GuEsS what DaY it Is?

I have a brother named Mike, and it's all I can do not to call him up every Wednesday morning. 

    

 This was the view from my kitchen window this particular hUMp day.

 At least there's blue sky looking to the southwest.

 Which became widespread by 10 am.  It stayed in the 40s but the snow melted.

 This may not be exciting news where you live, but to us it's pretty big stuff.  The maple trees are budding!  I love how the red buds look against the blue sky.

I finally sent out another package to Nantucket.  I finished the yellow moss stitch jacket.  With the bunny buttons.   I almost left off the pompon until I saw it as a sort of "cottontail".

 Yes, I know the little ceramic bunny has a hole in the middle.  That's because it is actually a napkin ring. I bought a set last year from this website. And the little white crochet bootees?  These are so sweet, and I made them from a pattern I borrowed from Olga at her blog Lacy Crochet.  I have more pics of the bootees that I want to share, but I am consulting Olga first, which is in keeping with her wishes.  You see, she recently found her free patterns being stolen and sold on etsy!  She is continuing to share free patterns, because she's just that kind of a generous person, and she loves to share crochet projects with others who love crochet.

And I finally finished the bonnet to go with the Peek-a-Boo Sacque and Bootees.

I kept putting it off because I knew I really needed to practice bullion roses more before I tried to do them on the bonnet.  I used some tips and tricks from Jeannie Beaumeister at Old Fashioned Baby.  I attached the ribbon according to her recommendations (sort of), folding the end over and gathering it at about 3/4" in.  Then I embroidered the rose on it.  The ribbon I used was very ravelly and so I finished the cut ends with Dritz Fray Check, even the end I was folding over.  It didn't want to fold over,  I had to press it to get my point across.  I also cut one ribbon about 3" longer than the other so that it would come out relatively even if it were tied with the bow on baby's right side.

I've saved the best for last.

The precious baby for whom I have been fussing all this time.

 Here she is, the lovely Marie Rose!  These pictures are about a month old.  My brother is tormenting me by not sending me daily cell phone shots.  In the shot above, I believe she shows her mother's eyes and nose, but the chin is directly from her paternal grandfather (my Dad).  He had a distinct cleft; I have a bit of one too, more subtle. 

Mum and I have yet to see this roly-poly cutie pie.  Truth be told, we have been busy caring for someone who is ill, and unable to get away just yet.  I'm setting my sights on Mothers' Day.

I want to cuddle her, smell her, gaze at her, can you blame me?

Little Baby Bunny Buttons

These are some buttons I have been collecting for baby garments.  I bought the bunny buttons about 7 years ago, when I was knitting this precious little jacket.

I know, right?

I borrowed this pic from the Yarnspiration website which offers the free pattern here.  Well, the baby I was knitting for was really not someone I knew very well, and so, when I didn't finish before baby was born, it got forgotten, and I think I just sent a card.  And so it languished.....

Recently, I pulled out my stash of baby yarn and I rediscovered the jacket pieces, waiting to be seamed, edged, buttoned and pomponed.  (What?  That's not a word?)

After the picture was taken, I found the missing sleeve.  Whew!  But I didn't find it before nearly finishing a new one I was whipping out with the leftover yarn. 

Now, here's where you come in....What? you say, What have I got to do with it? No way am I seaming that thing!

No, no, no. I've finished the seaming, I'm working on the edging and I need to make a decision and I need your help.  It's all about the buttons!

Now, look again at the pic above;  I had originally chosen the bunny buttons for this sweet little jacket.  But another set I really like is the little green flower buttons.  I must really like them because on Tuesday, I stopped at JoAnn Fabrics in Auburn on my way home from Stratton, to take a look at, among other things, little baby buttons.  See what I found?

 See anything familiar?  Yup.  I'm consistent.  I bought the same buttons twice.

 Here they are in a lousy picture made lousier by my amateur editing, but the point is that I have such cute ribbons that could be laced through matching bootees to wear with the jacket, either the gingham or the dots.

And here are the bunny buttons:

And now a quick peek of other little goodies I'm sending to sweet little Marie Rose.



Awaiting blocking and ribbons..

And if you read this post, you'll understand why I had to get this little outfit.

