Halfway up the armholes on the back of greensleeves and I am still unsure about whether I will have enough yarn to complete the sweater. I've used one and half skeins (of the seven that I have) on the back so far. That's not enough for me to say that completing the sweater is impossible, but also not enough to say that it is probable. So, I continue to knit.

Emma made a great suggestion the other day that I definitely want to try if I do think that I'll run out of yarn. She suggested doing half the front in green and the other half in the purple yarn that I had planned on using for the cable. Then half the cable would be green and half purple and they would wrap around one another. Neat, huh? I didn't know what I was going to do if the yarn ran out. I am really fixated on using the green yarn to make this Able sweater and can't imagine it becoming anything else. Up to now, I had been practicing the Scarlet O'Hara method of dealing with the possibility of failure: "I'll think about plan b tomorrow." But now I have a plan b, and a good one! Thanks, Emma!

After a week of otherwise successful knitting, I decided to forgive the giranimals pocket for going bad on me and give it another try. I'm happy to say that it is progressing nicely, with no major problems so far.

[don'tcha just love intarsia?!]

This time I've got the front of the jacket next to me while I work on the pocket so I can be sure that it's not turning out too small again. I've learned that I need to keep checking my knitting against the measurements given in the pattern's schematic. I've tried checking and rechecking gauge while knitting, but I don't find just checking a few inches here and there all that reassuring. Plus, my real question is, is this coming out the right size. So why not just measure that to check that nothing is going wrong? Which is why it really irks me when a pattern doesn't include all the measurements or a schematic at all. This Phildar pattern that I'm using for giranimals has great detailed diagrams for every piece, except the pocket. Okay, there's a color chart, but I'd have to count stitches and do the math to figure out the size. From the problems I've had with this pocket, you can tell that I didn't do that! (Dooh!) The Rowan pattern I'm using for greensleeves has a diagram with a few measurements like sleeve length to sleeve cap, but then no other specific measurements like sleeve width or sleeve cap length. Some of these are hidden in the instructions (i.e., knit until armhole measures 20 cm, then...), but how hard would it have been to write that in the diagram?! Well, since they didn't do it, I'm assuming that it's just about as hard as it would be for me to do the math myself, which as we noted above, I didn't bother to do either. For greensleeves, I decided to simply jot down measurements from a sweater of my own and work toward those.

Perhaps I should add another step to my project preparation process. First swatch and then make up a detailed diagram, including any missing measurements from the pattern's schematic. Seems pretty straight-forward, I'm sure, for those unafraid of doing a little math. But I tend to get so many different answers when I count stitches, for example, that I don't have any faith in the results that I get. I suppose that in order to become a better knitter, I'll have to forgive math for going bad on me too. Hmmmm....

Don't you just love Knitty?! Issue #3, and they just keep getting better. I will have to knit one of the cherries with something in my stash. And I think it would be great fun to size down janda and make it for my boys. There are so many great patterns this time, but my favorite thing about Knitty is the fact that Amy does such a great job of having some witty knitty projects in each issue. First there was vegan fox, then those nosewarmers and this time dim sum. Too cool!

The giranimals pocket came out the right size! I 'd like to think that some of my virtuous finishing last month has changed my knitting karma and that this bodes well for greensleeves. I've still got a lot of finishing work to do on giranimals II though, including embroidering the pocket and sewing the whole thing up, but now that I know the pocket will fit and look right, I'm very relieved.

More possible proof of my good knitting karma: I received some books from my Amazon wish list. The Knitter's Book of Finishing Techniques, (which is totally awesome) and for my sewing, Singer's Sewing for Children (which Cindy over at Knitting Park recommended to me - thanks for the tip, Cindy!). When the package first arrived I couldn't remember having ordered anything and then started getting worried that I'd become some sort of online shop-aholic and had totally forgotten buying the books. But they were a surprise from my mother. Isn't that nice? [I'm going to have to finish her sweater up soon!]

And can I just say that we could all use a little good karma (or good anything) around here, since we've had sick babies for the last few days. At least the blankies that I knitted for the boys turned out good for snuggling.

I forgot the best part of my new shiny happy knitting karma. Remember how I was worried that after ripping out the giranimals pocket and losing some yarn to snags, I wouldn't have enough left over to redo the pocket? Well, after binding off the last row, this is what I had left!

