This, and all the patterns, calls for doubled-up yarn, so you need about 12 skeins to make a full size afghan. I only used about half of that to make this throw, however.

I hope you are well and warm where you are. I have some fun posts to share with you this next week; hopefully baby will let up a little on zapping my energy so I can play catch up!

old hat new hat

Welcome to my world... on one of the rare occasions when I can see my toes! Baby C is baking away at the start of her 6th month (24 weeks yesterday); time is flying by. I feel her move regularly now, although some days she's very quiet and sedate, and other days she enjoys tap dancing and stretching her arms and legs--I have days like that too, so I understand. When I laugh really hard, she usually either rolls around or pops me one... I'm looking forward to laughing together! (To this, R says, "Oh boy.") :)

This is one of the few pre-pregnancy shirts I can still wear--it's funny to move through so many sizes at such a fast pace.

So the quilt I am so excited about will have to wait during the Christmas season... I have a few other projects I'm working on, but they will remain mum until they are given. :) These, I can share, however:

Pattern: Earflap Hat & Thumbless Mittens

Book: Knitting for Baby: 30 Heirloom Projects

Needles: Size 9 dpns and straight needles

Yarn: Red Heart Artesano (surprisingly soft, but I wish I had used a larger needle for a looser gauge)

This is the only pattern I gasped at when flipping through this book... and for me, that means I had to make it. I keep calling it a Flapjack hat instead of Earflap... :) What an easy pattern! Total time it took to knit: ~3 hours. You knit the hat like a regular ole hat on the double pointed needles, and the side flaps and ties are knit separately. You seam them together, and voila. Adorable. I'd like to add a pom-pom on top.

I think little one might end up with a lot of hats because they are so cute, and so quick to knit... Hopefully she doesn't hate having things on her head!

This next one took me less than two hours--we were watching All About Eve when I made this one. It reminds me of a hat in a book I used to read all the time: Old Hat, New Hat, by Jan Berenstain.

Pattern: Baby Ruffle Hat (Ravelry)

Click here if you don't have a Ravelry account... and then sign up for one. :)

Needles: Size 8 circular needles, size 8 dpns
Yarn: Simply Soft

LOVE this pattern. I've never knit a ruffled edge before--and honestly, at first, I was a little frustrated. You cast on 256 stitches, then knit two together for a couple of rows... This is a little trying at first, and I was getting a little tired of re-counting 256 every time I had to start over, but once my fingers got the hang of it, I was on my way. The rest is just stockinette stitch and decreases. I really love this yarn, A) for its price, B) for how soft it is, and C) how it holds its shape. I also would like to embellish this one with a couple of flowers, like on the original pattern.

More soon...