Projects!

Just as I say I'm transitioning into wedding blogging... I knit something!

My cousin is due this week - the first baby of the next generation in the family - and I used the occasion as an excuse to knit an oh so adorable Tomten.



The pattern is an Elizabeth Zimmerman classic. I have her book "Knitting Without Tears" and this is my first project from it.

I used some Shibui sock yarn in Peacock (I think that's the color) that had just not been working out as anything else. It clearly wanted to be this sweater, as it knit up nearly perfectly. The pooling you see on the arms is from the additional skein I had to buy to make it through the arms. Now I have enough leftovers to make a cute pair of booties. Probably not for this baby, but one of the other three that will be born in the next six months!

This patttern is fantastic, and pretty easy. No crazy shaping or stitches - it did take some imagination to figure out how to sew the arm seams to the underarms, but really, it just works.

The next project is not knitting, but making the backyard ready for a wedding (we're into the four week countdown!!). Right now, we're working with this:

While it's pretty green, the bed is full of weeds. We took out everything that was planted there, and nothing we planted grew! So, Roomie Liz and I bought a ton of flowers to plant in there:

Foxgloves, hydrangea (four different colors!), a gorgeous red rose bush (that might go in front actually) and a bunch of shade loving annuals.

I also have these to dress up the plain old fence with:

I'll post some "after" shots when it's all pulled together. Cross your fingers for big improvements!

What's Going On Here?

Something strange is happening... I can't quite make it out...

Oh! Hello there!

Would you believe I haven't knit a stitch since January, and today I whipped up one of these adorable little guys?

Well, it's true.

A combination of a crazy busy semester and my brain focusing on wedding things instead of knitting things led to a complete halt in all things knitting.* Until now. When I realized I have at least four pregnant friends, all of whom will soon have tiny little feet that need covering! (Well, that's not quite true- my friends' feet won't be shrinking, but my friends will soon have babies who have tiny little feet in need of covering.)

The semester is over, and I have one week of vacation before I start my summer job. I plan on making as many booties as possible in the next five days.

Ready, set, go-go-gadget-baby-booties.

*Ahem. Sorry for the four month lapse in blogging. If anyone is interested in wedding-related things that have nothing to do with knitting or baking, speak up in the comments and perhaps something can be arranged that would involve posting at a more frequent interval. ;-)

Knitting: Go!

I've been so delinquent in my blogging! I truly apologize. Fall is here, and I've been knitting.

First, the cable aran. I finished both sleeves last night (debate knitting) and am about to pick up the stitches for the neck. Then, it's just finishing!

This isn't the world's most illustrative photo, but I think it shows one important thing: it fits! I think the rolling hem makes it a leeetle too short, but hopefully a good blocking will correct that. I also didn't do the maths to place my waist shaping exactly where my waist is, but at least it isn't an entirely shapeless sweater.

Next, gift knitting!

I sent these out last week, so hopefully they have arrived.

My friend Damaris (check out her awesome cooking blog, Kitchen Corners) asked for a cupcake toy for her two year old back in the beginning of the summer. I finally sat down and cranked this baby out two weeks ago. Red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting and a cherry on top. Yum!

The booties are good luck booties, as Damaris wants a baby girl when she gets pregnant again.

Funny story: one of my professors has granted me permission to knit in class. The day I brought in the booties was the day we were discussion gender nonconformity and transgender legal issues. I felt so conspicuous, knitting highly gender-conforming and gender-stereotype-enforcing bright pink baby booties. However, hopefully that class just infused the booties withe kick-ass gender nonconformity vibes and the (as yet still wholly potential) baby will wear them, no matter its gender, and will grow up in a gender equal society.

Here's hoping, anyway!

J'ai finis!

Two things: baby booties (just in time- the baby is 9 days old today!) and my first year of law school! Wooohooo! The baby booties are way cuter than law school, so let's cut straight to the chase.

I got the buttons from Bolt, a fabric store in NE Portland. I love them. I hope Allison and her baby Evan love them, too!

The buttons stirred up a bit of controversy in the "boys-don't-wear-pink" crowd, but I think two things: Number One. Who cares? Babies will not be harmed by the color of button they wear. I promise. Number Two. Marching Elephants! Every baby should be adorned in marching elephants. All babies are cute, and all babies deserve cute buttons.

The pattern is Saartje's Bootees (pdf), an incredibly popular pattern. I'm not the world's biggest garter stitch fan, but it's a stretchy stitch, which is good for growing baby feet.

The yarn is Hazel Knits Artisan Sock in Beach Glass, leftover from my Embossed Leaves.

I've also been working on my Knitting Law Students Summer Knit-along project, the Mrs. Darcy sweater. I'm calling mine the "Eliza Bennett" because she's not ever called Mrs. Darcy in the book (I don't think) or in the amazing BBC version, just in the Keira Knightley version, which was not that great. So, Eliza Bennett it is!

This is the back.

I know a black wool sweater doesn't seem like a very summery thing to knit, but I'll be working in an air-conditioned office, starting Wednesday, and my current black cardigan is getting quite ratty.

Group Knitting

Last night I went to my first ever knitting meet up. It was at a great LYS- I didn't get a chance to look around the store much, but the sheer quantity of yarn was excellent. About 20 people showed up, and as far as I could tell they all knittogether a lot. Everyone was chatty and very familiar with each other. There was free champagne, which was an excellent bonus. (I didn't bring my camera- the photo is from thier website.)

I got a repeat and a half done on Lelah, and finished the first ball of yarn. I only got 3.25" out of it, so it's going to be very close. Five balls of yarn gets me 16.25", which goes from my hips to my shoulder, so I'm crossing my fingers I'll have enough. I'm toying with ideas about adding in a stripe of white cotton (from my stash) at the eyelet rounds, then using a green ribbon.