The good knitting karma continues. Halfway done with greensleeves and I've used a little under three and a half (of seven) skeins. I just might make it! I finished the back over the weekend and had a little bit extra from the second skein to use on the first sleeve, which I finished yesterday. I had problems recalculating the decreases on the sleevecap for my gauge and measurements. Once again, Maggie's Sweater Design in Plain English came to my rescue with clear explanations of just how to shape everything. After reknitting the top of the sleeve twice, I think I've finally gotten it right.

This is two weeks in a row that I've had to rip out all the knitting I accomplished during my Sunday knitting group. Two weeks ago, it was the giranimals pocket and this week, the green sleeve. Oh well, at least I have fun there. Last week, while I worked on my green sleeve, I also helped Dana with her first sock. Which is actually really cool, since Dana was the person who brought the green tweed to the yarn swap and I brought the sock yarn that she's using. How neat is that!

Sewing class was cancelled due to snow, but since I am such a good girl, I still did my homework. Okay, the fact that the boys needed to catch up on some sleep from being sick and took an extra long nap helped a lot! I stitched the armhole and neck facing for dressy. After cutting out the wee little pieces, fusing interfacing to them, and sewing them together to make the whole facing, the pattern called for teeny-tiny edgestitching all along on one edge (the edge of the facing that will just hang down and won't really be attached to the dress). So far I've loved the sewing, but this seemed soooo tedious to me. After finishing it though, I realized that it really does give the garment a neat finished look, which is one of the things I really like about sewing. I find great pleasure in a precise seam and polished shaping, things which don't come all too easily in knitted garments.

One thing I am having trouble with is the whole baste right sides together, turn this over, then stitch, flip back over, sew wrong side to this, then press right side, etc., etc. thing. Aack! What side am I supposed to be working on? What joins where to which piece? And these facings are the worst with their right side on the inside, so I gotta think all backwards about what's going where. I'm still not sure if I sewed them together right. I guess we'll find out when it's time to attach them to the bodice.

Coming next week, then, will Alison pass the sewing spatial abilities test, and what will become of the zipper?!

Since I kinda have to wait until sewing class on Thursday to do the next step on dressy (curved seams for the facings - yikes!), I've decided to get set up to begin my next sewing project. I cut out the pattern pieces for my groovy pj's and laid them out on my nifty fabric.

I can't wait unitl they're done and I can lounge around the house in them!

Please welcome my little sewing blog, sew blue, to the blue room! I'll be blogging there (less frequently!!) about progress on my sewing projects from now on.

Now back to knitting: here is a sneak peek at what I'll be working on this weekend.

Crisis time again. As hinted at in my last post, I started the front of greensleeves. I cast on one half of the front (the cable splits at the bottom) and started the moss stitch in green and the cable in the purple tweed. Result: I was not as thrilled with it as I had hoped. At first I thought it might be because the purple doesn't quite match the blue flecks in the green tweed, so I tried switching to the blue Manos yarn that I originally planned to use with the green tweed. That didn't really do it for me either. Next, I tried some of the tweedy yarn left over from the boys' giranimals jackets and it still wasn't quite right. I'm beginnng to think that loving the idea of doing a different color on the cable doesn't equal loving the result. Maybe switching colors makes the cable seem too bold or breaks up the panel too much. I'm not sure what bothers me about it, but something does.

Of all the yarns I tried out I liked the purple the best, so I ripped out the other test swatches, put the purple swatch on scrap yarn and then cast on for the other side of the front using just the green. The more I knit the monochromatic version, the more I like it, but my inner knitting masochist is starting to pout. I think I'm strong enough to overrule the inner masochist and actually let this project be easy, but I'm not yet convinced about which swatch I like best.

What do you folks think?

Thanks so much everyone for helping me through my latest crisis! Since you pretty much unanimously confirmed my doubts about the purple, I'll be ripping out the green/purple swatch this afternoon and going with the all green version. Some of you asked if I should even consider the monochromatic version, given that I might run out of yarn. I'm just going to go for it! I plan to do the second sleeve and then see how much yarn is left before I tackle the front. I think the front could be done with 2 full skeins. If there's too little, I'll try to do what Leigh suggested, and purchase some more yarn close in color to the green I already have, so the cable does stand out like I wanted but the effect is more subtle.

And don't worry about the inner knitting masochist. She has been appeased. I cast on 198 stitches for the second Dale sweater and after a couple of hours, I'd managed to finish a few miniscule rows. This should keep the masochist happy for a while!

