I'm gonna make 'em all!

hats from Itty-Bitty Hats: cute and cuddly caps to knit for babies and toddlers

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Thanks for making my spring cleaning book and yarn sale a huge success! It was fun! There are still a couple of books and few yarn lots left, so check 'em out. Between going through emails and sending paypal invoices, I was finishing up wee one's "olive you" hat (from Itty-Bitty Hats).

Wee one thanks you for helping get mommy's yarn out of her room!

Hee hee. (That hat just makes me giggle.)

I spent the baby's naptime (which is also my computer time) yesterday, doing some very late spring cleaning. I've been sorting out old kids' clothes and toys to donate and preparing for a big reorganization and move of my yarn and fabric stashes. It's time for me to get my yarn crap out of the baby's room! She's shared with me long enough. Plus, she can open the doors of the yarn cabinet now and is starting to think of the yarn as her own playthings. So I'm working on a chain reaction sort of move, where the boys' toys all go in their room, my stash goes where their toys were and wee one gets some room for a little play area with a table and a dollhouse. I'll have to pare down my knitting stash to make it all fit though. So look for a pretty good yarn and knitting book sale here next week!

We all know how stressful it is sorting through the piles of stuff that accumulate over the years - and I haven't even gotten to the yarn yet! - but I'm thankful that at night I can relax with my little olive you martini hat and it's fabulously yummy looking olives. There's only one day of spring left and wee one is asleep right now, so I'd better get through that last closet fast! I can treat myself to more olives and drinks later....

My stash may have let me down a little when I was searching for just the right colors for the embroidery on wee one's bonbon cardigan, but it has come back strong this time!

can you guess what this is for??

I'm teaching a class now at my lys on Susan Anderson's Itty-Bitty Hats book and I'm itching to get started on my hat! We're focusing on all the different sorts of little techniques and embellishments that are in the book and that every good knitter should have at his/her command like i-cord, three-needle bind off, crochet edging, picot edging, bobbles, tassels, pompoms, simple embroidery, and attaching small applique "doodads" (official non-scary term for students). Each student is choosing the hats she wants to work on and we'll just do whatever comes up. In the first class last week, I finished off the tie on wee one's new emli bonnet with leaves from one of Susan's patterns. This week, I'll bring in wee one's bonbon sweater and can rework some of that embroidery in class. But I can't pass up the opportunity to make another one of these hats! And olive you is one that's been on my list since I first got the book.

The stash of scrap yarn and extra balls has come through for me with the perfect colors. Olive it!

I know, I live in New England, the Patriots blah, blah, blah, but I can't help it, I don't like football. I do love this little football helmet hat from Itty-Bitty Hats though.

It looks just like one of those old-timey leather helmets (except for the baby blue color of course). Probably provides just as much safety too, huh?

This was knit for a friend of the family for his very first grandson. They're from Texas, so I think the football theme should be well received by the daddy. Here's my question though. I'm so tempted to add a little something fun to the top of the hat like a pompom (like Dani added to the hat she made last year and Dani is my guide in all things itty bitty hats!) or even the little sprout dobber thing that the original pattern calls for (Dani also tried one of these). But I don't want the dad to think that the hat has been girl-ed up somehow. What do you think? Cute enough on its own? Daddy should just live with a little pompom? Help!

Finally, wee one in her birthday cake hat!

She enjoyed some real birthday cake (decorated by the boys!) at a little celebration we had this past weekend with grandma.

And was as pretty as can be in her birthday dress, wearing the ribbons from her presents.

Yesterday Grace called my attention to Teeny Project Runway over at Mason-Dixon Knitting. If you haven't taken a look at all the hilarious knits over there, you gotta check it out (Grace's entry was Hedwig the owl in his regal knitted cape). Anyhoo, I just finished up a new knit for wee one and, as usual, she was a very good model in our photo session. But since she's always walking and since she's always after the camera (she broke the last camera after a project photo session in October), I have to stand about 10 feet away from her and take pictures as she walks towards me and the camera. Therefore, all of our baby L pictures nowadays look like a runway show. So this morning I present you with a wee runway show.

