Marching

This is March to me: mostly shadows, a little sun.  Not quite spring, but getting there.

In March, I suppose we should be looking toward shedding winter gear, but the hat I just needed to finish is finished.





















For now, we're calling this particular model the Monsters, Inc. Cap, but the "pattern" is called Tweedish because that's just how it looks to me.  I'm planning to write up a tutorial one of these days, because it's kind of a cool technique, and a good way to use up scraps of different yarns.

Interest really started to develop when I got out the pompon maker,





















in an effort to work a little bit during playtime, and it actually went pretty well.  I am now a devotee of this tool (I actually bought a bunch of sizes with coupons and another project in mind), and once we noticed that the colors matched favorite characters Mike & Sulley,
















he's barely taken it off.































These blocks are for ASB--mailed off to the UK this afternoon.  Very springy, even if the weather's not.  This quilt is going to be gorgeous.

I am a Godmother

Again, actually.  I'm guessing that two will be my limit, but the two I have are darling so I'm OK with that.

I finished the blanket.  Just in time.  Wove in the ends this morning.

It wasn't a gift for the baptism, but today was the right day to give it.

I am 80% pleased with it.  Blocking certainly helped it along, and I think it would have benefited from another round, but see above.  There's a sort of unintentional wonkiness to it that I don't adore, but it's soft and warm and cozy, which is all a baby cares about, I suppose.

I decided to crochet the panels together, because Jared Flood knows everything, and I think I'm pleased with the result.  Unlike his gorgeous blanket, I think there's definitely a wrong side, but the other seaming options I tried just weren't cutting it--plus the stretching Jared talks about was a real concern here.  The border is four rows of garter stitch, which necessitated weaving in eight ends instead of two (knitters, if you think about it, you'll know why), but I just wasn't sure I'd have enough yarn to do five.  Of course, I have an entire small ball left--always the way.

I had planned to make his actual baptism gift, but am trying to be more realistic about my to-do lists and decided that something handmade by someone else would be lovely and just fine.  I wanted it to be traditional but not stodgy,

and I think this qualifies.  It's from this wonderful, accommodating etsy seller, whom I would recommend in a heartbeat.  He basically worked his tail off to make sure I'd have it in time (because who doesn't order an important gift on Thanksgiving when the event is a week away?).

 The air was cold, the kids were cheerful, and the church was gorgeous.

A beautiful day for a baptism.

for baby ben

Our neighbor and friend just had a baby boy, and as soon as he was born (so I knew the sex and the name), I got started on this:

and this:

We had a beautiful day yesterday, so I was able to get outside for some photos (unlike last week when I had to take every picture indoors since the sun was always hiding!).  We were also able to get the Christmas lights on the bushes...which is a good thing since weatherwise, it's apparently all downhill from here.

One more day for the giveaway!

making progress

Well, I didn't quite finish the entire thing...but I did do all the knitting and start the blocking, which I'd say is pretty good for someone who's just finally over a nine-day stay from the swine cold (I never had a fever, but apparently this is possible?).  This is my first time blocking a knit (embarrassing to admit, but there, I said it!) and I have to say that I'm really enjoying it.  The blanket's visual success depends, I think, on corners as perfect as I can get them, and with so many knitters making the individual panels, some coaxing was required to get everything to match up.  I'm about a third of the way there (maybe some sort of faux pas in blocking? but such is life with a preschooler) and am really excited to see the difference the process will have made.

Back on task.

Another item from my November to-do list was that leaf wreath...which I contemplated giving up on till next year, because (did everyone know this but me?) the leaves are about finished falling before November even starts.  I have a door decoration for Halloween so I figured I'd wait till that was finished...but the leaves were mostly crackly and dirty and faded.  We made the best of it, and of the glorious day, by taking a family leaf collection walk yesterday, made all the more official by the fact that we were accompanied by a zookeeper who started out reluctant but took the "leaf collection" very seriously by the end.

I felt a little odd just walking up to people's parkways and taking their leaves, but nobody seemed to mind and I even met a new-to-me neighbor who asked me to please take them all. :)  It was actually kind of a rush to see a big pile of fresh-looking leaves (ooh! an apartment building!  They don't rake!) and then scurry over and bag as many as I could.

I ended up needing to make a repeat leaf run because, as Mollie mentioned, this thing took a lot of leaves.  I made the frame as suggested by Britt on her post at Infarrantly Creative, and then just started threading 'em on there.  What gave me the most bang for my leaves was using the taped sections for the sides, since the tape kept the leaves from falling and clumping at the bottom.  I actually added some extra tape at intervals along the sides and then again on the corners. 