Oh, and for any Knitsmiths out there, yes that is a different color from the 198 stitches and 5 rows I did on Sunday. I had mistakenly followed the pattern info for the alternate colorway. So for those of you counting along at home, that's three weeks in a row that everything I did at my knitting group had to be ripped out. Next week, no knitting - I'm bringing finishing work!

I'm about 1/3 of the way up the second sleeve of greensleeves and the first of my three remaining skeins is thinning out. The tension is mounting. I am so anxious to see whether or not there's enough yarn, that I might just have to do some marathon knitting to find out.

Speaking of marathon knitting, you have got to check out Inga's Lopi sweater that she made last month in FOUR days (from 2/12 to 2/15). Incredible!

Aren't these just as cute as can be? May, from the Knitsmiths also sews and brought in some old patterns she didn't want from a larger lot she'd bought on eBay. They are a little retro, but oh so adorable. I'll definitely have to try them out once I feel like I can do the whole pants fly-buttonhole-waistband thing.

Tonight we're supossed to learn buttonholes and some hemming stitches, so after that I should be able to get started on groovy. I've wanted to start it all week, but step one is 'make buttonholes' and I want to see that at least once in person before I try it on my own. And before I do step one, I'm supposed to 'determine length', which means measuring and I totally suck at that (as any of my knitblog readers can attest to!), so I'm procrastinating.

My stash has gotten out of control. I've had moments where I fear that there are projects under my bed that I have completely forgotten about. I desperately needed to inventory everything. So here goes...

works in progress (projected finish date)

• S's giranimals jacket, only needs finishing (march)
• greensleeves, back and sleeves complete (march)
• B's bugs sweater, just begun (april)
• hubby's brown butter vest, half of back finished (may)
• mom's native sweater, a ways away (august)

projects in waiting (projected start date)

• leftovers vest - I've claimed the leftovers from giranimals for myself! (soon)
• iona - my next Starmore (dare I start this when greensleeves is finished?)
• rebecca tank - in all seasons cotton (summer)
• linen drape top - long time stash member awaiting parole (summer)
• stripey cotton glace cardigan - can you tell I've been saving up summer projects?! (summer)
• boys' hamish vests - from A Season's Tale (late summer)
• boys' nursery sweaters - from Double Knits (fall)
• the blue sweater - every blue blog needs a blue sweater (fall)
• blue tweed - what to do with this (???)

really, really want to make (projected moment of weakness)

• one amazing sweater for me from poetry in stitches or norsk strikkedesign or more sweaters (winter)
• joe sweaters for the boys (winter, as long as they still like Blue's Clues)
• pipsqueaks sweaters for the boys (spring 2004)

Okay, let me just say that I'm not proud of the number of projects here. All written out it's actually kind of horrifying. But blogging about my on-going projects has so far really helped me make steady progress on them, so I'm hoping that keeping this list here will help me in my goal to make all these wonderful things. And maybe one of you is thinking about the same project? Knit-along anyone?

Okay, that was the sweaters. Just as I don't get excited in the same way about knitting socks and hats like I do about knitting sweaters, I couldn't motivate myself to inventory my "other" stash while still dreaming of all those sweaters-to-be.

But now, I'm ready. Here's the small stuff, in descending order of length of time stuffed under bed.

group a
• lorna's laces sock yarn for me
• regia sock yarn for me
• regia crazy colors leftover yarn waiting to become socks to match the crazy continental!

Except for the crazy colors yarn, I'm not sure I even like this sock yarn anymore.

group b
• regia sock yarn abandoned after quest to turn all remaining yarn from the boys' vests into matching socks
• 100g skein of regia sock yarn for even more baby socks

And since buying all this sock yarn, I've learned that I don't really enjoy knitting socks all that much.

group c
• phildar polaire to make mittens to match my blue hat
• more phildar polaire, but in brown for my brown hat

These two have a really good chance of getting started soon, although, an abrubt (and unlikely) end to this winter we're having could postpone any hats or mittens for a while.

And coming up next week: a few good leftovers in search of projects. Can you help them?

I haven't been knitting much in the last few days. I think seeing the number of projects I have planned overwhelmed me a bit. I've been taking it easy. I almost started some crazy colors socks and then the Phildar mittens, but I decided to stick with what's already on the needles for now. And that would be greensleeves.

