rainbow rasta baby

So i made another version of the Baby Sophisticate cardigan, this time for my baby. I'll admit that i bought the wool before i found out that it's a boy....but he can still wear rainbows right??
It's perhaps not the most masculine of cardigan colours but he'll just have to embrace his flamboyant side and wear it, now that i've bothered to make it.
I did have some beautiful orange heart-shaped buttons but i vetoed those in favour of the slightly less girly rainbow round buttons. I can't help loving this cardigan, so it will definitely be worn!
Ah the lure of rainbows...i just can't resist!

ruby "button" slippers

So for Poog's impending bambino/a, i made a cute little pair of strappy slippers at her request. The pattern was extremely easy to follow and is available as a free ravelry download here. If only shoes were so quick and easy to make in larger sizes.....
Well for reasons related to the theme of this post i'm going to be taking a little blog-holiday for the month of August. Due to various health-related issues I won't have any opportunity for crafting or posting this coming month so i'm allowing myself the luxury of a month off. It also allows me to redress the balance of 10 posts per month since I posted 20 posts in March 2009 and the uneven numbers have been annoying me ever since (yeah i know i'm a little weird and obviously have nothing more important to be annoyed about!! - but i hate uneven numbers!!)

So i'll see you in September! xxx

freecycle find!

So the first i heard of the website freecycle was when my brother-in-law emailed me to say:

(him) -"hey there's someone on the internet giving away a big box of hand-dyed cotton and silk pieces, woven silk yarn and a tin of vintage buttons for free to a good home...you want me to get it for you?"

(me)-"umm..(shaking my head in disbelief)...are you serious??? GET ME THAT BOX!!!"

Yep it was for real, on the website people give away stuff for free, you just have to go pick it up! I swung by the girl's house on the way home from work and picked up a treasure trove of hand dyed amazingness....apparently she was a professional fabric artist that was doing some spring cleaning. Some of the prices were still on the pieces...and they were expensive!! Wow, i couldn't believe that i'd just got the whole lot for nothing! Crazy!

So anyway - at the bottom of the box i found a skein of silk yarn, made from recycled indian saris. I made a simple cowl that i know i'll get a lot of wear out of! (81 stitches on 15mm needles, knit1, pearl1, then knit all the pearls and pearl all the knits. UK - moss stitch and US - seed stitch) In these pics it looks a little like something i picked up on the beach - i think it maybe does look a lot better in real life! lol!
All the little fluffy ends are so smooth and silky...i love it!

baby garden cardy

So i knitted another of the Baby Sophisticate cardigans - they're so quick and easy! I decided this time to make a girlier version in case "tot", poog's future bambino turns out to be a bambina if you get what i'm saying. And while i'm against blue being reserved for boy babies and pink being reserved for girls (although...pink on a little boy baby, maybe is a bit weird...) it seems that the practice is so widespread that you'll have to constantly be correcting people-

-"o what a lovely little boy, he'll be so handsome - he's going to look just like your husband "
-..."umm actually, i hope SHE doesn't!"

I made the cardy with short sleeves this time as i thought it might be cute to see little fat baby-arms sticking out, and it would look so cute with a wee green and yellow stripey onsie!
ps sorry about the dodgy colour balance, the sun just came out with a vengeance as i started taking pics...typical!

knit dolls for Africa

so my wee mamma loves her little bit of craft too, but she usually does her crafting for good causes, while i tend to do it all for meeeeeee!!! One thing that she makes a lot of (i mean 100's of...) is the little knitting one-piece doll. These are given out to local children who come in contact with missionaries out working in mission hospitals across Africa. I saw for myself how well they are received in Zambia. Toys are scarce there and for those kids in hospital, many days walk from their villages, it can be pretty boring sitting around all day with nothing to play with.

Sorry about the colourless photo....her usual batches are much more fun colours....i might update this photo in the future if she can give me a better pic.

So mamma has very kindly passed on the pattern, which i've attached here, so you can have a go yourself. She can knock out a couple of these dolls in one evening so they are the perfect quick craft!

reindeer jumper..in ritardo!

So after seeing the previous baby cardy, poog asked me to make a reindeer jumper for "tot" who has yet to be born, but is accumulating a wardrobe already! I should specify that she asked me to make this at christmas and i've just managed to get around to it...so yeah, it's a little out of season....but with all the time spent on the Lady Grey and on making bridesmaid dresses for an upcoming family wedding (shiver of delight) i'm struggling a little to get my traditional 10 posts blogged for this month!
This is the Baby Sophisticate pattern by Linden Heflin again, just with the collar and cuffs done in a different colour and the body blocked using a reindeer pattern that i drafted. Download the reindeer and snowflake design pattern here.
Have a go, it's really quick and easy!! It makes perfect traffic-jam-craft!! (i should add that i only knit in traffic jams when i am a passenger, and not driving..i promise mum!)

cosy reindeer ears

So this is the second redition of the headband pattern...this time it's not squirrelly forests but reindeer forests.
To download the pattern and instructions click here! Go make one..they're really fun! One word of warning though...make sure you do a gauge test of your knitting tension...i changed the brand of wool i used for this one and even though it has less stitches than the other, it turned out larger!
yay! cosy ears!

scruffy scarf!

