I tutu, do you?

We had fun making this, just different colored tulle tied around an elastic band. Made in February, 2009.

Wynter's birth hat and newborn socks

Hat and baby completed on 01/04/2009. Socks three days later.

Spongebob square hat... or is it still commercialism if its handmade?

Modelled by M

The recipient of the hat, in her usual pose for the camera, a crazed spongebob fanatic, made for Christmas, 2008.

Thanks to Kate for the title of this post, it comes directly from one of hers...

I started this hat because of this:

www.kodymayknits.com/2007/09/spongebob-squarepants-hat-pattern.html

She has some cool patterns and this gave me the idea for this. I also followed her pattern for the eyes and the puff ball feet and got the whole idea of earflaps and ties for the legs.

I did some random purling spots to make it spongey looking and then rather than decreasing, I made a flap on the top and made it square. Also I knit the tie and i-corded the legs, added the yellow legs and the red stripes for the socks. I over knit the smile and knit a couple of teeth. Honestly, I've never actually seen the show, thanks to the many images on Google.

Grandma's x-mas stocking

Thirty some odd years ago the blue stocking on the left was knit for me by my Grandma in Wales. The whole reason I started knitting (one year before I made this) was so I could have one for M. And there it is. I literally counted stitches and rows to make it just like mine. Her's is better though because nobody has washed it without knowing how wool likes to be washed. So it is still stretchy to be filled to the brim with goodies like grapefruits and oranges. She picked out the purple. Her fourth christmas, December, 2008.

Felted ballet slippers!

Top picture is pre felting. There she is wearing them in dance class. These were made in December, 2008. I used a chunky yarn, which makes these slippers more everywhere than dance class. She loves them, until she can fit into the handmedown "real" ballet slippers.

More socks!

Socks, started on two circulars and then I realized I prefer knitting on dpns for socks. I love these. The yarn irritates me a bit, it is not evenly dyed, so there was a lot of waste yarn left over to make the stripes. She loves 'em. I never thought I would like knitting socks, but a friend recommended them as a good knitting project on the road and I read somewhere that wearing knit socks was like wearing special lingerie, even if nobody notices, it's so special. My daughter's socks however, are wonderfully noticeable. The trouble we have with these is that she loves to show them off and they are warm. So we have trouble finding something she can wear on a cold day that still shows them off AND DOESN'T COVER NOT EVEN ONE STITCH. This is a very big deal when you are three. I promise you. Thankfully we live in a temperate climate. These were finished in December, 2008.

A few days before we left on vacation, M said she wanted to be a worm for Halloween. I hoped grandma would do the honors (as she did for M's first costume, the sunflower), but she wasn't able. She did manage to buy a few fabrics she thought might work, which she shipped to us, which arrived on Halloween eve. O.k., so the pink fuzzy stuff screamed worm. How could I not do this? So Halloween morning, after dreaming it up during a mostly sleepless night, I sewed this up. My second sewing attempt. M LOVED it. I was going to put a band around the center, the one that worms have, but she was happy with it as it was. And so was I. Thrilled, actually. Even if she did have to tell every single person what she was. (And I was a composting gardener, ever grateful for my earthworm).
And the little guy below was her baby worm.

The baby boom

All my friends were pregnant. Babies babies babies! So I knit hats. First, the hat and booties. The booties were from Vogue Knits for Babies and the hat was a Stitch n Bitch I cord knot hat with some pattern worked in to match the booties. All cotton. Those went to Freddie in England, happily wearing them here. Then came the hat for Jack in Massachussetts. I love that blue yarn, it was a knit picks cotton wool blend. Same type of hat. Then the cotton blue hat for Brandon, my neighbor here in my complex. By that time, I had to try something new, hence the pin wheel on the top (I just split the i cord and knit and then put them together in the middle). And then for Beverly, her family used to live here in my complex, and finally, in time for his baby shower, hat and booties (I found a seamless bootie pattern online, but I made so many changes to it, I couldn't repeat it) for baby Wynter. And his mom asked, will it fit him when he's born? No. So he scored another hat, started 2 days before he was born and finished while mama was in labor. And socks 2 days later, because when you are with a baby when he is born, you will do anything for him.