P.S. Don't forget to leave a comment about which buttons look best....Thanks!!

Latest Projects, Part Two (and a teeny tiny announcement)

This is just a little beginning.  Poor Marie Rose has a Peek-a-Boo Sacque and Bootees, but no Bonnet to match!  And being a discriminating newborn, she no doubt wants her headwear to match her outfit.  I still haven't met her, but I hope to soon.  After all, it will be difficult to be Favorite Auntie if we don't get some bonding time in.

I am adapting another bonnet pattern to have the same stitch pattern as the Sacque and Bootees, and while this is relatively simple, it has its little challenges as well.

The real news is:

The Chiloquin Mani-Mitts are done!  I finished the right mani-mitt and decided that I had not only done it a little differently than the left one, but I had done it better.  So I had to take apart the left one, unravel almost half of it, and do it over!  I think it fits better now.  I was about to wrap them and send them on their way to Chiloquin, but guess what?  A.C. from Chiloquin is on her way here.  So much the better!  I look forward to a hug and a visit. 

 How cute is that little pincushion in the upper right hand corner?  It is vintage, and a homemade  craft.  Inside is a tin can of some sort, like tuna fish, maybe.  The lace edging is soft, like cotton, not stiff and scratchy, like the yucky nylon stuff you find now.  The bottom is covered with a round piece whip-stitched on by hand with neat, little stitches.

Well, now my teeny, tiny little announcement.  I am going to post the patterns I adapt on their own page. (See the tab above.)  In case anyone wants to give something they see here a try.  They will, of course be free, since I am entirely amateur, have no test-knitters or test-crocheters, and have no experience writing a pattern.  That being said, I will do my best, and welcome questions and critiques, deal?

Latest Projects, Part One

I have already missed 3 birthdays in early March.  Fortunately, everyone who knows and (presumably) loves me expects that.  I think I am going to sit down and make a simple little pair of handwarmers (wristwarmers/fingerless mitts/fingerless gloves?).

Aside:   Does anyone volunteer a neologism to make talking about this category of handwear easier?  We should have a contest....I'm entering "Mani-Mitts".  I just have to sell the idea on Ravelry to make pattern searches easier.)

So, one evening with a couple of hours of classic movie-watching ahead of me, I assess patterns on Ravelry, pick one that has the look I want, the weight of yarn I want to use, and beginning swatching the stitch pattern.  Before I know it, the movie is over, I have ripped out a few swatches, perhaps chosen another pattern, perhaps changed my yarn, googled some technical question on crochet, watched a YouTube video on "how to.....", sketched out some kind of stitch diagram, convinced myself that the pattern-writer's math is right/wrong.  Like Thomas Edison, I now know 200 materials that will not function as a light bulb filament, and I am sitting (figuratively) in the dark.  For the next few days I obsess, refine what I want, and make and rip out what is slowly becoming a prototype of an item which no longer resembles any of the patterns I consulted (except vaguely), and I have done enough groundwork to re-invent the wheel.  Side-tracked much?

This is what I ended up with.  One (so far) Chiloquin Mani-Mitt.  The giftee will know why I'm calling them Chiloquin. (Because that's where she's from and I like the name.)

As it stands now, I am about halfway done making the right mitt. That should only take me about 2 more hours, since I can just do it; all the thinking through is (mostly) done.  Whew!

But in all fairness, I want to acknowledge that my inspiration that got me started was Wendy Cozby's Pattern, which I found on Ravelry called Crochet Hand/Wrist Warmer.

The yarn is a little more green.  It is Lion Brand Wool-Ease in Seaspray.

And now, there are two more birthdays to catch up with.  And the April birthdays to get started with.

(That yarn is also Lion Brand Wool-Ease.)

*****************************************************

On another note, this is the view out my kitchen window.  Reminders of warmer weather.  Swings in the back, lacrosse net for shooting practice (on the right), fire pit in the foreground.

The picket fence on the left encloses the neighbor's back yard around the corner from our house.  The Y-shaped craggy tree at the end of the fence is an apple tree, one of the few left from when the neighbor's house was the only one around, and my yard was part of a saltwater farm apple orchard. (See pics of the farmhouse and barn and backyard in pics 11-13 of this post.)

