the blue blog archives: flowsies

In an effort to get out of straight stockinette hell, I decided to start the next baby sweater, Daisy from Pipsqueaks. I had planned on making the intarsia flowers like in the original, but the Debbie Bliss Cashmerino is so smooth, I was worried that things would be too slippery for me to control while doing intarsia. I also remembered seeing Leigh start a flowered cardigan from Miss Bea's Colors and really liking the textured flower pattern. So I just switched the intarsia flowers to textured flowers in the original pattern. I really like them. They're sort of subtle, but still recognizable and very pretty.

"Flowisies", by the way, is how my boys say flowers. It's very cute. I can't knit flowers for them, but when I do knit them, I get to hear the boys say "flowsies". You may have seen the flowsies last month over at Mary's site. After her "Virtual Spring", her site quickly moved up to S's favorite. He used to come up to me when I was browsing blogs and ask for the 'cat' (aka, Wendy Knits), but now only the flowsies will do.

posted by alison at 8:39 am | in baby (sweater) factory

Comments

That's right. Just say no to intarsia in smooth yarns. Cotton' s really nasty for it too. Debbie Bliss is always designing these beautiful patterns while trying to talk people into intarsia with yarns that make it about as much fun as sitting down with dpns in your pocket. I've been sucked into her evil web before. Resist.

Posted by: Stephanie at March 4, 2004 9:18 AM

I won't tell Lucy. She'd be crushed. ;-)

Posted by: Wendy at March 4, 2004 9:38 AM

I love the flowsies, they look beautiful. Brooke always asks to see "Justin" when I'm surfing, she thinks prettyposies Carrie's boyfriend looks like Justin Timberlake!!

Posted by: kerrie at March 4, 2004 10:05 AM

Stephanie, I so agree. All those Rowan designers are nuts for the intarsia in cotton and straight fair-isle. Aaack! I must defend Debbie Bliss though by saying that this is not her pattern, but a Kim Hargreaves Rowan pattern and I chose to use DB's yarn instead of the Rowan cotton. So it's my fault for changing the yarn and then whimping out on the intarsia. Well, maybe we'll give DB a little blame for making such a fabulous yarn that I had to buy it!

PS - I hope you all have picked up your copy of Knit Lit Too and read Stephanie's fabulous story.

Yes, Wendy, don't tell Lucy. My mother has had several siamese cats, and I know how they can get when they feel that someone has not fully appreciated their beauty. ;0) We do still visit her often though. Yours and Mary's blogs are the only ones the boys remember, so whenever they're surfing with me we're sure to visit both.

Kerrie, that's too funny!

Posted by: alison at March 4, 2004 11:52 AM

I'm usually not much of an intarsia fan, so I love the textured flowsies. Subtle but still adorable--I might even try something like that for myself, since I like girly stuff but intarsia flowers probably wouldn't cut it at the office...

Posted by: J Strizzy at March 4, 2004 12:23 PM

Love those flowsies! (Did Mary spell it that way because she knew your boys pronounced it that way? Here I thought she meant to write "floosies." ha!) Those daisys remind me of the swatch I did for Kerrie's blanket. You are too good with the baby gifts. I've given up and now head to Rugged Bear whenever I need one. Yep, I'm a baby knit wimp. :)

Posted by: Kerstin at March 4, 2004 12:27 PM

Very cute, very pretty! Great choice!

Posted by: Marg at March 4, 2004 12:50 PM

Very pretty flowsies! Your boys are cute--it's fun to hear how little toddlers pronounce words.

Just this morning, Noel was sitting with me surfing around and he got very excited about Wendy's site too. He likes visiting yours to see what your guys are up to as well-- "Look Mommy! It's a little boy!"

Posted by: Leigh at March 4, 2004 1:39 PM

I'm so behind! It sounds to me that Stefan may be in heaven if I can capture a cat/flowsie picture for my blog! I'm setting that as a photographic goal for the month!

:) I started one of Miss Bea's intarsia flowsie sweaters and started to go a little bit crazy! I think I may rip it out and change over to the sweater with one big intarsia flower in the middle, instead of lots of little ones around the border. For my sanity!

Posted by: Mary at March 8, 2004 11:00 PM