So i still had a bit of that chunky wool left over and felt like making something a bit more scruffy than the even coils of the previous cowl.

Using 15mm (19US) 24" circular needles and chunky wool, I just cast on 91 stitches and knitted in moss stitch (k1, p1, k1, p1....then next row: k the p's and p the k's)
I love how stretchy and squishy it is...it has a different shape everytime i put it on...
...but it's always just as cosy!!! I haven't taken it off since!

squirrelly forest

So you might remember the squirrelly mittens that I made last year. Well this year i decided that i wanted something to go with them!

A headband seemed like the perfect idea so I just manipulated the simple pattern to draft it into the right shape for a wide stripe. I apologise for the photo...i really should have ironed it before photographing!
It's a lovely easy pattern to do and I find it better than a woolly hat because it warms your ears without overheating your head! lol....although, maybe it's just me who hates that!

Anyway...have a go! It's really easy! To download the pattern and instructions click here.

michelin cowl?

So a super-simple knitting was my first project of the year, done mostly over the holidays while stuffing my face with chocolate. I used the extremely simple free pattern of the squishy snood on ravelry. Which is basically four rows of knit, 4 rows of pearl....and repeat until reach desired level of "squishy-ness"
Then when you coil it up round your neck it sits in lovely michelin-style rolls, which look great in snoods but not in waistlines!!

Sophisticated Baby!

Firstly...there is no deep meaning in the fact that i'm knitting baby clothes...i just like knitting but get bored of it too easily to make something big enough for me to wear. This is the Baby Sophisticate cardigan by Linden Heflin. See the pattern here. It really is a joy to knit...super-quick and very easy!
I feel like having a go in a reindeer / snowflake pattern..hmm

buttoned beanie

So i found a use for one of my big buttons anyway...i sewed it onto this quickie-hat that i rustled up a couple of weeks ago to try out a pattern. I crocheted the crown using some pointers from this post and then knitted a thick band to sew on, to give a bit of contrast. The band overlapped onto itself and needed a little brooch or button or something.
Gill road-tested it for me on our lovely skive-work-day", when all the females of the family took the day off and went for a fabulous coastal walk and big tasty lunch....may we have many more of them!!! Doesn't she look great?!...that's the excitement of avoiding work!

snuggly squirrel mittens!

Cold days!!!! New gloves, new gloves, NEW GLOVES!! These are cosy-tastic!!!Find the pattern on ravelry. Warning: the needle/wool combo is so fine that it might drive you mad, but perservere...you'll be delighted (and warm-handed) if you finish them!!

cosy cowl

Well the chilling winds continue on the little island of ireland so it was time for some fast craft to produce some kind of neck protection!!!

I found a pattern on ravelry but really i made so many little changes to it that i'm not going to bother linking to it. Basically, i cast on 45 stitches of mega chunky wool with 1mm needles and knitted rows in moss stitch (seed stitch in the US) until it measured 8.5". Twist the piece once and sew ends to secure. Easy-peasy and quick..uhhh...quick.....(less easy to rhyme something here)But it sure is cosy!!!

cold hands - pink hearts!

BrrrrrrRRRRrrrrr!!

O man, it is cold these days!...my fingerless gloves were really not cutting it. My fingers have started to die off...quite literally actually!!! The blood drains from them and i'm left with ghostly white, stiff little fingers!!

Time for mittens!!! I don't have a pattern so just drew the shape and then knitted it. It was about 34 stitches round and the thumb was 12 stitches round, and i have normal-small hands. I actually find knitting quite boring and was dying to finish them (took about 2 days of casual knitting the odd time i watched something on tv) but as soon as i'd finished i wanted to make a new pair with different shapes and colours...typical!I find normal gloves leave each finger dreadfully isolated so i needed to go old-school with a pair of kid-style-mittens (without the string to hold them on...although if i lose one the next pair will be on a string!!!)

I've been knittin' mittens!!

Yay finished the green mittens!!

The extent to which i "followed a pattern" on this occasion involved drawing round the hand of the intended recipient on a piece of paper and measuring up against it now and again while watching River Cottage on tv.


I had intended to go the pom-pom embellishment route but when she received a pair of pom-pom resplendent mittens before i got a chance to give her mine....i changed the plan and went for crochet roses instead!!