This view shows a closer look of the apple tree and behind it, those golden shrub-sticks looking all barren will be forsythia!  I am reminded of this because I saw some forsythia blooming in the house of another blogger (in a warmer climate, obviously).  A few days ago, I saw and heard the most brilliant cardinal perched in the branches of the forsythia.  He's been singing his heart out the last few days, no doubt trying to find a lady love.  If Spring eeever gets here, I will get a good pic of that forsythia stand and share it here, (about the time the rest of you have moved on to the bloom of your roses, hydrangea, peonies, etc.).

Like I needed more fabric in my stash....

 

I stopped at Marden's  on my way home from church yesterday afternoon. 

It is a chain of stores here in Maine, which stocks surplus and salvage goods:  clothing, some furniture, dry (boxed, bottled and canned) foods, home décor, small appliances, you name it, you never know what will be in stock this week.  And the prices are deeply discounted. It's kind of like a treasure hunt, and you can spend more time than you intend to...  I went in to rummage through discontinued yarn.  They always have a lot of yarn, but I tend to forget to check there.  Yesterday, it occurred that since I am lamenting that Bernat is no longer offering their light-fingering-weight baby yarn, that maybe Marden's would have some.  Nope.  They had less yarn than I have seen there before, and can you believe it?  I didn't buy a single skein of what they did have.  Nothing appealed to me.  There were lots of novelty yarns, the type whose mere existence irritates me.  I don't believe it deserves to be offered up as "yarn".  It should be called "wacky craft goods" or something.  How many uses can you dream up for something with dyed rabbit fur puff-balls worked in at periodic intervals?  Unless you have the "fashion" inclinations of say, Lady Gaga or Helena Bonham-Carter.  I hope I'm not offending you, but I think you've probably surmised that my fashion sense is solidly conservative and old-fashioned.  Avant-garde for me is to wear something that is both boldly-patterned and brightly-colored.  Wearing white slacks or shoes before Memorial Day and after Labor Day makes me feel devil-may-care. 

I consoled myself in the fabric department.  They were selling remnants @ 50% off.  Most were in the 1-2 yard range.  Hmmm....just right for making baby clothes.  I am also quite conservative when it comes to baby clothes.  I agree with Michie' (see her gorgeous blog), who opined in one of her posts that she didn't like the clothing to overwhelm the baby.  I don't care for prints to be loud or large or busy.  I love color, but I like it to be soft, and often, pastel.

 I like the trend of using more "muddy" or muted colors.  (Have you seen how Alicia dresses Mimi?  Brava!)  I love simplicity of form, but with judicious touches of detail, like embroidery, tiny bits of piping, and definitely tucks and smocking.  Oh, and fabric-covered buttons on a simple sweater, yummmmm....
For the special-occasion, heirloom type things, you can't beat Michie' or Jeannie Baumeister.

You can see that I found some fabrics I can embrace...they are mostly plain-weave cottons, like for quilting, but I was pretty picky to stick with things that were smooth and soft.  The peachy-pink solid is a fine-wale corduroy.  The one to its right is the palest gingham I've ever seen, you almost can't tell it's gingham---it seems to be like...ramie (remember that stuff?)  and it's very sheer, so will likely do best with a batiste lining (as it isn't as silky as you'd like next to a little'un's skin).    Some of them feel a little like lawn (the posy pinky one on the left above), and one (blue flowers on white in the first picture) has a twill weave and is brushed like flannel.  The little packages of buttons were 2 for a dollar.
Now I need some patterns!

Finally Finished!

Oh, I can't believe how long it took me to get these things finished!  I'm afraid Marie Rose will have outgrown them, and then they'll only be useful to her as doll clothes.

 The little sweater, or sacque, as it is called, is called the Peek-a-Boo Sacque.  I found the pattern on Ravelry, which linked me to a website generously offering vintage baby garment knitting and crochet patterns.  (Win!)  Many of the patterns are available in matching sets of garments, but this one was a stand-alone.

 I had to devise a coordinating pattern for the booties.  I adapted and modified another vintage bootie pattern.

 I'm mostly happy with the result.  I'm working on a matching bonnet now, but dared not wait to get these out the door.  Details on my Ravelry page.