Here are the front pieces, joined with one cable cross completed. I'm really liking the way the monochromatic version looks, but I think the purple could have been quite lovely. Michelle and Peter had both suggested that I make a swatch of the purple cables twisting once to really get a sense of how it would look (what good knitters they are!) and if I hadn't already been swatched out, I might have, but I just didn't have another swatch in me. As it turns out, I had to redo the all green panel because I had forgotten to duplicate the waist shaping that I'd added to the back (I added a little shaping because, well, I like it, plus I thought it would save a bit of yarn). So I had to knit both front panels again. C'est la vie.

[Which reminds me. Did I say somewhere that I didn't like France? Well, I take it back. I would like to repeal my being con them and apologize for having chuckled as the asteroid from Armageddon destroyed Paris. No freedom fries for me, thanks. I'd rather sign up with the francophiles than play these silly reindeer games. And by silly reindeer games, I mean evil propagandizing war-mongering ways. Dismount soap box. Start planning escape.]

It's not easy being green. Or cabled. The front of greensleeves has been a challenge. All the counting of rows and such. I guess it's been a long time since I've done cables! The sweater is also constructed unusually with the front cable bands actually continuing around and joining at the back of the neck. And then there's an error in the pattern directions regarding the shoulder shaping for the front. But the most difficult problem was the one I created for myself by substituting the yarn. My gauge is off, particularly the row gauge, which would be no big deal, but those front cables have to cross and then divide right at the V of the neck. So I had to do quite a bit of math to lengthen them just enough. I was a little unsure, but they came out just right!

Amazingly the good knitting karma continues with this sweater. So far it seems to fit perfectly and I've got way lots of extra yarn. I'll be finishing the seams and weaving in ends today and should have a finished picture for you by tomorrow.

I think this is the most pleased I've ever been with a sweater I knitted. I'm just so proud of myself for successfully adjusting the pattern for the yarn I had and after so many mistakes and outright failures on other sweaters, finally producing a sweater that fits me exactly as I wanted. All in all, this project was a real joy. I fell in love with the both the yarn and the pattern immediately and knew I had to put them together. The yarn was easy to work with - those 5mm needles were a welcome relief from my usual size 3's! - and moss stitch makes weaving in ends a lot less painful. If only it could be like this everytime!

Inspired by greensleeves and St. Patrick's Day, I started swatching some light green cotton chenille which I'm thinking about using to make a baby sweater for a friend who is expecting. No matter what my favorite color is on other days (I've got two boxes of blue yarn under the bed and purple and more purple on the way to me right now), today it is green.

I finally got around to putting the tie on my needle holder. I've been using the thing for what seems like ages without it. When I first sewed the long strip for the tie, I couldn't figure out how to turn the thing right-side out. So I went ahead and put all my needles in the case, stuffed the tie inside, rolled it up, and promptly forgot all about it.

It was actually quite a while ago that May, from Knitsmiths, helped me get the tie turned the right way, but since then I've only thought about sewing it on when I opened it up to get some dpn's and I haven't had to do that much lately. Today I miraculously thought of it while the sewing machine was out. Pointy is finished, and I've acquired even more double-pointed needles, so it's already completely full!

All work and no play is no way to knit. I'm trying to quiet the calls for progress coming from my inner knitting taskmaster by giving myself some time off from the knitting grind to enjoy designing some stripes for my leftovers vest. I plan to slow down my knitting pace a bit 'cause I've been stressing a little about all the projects I have on the needles (and in the stash) and how I want to be working on every single one of them right now. I'm hoping that playing around with the leftover colors and doing a bit of leisurely swatching for this project will give me a more carefree attitude towards my knitting.

I finally started working on my pajama bottoms. Step one was make buttonholes, something which I hadn't done before and needed to practice a bit with my machine first. My machine has a nice little four-step buttonhole stitch that worked real well, so I jumped right in and did it!

The buttonholes are actually not for buttons but rather for the tie at the waist. If I understand the instructions correctly, elastic will be attached between two fabric ends, which will slide through the buttonholes to the front. I really hate pajama pants with only elastic. I prefer men's pj's with snaps that let the pants hang around my hips. I hope that I can manage to adjust things on these pj's so they'll sit on my hips the way I like.

I think I've decided to go with this sequence for my stripes. I'm a little worried about selecting a stripe sequence beforehand, since I'm working with leftovers and if a color runs out, I won't be able to continue the stripes in the same sequence. The other option would be to make random stripes, but I suspect that I would be happier wearing a perfectly ordered and symmetrical sequence of stripes. But then again, I think that the stripes on Matt's High Helen sweater look great! Hmmm, maybe I'm just chicken. I suppose I could try really big stripes - one for each color until it runs out - but I'm not convinced that that big horizontal stripes would be very flattering (e.g.: this).