We went to JoAnn's last night for some ribbon, but the line was way too long, so I went with this orange satin ribbon from a grab bag I bought a while back (best investment ever!).  Not my favorite, but for this year, it will be just fine.  Once I had it hung, I trimmed the stems, and it was finished. 

 Next year: brighter, fresher leaves...and maybe I'll splurge on the fancy ribbon.

a pleasant surprise

You know how there's that person who will always volunteer to coordinate /run/organize something? That's me.

My oldest friend (really! I've known her since birth!) had her second baby in July. Her mom is my Godmother, and I'm to be the Godmother of this too-cute babe (make sense?)...definitely an honor. Theo's mom is a knitter, so her sister-in-law hosted a sip 'n stitch before he was born and asked me if I'd be willing to teach newbies how to knit. Sure. Could I help choose a project, so we weren't all just sitting around knitting for no reason? Sure. After lots of thinking, I finally remembered this beautiful blanket (check out all the awesome finished versions on Ravelry!).

Seemed perfect, since most of the pieces weren't huge, we could assign the biggest ones to people with experience, etc. More emailing ensues, we settle on this yarn to go with the baby's beautiful nursery, spreadsheets are constructed, I wind 14 balls of yarn, no problem--I can finish whatever the guests don't, it won't be much--we have the party, and...nobody really loves knitting.

Which leaves us (the knitters--there were five of us, and I think one other person who liked it enough to finish a rectangle) with lots and lots of garter stitch.

A couple of months later, Theo's mom brings me a bunch of the finished pieces. And there are still five left for me to do, plus I'm the one who's going to seam it all (party time!) and knit the edging.

Responsibly, I set it aside for Far Too Long.

Guilt creeps up on me. The baptism is approaching, and I really have to have it finished by then, plus I've got his gift to make. I've been plodding along on one of my pieces, but am imagining a really lot left to go. So today, full of dread, I pull it all out of the bag.

And...it's not that bad! I discovered in laying out the blocks we have that my knitting must be really loose, so a piece I thought would fill one spot can actually (miraculously!) take the place of the biggest piece, and like dominoes falling, the whole thing all of a sudden seems pretty manageable.

When this kind of thing happens to me, I get in a mood...I want to finish this thing THIS WEEKEND. We'll see if I can pull it off.

a special kind of solitude

Which for me, actually, comes in a very public place.

I love me a train ride.


Not sure I would really love a train commute, but my once-in-a-while suits me just perfectly.  Maybe because I'm wearing something a little more interesting than usual.  Maybe because I'm guaranteed a little bit of quiet time.  Maybe just because it means I'm going into the city (miss living there, kind of), and am about to do something fun (like this time, which turned out to be a great dinner followed by my best experience in a theater, ever). 

But no matter where I'm headed, I think I might look forward to the train ride the most.

There are train ride rituals: a snack, some (audio and in this case kind of gratuitous) reading, some knitting, and some being alone.  I always bring a notebook, planning to make lists and draw craft ideas, but usually don't get to it...just having it along is what's important.

This trip, I finished (finally!) the first knitting project on my kind-of-long list.  Cast off ten minutes before I got off the train, and thought dropping the stitches would take a couple of minutes (don't stitches seem to drop in an instant when you don't want them to?)--just kidding, took me the whole train ride home too.  No matter, it's delivered now.

 I love it.  I hope my mom loves it too.

It's Monday...

and what a glorious weekend it was, seeing a terrific friend for the first time in years and meeting her little one.

Perhaps glorious is the wrong word, since rain was a heavy player, but at least it was a gentle rain (which is kind of like saying it's a dry heat...). 

There was sand,

and tic tac toe,

and running,

and searching for ducks...

and we even brought bread, but they were quacking somewhere else that morning.

Today, the weather's not much more glorious around here (though yesterday truly was), and it really does feel like fall.  I have too many knitting projects going on right now, all for gifts, and all with "deadlines" approaching...none for a party or occasion, but they're kind of hanging over me nonetheless, so it's a good thing that it's fun to knit when it's dreary.

This afternoon, I've been working on this scarf {Rav link}for my mom and am realizing that I don't love really repetitive knitting.  Or maybe I don't love repetitive knitting on a deadline.  Anyway, the yarn is too gorgeous--I'm using the same colorway as was shown in the pattern--so that (along with the promise of dropped stitches at the end) makes it palatable.  I'm just about halfway there, with a month until delivery.

Tomorrow, I want to talk pizza.