First up, wee one in her latest itty bitty hat, the rosebud wreath (well, more like bouquet) hat.

I knit it in Berroco Touche and the flowers were knit by my knitting buddies in scraps of Rowan handknit dk. She's so good about wearing all these itty bitty hats! And a little something extra for the camera please...

Next a stunning sweater dress that was a store sample at my lys.

I loved this blossom sweater from Knitting at Knoon the first time I saw it and have recommended the pattern to many customers. It's simple but girly, hip and retro and it's knit in Dream yarn (it was a really nice angora blend from I forget who, but it's now discontinued, which is why the store sold the sample - UPDATE: found it! it's Dream from Marks & Kattens). The sweater is actually a size 3, but with the sleeves rolled up about 5 inches, it makes a sweet little dress. And now a turn...

And lastly, the swimsuit competition. Wee one loves the water! She gets so excited when she sees her little bathtub come out for bath time. So I signed her up for a baby swim class where we can splash about in the pool together. I had to find her wee swimsuit first though (which is tough in the middle of February, let me tell you!). When I brought the bathing suit home, she saw it and wanted to put it on right away. She wore it the rest of the day over her clothes.

Look at her pose!

I mean, seriously, does it get any better than this? I've got a beautiful baby girl. She's just about to turn one. And I get to make this adorable hat for her to wear.

It's the birthday cake hat from - yes, you guessed it, what else - Itty-Bitty Hats. I've been waiting to make this for wee one for, well, a year! For the cake, I used leftover Lana Grossa Merino 2000 that I bought in Germany to make the cottontail on the cottontail hat. And the yummy pink icing is Knitpicks Shine Sport. Making the icing was so much fun! I thought the crochet loops would be tedious to do but they were just so gosh darn cute, I was smiling the whole time doing it. I was so tickled by them, I had to show hubby the hat after each round of icing was complete: "Look now. It's so cute!" "Yup."

Then came the candle. Again, I imagined this would be fiddly or annoying, but no. It took no time to make and it came out perfectly. That Susan Anderson is a genius!

When the boys woke up the morning after I finished the hat and saw it on the counter, S said quizzically, "uh, is that, uh, a birthday cake hat?" "Yes, yes it is!" "Is it for the baby?" "Yes!" "But she has to wait two more months to wear it." "Nope, her birthday is actually only three weeks away." "Oh, wow!"

Almost exactly one year ago, two of my best friends threw me an amazing baby shower where all my knitbuddies made baby booties for wee one. This Saturday, I got a little payback when I got to go to one of those friend's own baby shower and bring a gaggle of itty bitty hats from the Knitsmiths.

My offering was the marshmallow bonnet, which I knit in Blue Sky Alpaca's most incredibly soft Handspun Organic Cotton. It's practically like cashmere, but no animal fibers (Shannon's allergic)! I knit this same pattern for wee one over a year ago but it must have happened in some baby-brain haze because I didn't remember anything about how it was constructed! The other hats are (almost) all from the Itty-Bitty Hats book, including a Stars hat from Johanna, a Marley hat from Thea, a pink stripey hat from Colleen, a Bunny Tails hat from Dani, and an Upside-Down Daisy hat from Lisa. Shannon was surprised and happy to be remembered by all her old Boston buddies.

I also did a little sewing for her new baby. Baby's grandmother is an incredible quilter, so I was pretty sure that baby would be all set with beautiful quilts, but when I happened to come across a fabric panel of one of Shannon's favorite children's stories, The Little Engine that Could, I knew I had to make her a little fabric book. The panel wasn't made to be a book - there weren't the right number of blocks and they weren't in proper page groupings for a book - so I had to do some finessing to make it work. Plus, it was all very, very basic blue check and Shannon is having a fabulous little girl, soooo I had to gather up fun and fabulous coordinating fabrics to pretty it up a little.