I want to be sure about what I'm doing before I really begin the vest, because, as we recall from the giranimals pocket incident, this yarn does not like to be ripped back. I can't afford to lose any yarn this time!

Hello, I'm almost four skeins worth of lovely Cascade 220 left over from the boys' mutssjaals. What shall I be? A matching mommy mutssjaal? Maybe some neato sideways gloves and a coordinating hat? How 'bout a fun purse. I've heard that Cascade 220 felts up real nice (thanks to Rob!), so what about a Suki bag? Or fuzzy feet for the whole family? Any other ideas?

Here's my swatch for the little baby sweater that I'm planning to make for my friend who's expecting. I'm using Crystal Palace Cotton Chenille, which I really, really wanted to use because it is so soft and totally says cuddly baby clothes. I was disappointed to see that the ball band says 'hand wash', but I'm still holding out hope that it's actually machine washable. I've already run this swatch through the machine once with hot water and poopy baby clothes and it survived quite well. It grew a little bit widthwise, but is still the same length. I plan to throw it in another time and may even try putting it in the dryer. That's what swatches are for, right?! Anyone else out there have any success washing/drying this yarn?

The zipper is in! Whew, what a task that was. We learned how to do a centered zipper in class, but of course my pattern called for a lapped zipper. I took some scrap yarn and followed the nice pictures in the Singer Sewing Essentials book and, miracle of miracles, it worked! But when I went to do the zipper on the actual dress, I realized that the seam allowance was too small to do all that stitching, particularly the top-stitching to finish the side that overlaps. Then I remembered that I'd read somewhere (totally forgotten where) that you can extend the seam allowance with bias tape, so I spent the boys' naptime driving to the fabric store for the tape. Tape on, zipper in, and voila!

Dressy fits pretty well now that the zipper's in. And doing the zipper wasn't so bad. Maybe now I can try knitting a sweater with a zipper (something like Joseph perhaps?). That way I can use the cute little zipper foot again. It's so neat! I did find the whole shift it to the left, then shift it to the right thing a little tricky though. At one point, I didn't know which side to put it on and apparently left it in the middle. Snap! First needle broken. Guess I'll have to make another trip to the store!

Started the green baby sweater while watching the Oscars and managed to finish the back. I'm using the koko kimono pattern from Jil Eaton's Minnies. The patterns in there are so cute! I'd love to make the cabled overalls for my boys, but I think they're too old to wear adorably silly pants like that. In fact, they have officially started to take notice of the clothes they have on. One day, I pointed out that their shirts had trucks on them and they pointed at them all day long, especially while they were playing with their toy trucks. Sometimes when we see a truck on the street now, they'll take a little peek at their shirts to see if they're wearing the same ones!

And for those of you keeping score at home, here's the chenille swatch after another wash in hot and a trip through the dryer. Still the same size, but a little smooshed and crumpled. I don't think I'd purposely machine dry this yarn, but it's nice to know that just in case, it shouldn't fall completely apart.

These gorgeous fabrics are by Kaffe Fasset and were sent to me by the oh so fabulously thoughtful Kerrie (who is so lucky to live in Rowan-land!). I don't yet know what to do with them.

I haven't ruled out simply keeping them all wrapped up to adore and fondle.

That is the question. A few days ago I would have said yes, but now, not so much!

Made anxious by the onset of warmer weather, I started knitting B's ladybug sweater over the weekend. Everytime it seems like good sweater-but-no-jacket weather and I want to put S's vw bug sweater on him, I think about how poor B is still waiting on his bug sweater. So I ignored my fear that I have probably forgotten how to do fair-isle and sat down to start the color work on Dale sweater number two. The two-handed stranding went great and I had just reached the ladybugs as I finally had to admit that my gauge was way too tight and the sweater would be too small. I ripped back to the light blue hem and switched to a larger needle. 'Knit loosely', I chanted, until I was distracted by the cute little ladybugs taking shape under my needles. Ladybugs complete. Check. Nooooo, it's still too small! I'm making the two-year size and the boys will be 2 1/2 by the time they'll start wearing these sweaters this winter, so I can't afford to be two inches off in final width. I pulled out the next sized needle and knit a bit further. I finally got gauge (crazy how different my gauge is on these two projects!) but it wasn't a bamboo needle and the stitches slipped all over the place, making the end result so crappy looking that I went ahead and frogged back to the hem again and immediately put in an order for the bamboo circs I need.

