two baby sweaters for friends expecting

 

Mya from Rowan Junior in Phildar Lambswool
Daisy from Pipsqueaks in Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino

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And while I was waiting for my yarn, I also finished the little daisy cardigan.

She's so sweet. The Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino really knits up well. And the Pipsqueaks pattern was fun to knit (yes, I do like me a good chart to follow).

So now this baby has the green light from me to be born. And I've got to work on getting some more non-knitting, baby-girl-having friends!

I found the perfect little daisy buttons to match the daisy cardigan and sewed them in last night. I'm getting the finishing done on this one a little at a time. A few minutes of seaming here, a few minutes of weaving in ends there. I still have that collar to do, but then she'll be all done and she can be on her way. Sniff, sniff. I'll miss this little cardigan. She was a real pleasure to knit.

And I fired up the Bernina again and have begun sewing my big Burda top. Look, I'm sewing my first sleeve!

(Shrug update: all nine balls knit - check back tomorrow for the big mother's day reveal!)

In the homestretch. One sleeve in, one to go. Buttons, collar still to come.

Crunch time! The baby for whom the Daisy cardigan is destined is due next month, so it's time to get cracking on finishing this one up. Sleeves are finally all done and blocking.

That leaves me a few weeks for all the finishing - seaming, doing the edging for the neck, and weaving in ends. It would be so nice to have this ready to go as soon as we get the birth announcement. When do you all generally send off handmade gifts? Before? Right after the birth? Whenever it's done?

Speaking of bundles of joy, look what arrived last week: a girl and boy...

Calmer! These are from my linen drape yarn trade with Lynn (thanks, Lynn!). So cute, don't you just want to pinch their little ball bands?

And check out what the stork sent me by email. A link to this amazing tank knit by Helle in Denmark. Helle and two other very talented Danish knitbloggers started a little spring fling knitalong, inspired by my spring fling tank. This is a clear case of the offspring surpassing the parent, I think! Check out Elisabeth's beautiful, sexy and BLUE tank here! I'm anxiously awaiting Bettina's. Anyone out there read Danish??
[Update: Bettina's put her spring fling plans on hold. But Lise has just started! I love that there are knitblogs from all over the world in all different languages. Can anyone recommend a good web page translation site? It would be great to be able to visit and understand what some of our colleagues abroad are up to!]

Oh and one more thing, a long-awaited arrival. Deborah, one of the very first Ribby Cardie knitalongers, has just finished her ribby! Isn't it a beauty? I know I was only a knitalong mom, but I'm so proud. Sniff. Sniff. Well done, Deborah!

After frogging flowsies last week, Daisy is back on track. The two front panels are all done, with buttonholes correctly spaced this time!

Now, don't go thinking these pieces come off my needles looking this good. Before blocking, the purl stitches in the flowers caused each piece to pucker like mad making it look pretty much like a wadded up washcloth. See?

The moral: blocking is good.

I didn't really press them though. I like to wet block. A little wash, a little laying out to dry in the sun, and they flatten out just fine (so maybe they're more like dried flowers?). And I'm not a pin person either. Two toddlers and dozens of straight pins in the same house is not a good idea!

There's trouble in daisy-land. I finished the first front panel of the Daisy cardigan and realized that I had incorrectly spaced the buttonholes, so it was not possible to have a button at the very top of the neck. If it were my sweater that might be okay. I mean how often do I close the top button on my cardies? But this is for a baby, where the top button might actually be used quite a bit, perhaps exclusively. And I bought such sweet buttons that I'd hate to use even one less of them. So no fudging possible here. I had to go back and fix.

First I thought maybe I could just drop a few buttonband stitches all the way down and reknit the button band that way.

But the two row buttonhole that I used didn't really want to cooperate and rip back without serious ugliness, so I went ahead and ripped the whole thing.

There was much sadness, but I always try to do my ripping quickly, as soon as I realize there's no other choice, before I can get too attached to the work and what was good about it. I feel good about how it's looking now. It also helps that my first attempt at crocheted flowsies went well!

Starting the front panels of the baby daisy cardigan. More flowsies! Knitting these flowsies is really addictive. It's like doing the color stripes on the cardi raye. Each flower (or color stripe) is relatively small, so I rush through it to see how it turns out and then I want to just start the next one. Before I know it that one's done and I wanna start just one more. It really keeps me interested and motivated. Despite the constant chart-following (and the sparkle/no-sparkle controversy), I'm having a blast! Plus, I get to say flowsies all the time.

Speaking of flowsies, have you seen the sweet spring flowers Georgia has been crocheting? She's inspired me to try using my crochet hook for more than just rescuing dropped stitches and scratching my back! Gotta see Claire from my knitting group for some crochet pointers and I'll let you know how I do. Crochet flowsies, here I come!

Now where did mommy put that bookmark for the flowsie blog?

Inside = flowsies.

Outside = snow.

Finished the back of Daisy during the latest snow storm. I've got two front panels and two sleeves' worth of flowsies to get me through the last of winter. Better knit slow, just in case.

With little pink flowsies all in a row. I spiked the knitting needles with a little miracle grow and I'm almost done with the back of Daisy. It'll need a severe blocking when it's done though. If the piece isn't stretched across the sofa arm it looks more like a wadded up washcloth than a sweater back!

Hey, speaking of washcloths, I finished the first sugar 'n cream log cabin washcloth! It's so cool.

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.