Despite the myriad difficulties that arose while I was making this (like the final book being too big to fit under the presser foot of my machine!), it was a pleasure to make. Whenever I got frustrated, the happy little train's chant of "I think I can, I think I can, I think I can" helped spur me on to finish it.

Lastly, the big present for Shannon's baby... see if you can recognize it....

Yes, it's an unfinished hemlock ring blanket! I tried my best to get it done in time. I had even started the bind off, but there was no way to get it blocked before the shower, so I wrapped it up as nice as I could for the ceremonial opening and then snuck it back into my bag to take home to finish. More pics of it blocking, etc. to come!

Best wishes to Shannon for the last couple of months of her pregnancy. Thanks for giving me a reason to make these wonderful projects and the opportunity to pay you back for my own awesome baby shower. We can't wait to see Cheezit in her little hats!

One last little Christmas present to give away while I'm here: a bunny tails hat for a wee girl cousin. This was a last-minute gift that I had to find yarn for, but I was pleased to find a very nice yarn store in the local area (and trust me people, this is a big deal because there's not anything in the local area!). The chocolate brown of this Lana Grossa Merino 2000 caught my eye right away, so I decided to make a brown bunny with little pink bows. And a white cotton tail, of course.

I'm so pleased with how this came out. It was a heikle Sache at first with some gauge issues and some reknitting. I wasn't expecting this sport weight yarn to work on a US7 needle, but it has a wonderful body and sproing that makes it knit up soooo nice. I finished up the ears in the dark shortly after midnight while watching some locals shoot off fireworks and ended up making one ear a wee bit longer than the other, but I think it adds personality to the little guy, don't you?

Here's hoping this adorable new year's bunny is a sign of happy knits to come in the new year.

Wee one versus godzilla!

Wee one walks!

A quicky wee hat for a friend.

The boys, the baby and I trekked out to Black Sheep Knitting yesterday to meet the amazingly creative and talented, Susan B. Anderson of Itty-Bitty Hats and Itty Bitty Nursery. She was soooo nice.

I was not at all surprised to find that she was just as sweet as the adorable little knits in her books. She brought along a whole trunk show of her knits and, let me tell you, all those itty bitties were even cuter in person! Can you see the teensy knitted teacups and that wonderfully stripey elefant. Chubby bunny was also there. I looooove him!

And the giant over-sized chenille peas and carrots were even funnier in real life. I don't know what you'd do with them, but when you see them in person, they are so outrageously huge and stuffed like something Claes Oldenburg would knit, that they're suddenly so cool, you want to make them. They're a riot!

Finally, the one thing I was most interested in seeing in person, besides Susan of course, was that incredible mouse mobile. Wee one touched some of the mice tentatively, but the boys really liked it. They came by and kind of mauled it after I took this picture.

To celebrate the occasion, I made wee one the bunny ears hat from Itty-Bitty Hats. Because of my bad math skills (I recalculated incorrectly after choosing a larger-gauge yarn and ended up at first with a hat that would fit my head!), I didn't get it done in time for wee one to wear to meet Susan (she wore her daisy hat instead), but it's all done today!

Such a fun pattern! I really appreciate how all of the hats in Susan's book are very simply constructed, so they're easy (if you don't goof your times tables like me) to resize for different gauges and larger sizes. I wanted to make this bunny hat out of some of the handspun angora I got from Jamie Harmon at Rhinebeck one year. I made myself a hat with her handspun and it's so cozy, wee one likes to take it off my head and snuggle with it. She especially likes the funny pompom on the top. Which is why I knew she'd love this bunny hat, because on the back it has a little pompom cottontail! (You don't see this in any of the book pictures, but it is in the instructions.)

Thanks to Susan from moms of now-even-cuter babies everywhere for sharing all your wonderful itty bitty patterns with us! I can't wait to see what you have in store for us to knit next!!

So what did I knit while on vacation?