Luckily, B is still too young to realize that his brother's sweater is all done and his is barely begun. Besides, he had plenty of fun just playing with the yarn.

This little guy's name is Flame and I got him in my last kinder surprise egg. Seems kind of appropriate as the outrage continues over THE article.

the article (not to be confused with this article)

Bonne Marie's response
the Curmudgeon speaks
girlreaction reacts
not so swift, says Amber

What do I think? Well... hmmm.... sorry to say that I just can't get really worked up over this one. I think some of her derision for the recent trendiness of knitting is legitimate. There are young women (not any of us, I'm sure) who have picked up the hobby as a whim and will make a couple of scarves and never knit again, and frankly I'm a little tired of everyone celebrating their new acceptance of the craft. But I would blame Martha Stewart and her ilk for yuppifying knitting more than the recession or any nesting "urge". That said, however, I don't feel a need to distance myself from accusations of domesticity, especially when they come from someone so obviously concerned about separating herself from all things domestic. Sounds more like her issues than mine.

Man this bug sweater is being a pain in the butt! While I'm waiting for the proper size circular to arrive so I can restart the body, I decided to work on the sleeves, since I do have the appropriate double pointed needles. After twice knitting and ripping that first row of bugs on the body, I have now knit and ripped it three times on the sleeve. I just can't stand the way it looks. The colorwork looked great when I was knitting real tight, but with a needle two sizes bigger it's this big hideous loosey-goosey affair that I simply cannot abide. I've knit so much on this sweater that I should be halfway up the body, but alas I've got an inch of the body (and half of that is hem to be turned under!) and the same inch on the first sleeve. Aaaargh! And in the meantime, Cindy is almost done with her Kool-Aid sweater, Wendy has practically finished the body on Hank 8 and Michelle has made incredible progress on her intarsia plaid. What is my %*&#@ing problem?!

Did some work on the groovy pj bottoms. I've finished the inside seams and fly. Next, I'll baste up the side seams and then I get a chance to slip 'em on and see how they fit. So far, they look humongous! I'm using one of those unisex multi-size (kids and adults) patterns and I'm not sure that medium adult = woman, but that's what I guessed from the measurements listed. Loose, comfy pj's are what I'm shooting for though, so I think I'm on the right track.

Once the fitting is done, it's on to my first attempts at using elastic and hemming. Luckily, we briefly went over the basics of these in my last sewing class. No one was using elastic and no one was far along enough to start hemming, so we didn't really get much of a chance to practice the techniques, but I'm hopeful that having seen it a couple of times and following the pictures in my reference book will be enough. And if they don't come out perfect, well no one's gonna see them anyway!

At least the baby sweater is progressing nicely. I've finished the front panels now and attached them to the back at the shoulders (three needle bind off, my favorite!). The pattern calls for the sleeves to be knitted down from the shoulder, so I'll have the joy of picking up stitches out of tightly-knit chenille. Woo hoo. I've already developed a serious callus on my right index finger from trying to get the stitches off the needle. The yarn may be soft, but working with it is a bit tough. I'm really liking the result though! Only, now that I see it here, I'm thinking that the decreases on the left front didn't quite come out looking like the original. Maybe I'll try undoing the seam and redoing the top quarter of that panel again over the weekend.

Got one of the sleeves done and (don't be mad, Peter) I redid the decreases on the front of the baby kimono so it lays smoother and looks a bit more like the picture in the book. This kimono is progressing so quickly that I'm thinking I should knit something else for my friend's baby. It does seem sort of strange to knit just one baby sweater! I'll have to come up with some coordinating something to go with the kimono. Hmmmm....

And speaking of green sleeves, we're back to cold weather here, so I got the chance to wear my greensleeves to Knitsmiths yesterday. Yeah! We had a small group, but a few really nice finished projects to share. Check out Dana's first socks, Claire's beaded bag, and May's new cardigan. I love show and tell days at the knitting group!

The boys need some lightweight spring/summer pants to replace some pants that they already have and are about to outgrow. So, I picked up some knit fabric online, studied my Kwik-Sew Sewing for Toddlers, and closely examined the pants I'm trying to copy.

They look pretty simple. There are no side seams, just a center seam, inner leg seams, elastic inserted in a casing at the waist and simple topstitched hem at the bottom. I want to fiddle around with the Kwik-Sew pattern a bit, so that the pants end up looking more like the ones I'm copying, and then I should be all set to make what I hope will be a few quick and easy pairs of pants!