Okay, so the brushed alpaca wasn't my only yarny treat to myself in the last weeks. I made a few additions to my stash while I was away. First, I got this fabulous swift from fellow Massachusetts knitter, Julia! Up until now, I've just used my husband to hold the yarn, or in more desperate times, my shoe (remember?).

Well, now I'm swifting up my Peace Fleece like a pro. How sweet it is. A big thanks to Julia (from my husband too!).

Next, since I love that blue bumpy yarn for the too small sweater so much that I'm almost sad to see this sweater reach the finishing point, I jumped when I saw some more Giboulees on sale on eBay.

And since I'm a just a sucker for Phildar on eBay, I picked up some Pegase for this baby sweater - the third in line at the baby (sweater) factory here.

There's still a wee bit more yarn on its way to me. Ahem. I guess the idea of getting more bandwith got to my head. I'll let you know if I come up with a way to store yarn in my unused server space.

Here she is, finally. Mya. I went with the little i-cords and love them! I really like that I could pick up stitches to start the i-cord, so it would be securely attached to the garment. So much better than a button, if you ask me.

Laura asked me to compare the two baby kimono-style sweaters I've knit for anyone out there considering the two designs. The first was the koko kimono pattern from Minnies. The Minnies' kimono is more of an asymmetrical cardigan. It's a simple design, written for a relatively large gauge (US6s) - a real quickknit, just like the book subtitle says. The sleeves are knit down from the armholes, which also saves on some seaming. The Minnies pattern would be well-suited for a beginner, for someone who's looking for minimal finishing work, and anyone who just wants to make a simple sweet sweater for a new baby.

The Rowan Junior Mya pattern is a wrap style cardigan, with each front panel going all the way across the front. That gives it a more feminine look (the koko kimono is pretty unisex) and also means a lot more knitting! Mya is also written for a smaller gauge (US3s) and a finer yarn. The body is knit in one very wide piece to the armholes, while the sleeves are knit separately and sewn in. There is a lot more detailing in the Rowan pattern with its striped border (I changed it to a solid yellow) and long moss stitch edging picked up and knit around the neck. So the Rowan pattern is definitely more work, but it produces a much finer garment. Perhaps it's a better choice for the patient intermediate knitter who wants to make a very special sweater.

They're both great designs though - good, clear patterns which make beautiful baby sweaters. Go knit kimonos!

Mya - aka, the tiny-gauged baby sweater - is all sewn up. There's only the fasteners left to add. Well, to settle on and then add. The pattern calls for button loops to be crocheted on at the side of each front panel (one inside and one outside). I tried doing the loops and felt like they were stretching out the edging too much. So, I ripped them out. I briefly considered afterthought buttonholes (cutting a hole into the finished edging and stitching around it to secure the yarn, but that seems like a last resort option). The next best option seemed to be to sew in snaps. Now that the snaps are in, I don't like them. They pull too much on the stitches in the body. Even with some grosgrain behind them, I think it's too much strain on the fine yarn. So out they'll go. Fellow Knitsmith, Gina, suggested some tiny little i-cords at the sides, just like in those wrap-around baby onesies. I'd love to attach pretty ribbon, but given that one of the ties is on the inside, I don't see how I could sew in ribbon without it showing on the outside. So little i-cords may have to do. Any other brilliant ideas out there?

I'm too tired to come up with something right now.

(No knitting pictures from me today. Sniff, sniff. But if you want to see lovely knitting, don't despair. Just check out the links in the sidebar to some recently finished Banffs. They're beautiful!)

Ready to seam!

First let me say that yes, I realize that I don't need another active project right now. Now let me say this, BUT.... my advanced beginners knitting class started last night and I thought I'd take the opportunity to swatch for a baby sweater along with my students. I do have two other baby sweaters to make for friends who are expecting and I picked up some wonderfully soft Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino in the loveliest pink last weekend for the next one. So why not?! I plan to make the Daisy sweater from Pipsqueaks. Intarsia flowers - yes!

I haven't been neglecting the original tiny-gauged baby sweater, though. Here's the body, now with yellow border and one sleeve. Getting closer!

Tiny-gauged baby sweater body reporting for duty. (Heh, heh, you said doody.)

Now get ready for teeny-tiny-gauged sleeve hell!

Finally some decreases on the tiny-gauged, wrist-pain inducing baby sweater! I've started the slopes of the front panels and separated for the armholes. Now I've got a cool 130 stitches in three sections on the needle instead of 190 in one big piece. And it's starting to look like a baby sweater and not a blanket!

I really feel like I've got largest chunk of knitting behind me now. Each separate section and each sleeve should be doable in a sitting. And I'll be able to see the progress I've made right away. Now I remember the rewards of knitting baby items. Yeah, baby!

A friend's baby, expected at the end of January, has arrived early. I hadn't even started knitting the baby gift! Better hop to it...

I'm making a wrap around style kimono sweater from Rowan Junior in some soft lambswool that I had leftover from my funky vest. I think the pattern calls for Rowan 4ply or something really fine like that, but I'm not going there. Still, this lambswool is the yarn that gave me those wrist pains before, so I'll be knitting this one a little at a time with lots of breaks.

As usual, I was too lazy to make a real swatch. With baby clothes, I often just cast on according to expected gauge and for a larger size. It doesn't have to be one specific, exact size - they'll be every size eventually. And I figure bigger is better - they can get more wear out of it. This one looks like it's coming out to be about a 1 1/2 yr. size. (Seems good for a baby born in the winter, right Melissa?)