It's another dolly bag, knit in pink this time and with the few changes that I wanted to make last time. I added four stitches to the total width, allowing for one purl between the diamonds and the cables at the widest point, and also changed one of the cables to twist in the opposite direction so they twist toward each other. It was already the cutest thing ever for a little girl - and now it's just a little bit better.

So what do you make after you make the cutest thing ever for a little girl? Well, the cutest thing ever for a little boy.

It's the striped denim hat from one of my fave books ever, Itty-Bitty Hats (it's the inside of the white denim hat with dots pictured in the book). It hasn't been washed yet, so it's still a little long, but it is such a handsome hat!

These are both gifts (overdue gifts!) and are likely to be my last little projects for a while. After 5 months of the limited time and even more limited energy of new mommy-dom, it's time to make something adult sized again. Yup, the vacation's over.

can you find the daisy hat in the middle of all those legos?

I spent the entire afternoon with the boys working on our "structions". They picked out their biggest lego sets to work on and I had my itty bitty hats book.

how to make a car suspension

how to make a wheel assembly for a helicopter

how to make petals for a daisy hat

While the boys built a car and a giant helicopter, I mananged to make all the petals and sew them to the top of the upside-down daisy hat. The boys were actually watching my progress, asking how I was putting the petals on. They were really interested! And they thought it was so cool that I was following 'structions just like they were.

And here's bear/dog with the finished hat!

It came out super cute (despite the fact that my gauge must be a little different from the desired gauge in the book and I could only fit five petals on the top instead of six), but I think it still looks just like a daisy! This may be my favorite of all the hats I've made so far. Of course, I can't really see all the hats I've knit, since baby's stuff is all piled up in a heap in our bedroom. Next week we'll finally be setting up baby's room. And then I promise a pic of all the hats and all the booties all together!

I couldn't help starting another Itty-Bitty Hat! This time it was the cotton stria hat.

I dug up all the tiny little scraps that I had leftover from Johanna's circle of friends blanket and jumped right in. Each of my scraps was good for only about two rounds in the hat, so I had A LOT of ends to weave in at the end, but it felt so cool to actually make something useful out of those tiny bits.

Dani had some aqua and orange and hot pink leftovers for me to throw in to the mix and the result is so adorably stripey, I can barely stand it!

And speaking of Dani, she was so inspired by all those cotton stria colors that she created a new sock yarn colorway for Sunshine Yarns based on them.

I think she's putting some of it up for sale in her store tomorrow! I grabbed a skein right off the production line, so to speak, for booties to match the hat. How perfect!

This was the subject line in some junk mail I got this morning. I like to read them out loud (they always sound better out loud) and then say "Yes!" "Absolutely!" "Just what I wanted!" right before I delete them.

But this marshmallow bonnet with the pink squiggles is the real deal. "Yes, absolutely, just what I wanted!" Why didn't I put the squiggles on in the first place??

The pink is left over from the bee's knees sweater (I'm making use of all those color sequence repeats I had to wind off to get the pieces to match). I'm so excited about how good it looks with the peachy/pink ribbon from the großmutter sweater. I really think this hat will work well with both sweaters. Which means that I can move on to the next page in the book and make a different hat.

"Yes!" "Absolutely!" "Just what I wanted!"

I spent the night before Christmas Eve braiding ties (wow, that took a long time!) so Santa could put the nosewarmers under the tree for Christmas morning.

click here for the video! (Windows Media file should work on Internet Explorer
or try this link for Real Media version or this link for Quick Time version)

And I even got a little something knitty for Christmas! Hubby (with the help of knitbuddy, Dani) got me the Itty-Bitty Hats book (something I've picked up and considered buying for myself a dozen times) along with yarn to make the little striped cherry-o hat. So I did.

I started it while playing board games with the boys (which I can do virtually hands free, 'cause when we're playing Mousetrap the boys always want to do all the building, plus they like to move the all pieces themselves, and S built a lego die roller with his Christmas legos that spits the die out of it's mouth to roll it!). And then I relaxed in the evening (with a very excited wee one in my belly) by finishing off hat and cherries.

Hope your holiday was merry!