Something Old Something New Something Borrowed Something Blue

My dear friend got married in Jamaica (08-08-08) and I couldn't go. So in lieu of me, I made a small Somethingoldsomethingnew... It didn't occur to me to take a picture, so here she is, wearing it (except you can't see it). It was a small crocheted flower, using blue embroidery floss from my grandma's stash. The something borrowed was the wee safety pin.

The wee doll

M took this picture. I wanted to try this out: http://kimberlychapman.com/crafts/knit-littledudes.html mostly because I could not find any dollhouse dolls that weren't creepy to me. I did eventually buy some wooden/pipe cleaner type popular with today's eco mom. A friend pointed out that the mother figure of the family of these dolls, with her placid face, long sleeves, and long skirt, looked like a good Mormon. So, essentially, mainstream dollmakers, in their attempt to appeal to a wide audience, offer us either Bratz or Mormonz.
So this doll, I thought would be a quick knit. But it uses size 1 needles, which at that point I had not used, and worsted weight yarn. I thought I was knitting on toothpicks and was concerned about snapping the needles when I knit the cotton yellow part. M of course loved it, but the doll, like her owner, is a one of a kind, made in June and has no attempt has been made to make another. Yet.

Mama and me matching rainbow socks

My first knit socks. Hers were first of course.

She took the above picture.

They are very comfy. They were knit on 2 circular needles, I learned from the book "Knitting Circles Around Socks" by Antje Gillingham. The book teaches sock knitting wonderfully, but the errors in the book are atrocious. I have actually since started knitting socks on dpns, which I prefer. The circular needle method requires, for my taste, far to much of the scooching of the stitches. But it is nice to finish both socks at the same time. Of course, you can do that anyway if you have two sets of dpns, if you are so inclined.

The sewn purses

We made purses. I had received a sewing machine for Christmas and had sewn a few bean bags. We had a visitor in town who was 10. Attempting to find an activity that was rewarding to both a 10 year old and a 3 year 0ld, I thought we would sew purses. This idea was flawed because what is interesting to a 3 year old for more than 20 minutes is not always interesting to a 10 year old for more than 5 minutes and what is interesting to a 10 year old for more than 20 minutes is not always interesting to a 3 year old for more than 5 minutes.

But with a little fanfare, I can usually pull it off. That is, if I am not dealing with the other major flaw of this idea. I have never actually done this before and I am a novice sewer. So I am managing the disputes of who gets to push down the foot pedal (while really, I ought to be doing it myself, given that I really should give my novice sewer self the advantage of keeping my own pace), trying to keep it interesting to my 3 year old even though half the time she has to wait patiently while the 10 year old does hers. Add an iron to the mix, and here comes disaster.

The only reason this worked is because really, the 10 year old and the 3 year old are amazing kids with patience beyond their years.

The girls pretty much picked their own fabrics, with some veto power from me (too thin, too thick). That was an adventure in and of itself, as my 3 year old picked out hers in 30 seconds, but we spent 45 minutes in the store. I had forgotten that after age 7, shopping isn't necessarily so simple.

Here is the 10 year old's purse, the stitching was picked by her, the cool zig zag. I was not really excited about this choice because my mistakes would show up more, but she had faith in my abilities after I warned her, and it turned out pretty cool.

And here is M's purse.

Afterwards, we got fabric paint, and the girls painted them.

Matching crocheted Rainbow hat

The completed set.

Here it is in progress. It was completed early April 2008. The hat is also made with Sugar n Cream cotton yarn.

There's that i cord. I love this get up. M landed in the paper wearing the dress.

Knitted Rainbow Dress

The name of this dress comes from M, I asked her what we should call it. This was the dress I made in March, 08. It was based on the folk festival frock pattern from the book Boho Baby Knits by Kat Coyle. A friend showed me the pattern and I liked it, but I made the belt part lower and the skirt part flared. As you can see, my signature "too big" style is present... but I later fixed that with an i-cord tie in the back. If I lengthen the skirt, she'll be able to wear it til she's 15! And she loves it almost as much as I do. I used sugar n cream cotton self striping yarn and got the cool effects that changed throughout.

No hair day

My first projects were completed in Janury, this in February, 08. This I stumbled upon when looking for a sun hat pattern for M. This is the link for what I found instead: http://www.headhuggers.org/patterns/kpatt10.htm

It is called "The 'No-Hair-Day' Hairy Chemo Cap. My friend's daughter (10 months younger than M) had just commented on not liking her mom's post chemo hair . So I made them matching hats. I asked her what color she wanted, this was what she chose.

My daughter comments when we go and look at yarn and she sees this yarn, "This is weird yarn, isn't it?" As a novice knitter, I must have said that several times, as it is very forgiving if you make a mistake (the fur hides everything), but if you make a mistake, it's harder to fix, because you can't rip it easily or see it well to fix it.

I think they are great fun. My dh, when I started knitting, told me "Just don't make anything for me." He is very wise, and was avoiding a potentially less than ideal situation (me knitting with love, him really not wanting to wear it). But when he saw this, he told me, "You can make me one of those. In yellow."

The mismatching matching buddy mittens

So after the hat came the mittens, with little people and an matching hat to match her hat. What is dear to me about these especially is that these mittens are for my daughter, the white yarn I bought, the blue yarn my mother got for us, and the embroidery floss is from my grandmother (my father's mother). The mittens that span four generations! I made the one that slightly resembles M first. And then I asked her who the second one would be.

And there he is, our neighbor and her dear friend, O. She adored these mittens, but 8 months later when we got them out as we started to ready for the weather change, she was very disconcerted that they didn't match. Matching is very important when you are 3. But then I reminded her that they actually DO indeed match, that it was O and M wearing matching hats, and the matching need was met.
I love these mittens, but I should have used a different body yarn, I didn't know enough about yarn, and I think that while I love this yarn, I think it may get scratchy after a while. But where we live, chances are she won't need to wear them long enough to bother her.
The hat, I think, I was lucky it fit her (even as a novice knitter, I didn't knit guage, the pattern was for an adult, I was using a different yarn, etc.). But the mittens were the beginning of my knit-it-too-big-on-purpose m.o.. Maybe I have a phobia that by the time I finish, it will be too small, but I think that really I just felt that if I knit it, I want it worn too big, just right, and a bit snug.
The idea for these came from the memory that I had gloves with faces on each finger when I was a kid that entertained me for hours, I did a search for mittens and finally found these: http://www.aristofashion.com/handknit/freepatterns.htm but I pretty much played it as I went along, and made the hats to match hers. I was going to add the cat ears, but she just wanted the mittens already.

Note: We went to Chicago in Feb of 09 and M would announce to me when holding my hand: "You're holding your Molly!" Or "You're holding Oscar!" I love how much she loves these.

The Kitty hat

So in late December, 2007, I learned to knit. Ultimately it seemed as if I wanted a x-mas stocking for my daughter like my grandmother made for me, I'd have to do it myself, as no one I knew who knew how to knit was knitting socks. A wonderful friend and a wonderful fellow mama turned me on to Stitch 'n Bitch, and I was off. I really didn't want to spend the time knitting a scarf as my first knit item, as we don't really live in that climate. I loved the Kitty hat. Here is M modeling my first knitted item, before I added the ears.

Here she is making a snow angel in the hat (with the mittens that shortly followed)

And on a blustery day at the beach in Mexico in February.