Speaking of my stash, I organized it the other day. I took all the random balls out of the box and shopping bag we moved them in, put them in labeled ziploc bags, and then into this beautiful cedar chest my great-grandfather made for me when I was born. I even weighed them all, so know how much I have, since none of them have bands anymore (i inherited most of the stash in college). It's a lot of acrylic, so I'm thinking more and moreof learning crochet so I can make a ripple afghan.

And, baby Faust's booties arrived and he is a studly stud, sporting them all over Germany!

You can tell in the picture that my grafting at the bottom of the foot left a bit of a ridge, but luckily he won't be walking until he grows out of these!

Zwei beutes!

I finished the booties- and just in time! Little baby Faust was born June 29. Perhaps by the time these arrive in Germany, his little feet will be big enough to fit. I don't think I'm going to get the hat in this package, because I don't trust myself to get the hat knit in a timely manner.

Pattern: Circular "seamless" Bootee that I found on Ravelry
Yarn: Reynolds Utopia Sport, in 2131. (Pulled from the stash- last used for a sweater-coat I made 4 years ago)
Needles: Good ol' Brittany US 2s in white birch
Notes: I initially thought there was a mistake in the pattern, but I realized on the second bootie that I just can't read correctly. But the mistake blends in- a little blip in the garter stitch, but no big deal. I like how cute these are, and I love the color of the yarn. It's ok that it's 100% acrylic, because it's soft, and is machine washable. The pattern calls for an optional ribbon / icord to thread through the eyelets, but I'm going to let that pass. I really like letting the lace be it's own decoration. My only bone to pick with the pattern is that these are called seamless, and I don't think any pattern that usees a Kitchener stitch finish can really be called seamless. That might be knit-picky, but I think that Kitchener is harder than seaming. I am quite proud of my garter Kitchener, though. It's much nicer than my Kitchener when I'm joining two pieces in Stockingette. I might make these again, but I think I prefer the booties I made for the first baby-of-a-friend, out of a vintage pattern book my mom gave me.

In other news, I was able to work on the Chevron Socks today. We went down to one of the old mining towns around here for the 4th of July "parade", family picnic, and town band concert. I put parade in quotations because it consisted of several small groups of people, sporadically walking down the street. Most were dressed in red, white and blue. There were also kids riding bikes & scooters with approriately colored streamers. The highlight was the end, though. A rowdy group of biker/woodsmen (the cockroaches and earwigs of the area, as Mike's mom refers to them), having imbibed throughout the hot hot morning, carried an enormous American flag down the street, stopping every 50 steps to shout the Pledge of Allegiance. Special accent was placed on the "under God" bit. Oh, Amer-ka.

I was a bit apprehensive about it, both for the heat and the family politics of it, but I wore a t-shirt I got from an anti-war artist's collective that says "We will not be silent" in English and Arabic. (Initially coined by Germans to protest Nazi treatment of Jews and others, and now used to protest the war, Abu Ghraib, Bush in general, Guantanamo, etc, etc, etc.) I was more worried about the Arabic script than anything else, but maybe I have too little faith in rural Americans.

All in all, it was a lovely July 4, even though it was over 100 degrees and there will be no fireworks because of the forest fire danger.

You Say It's Your Birthday?

It's mine! Well, yesterday. I'm now solidly into my twenties, at the grand old age of 24.

We went to the beach, north of Bodega Bay. There was much kite flying, grilling of fish and fresh organic veggies, and playing of Mancala. No photos, because we forgot our camera. No photos of our trip to Portland or through Redwoods National Park, either. Sorry.

But you don't care about any of that anyways, do you? Let's get to the knitting.

First presents!

From Mike's mom, a copy of Law School Confidential, the crucial book for 1L law students, I'm told. A rolling pizza cutter, to supplement the pizza stones I got for Christmas (I say stones, plural, because both Mike's mom and his dad got me pizza stones! I also have one of those long, rocking pizza cutters. Good thing I love to make pizza!)

And, some amazing knitting ribbon, that I have been lusting after since seeing it on someone else's blog. Those are the only visual presents, as my own mom is buying me health insurance until I get into school (thanks Mom!) and that is just not very photogenic.

Ok, now we can talk about knitting.

One sock, two socks.

Old sock, new sock.
Big sock, little sock.


I've gotten quite far on the second Chevron Sock. I think the reason I'm not a car knitter is due to the poor shocks on Mike's truck. In the giant van with the smooth ride, I knit almost a whole sock! In the truck, I can hardly knit two rows. At least on US 0s. I started the short row heel and the bumps just got too much.

So, I cast on something new! I recently found out that an old friend of mine both got married and had a baby in the past week or so. (She lives in Germany and I haven't seen her - or talked to her, for that matter - in about four years, so that explains how the baby could be a surprise). I got her address and am going to make her some baby booties. Also, probably this hat (Deb- no cheating!) I said I wanted to make one for the next person I know to have a baby, and Deb is the winner!

The booties are a pattern I found on Ravelry- a seamless bootie knit in the round. The pattern calls for a ribbon or i-cord to go through the eyelets at the ankle. Some sort of tie is probably necessary to hold the booties onto a squirmy baby's feet, so I'll probably go with an i-cord. After US 0s for so long, these booties on US 2s are a breeze! I can't wait to get to something on needles that are bigger than toothpicks! I think the only thing holding me back at this point is money. I just can't afford yarn.

What I can afford is flour. And I can turn that into delicious shortcakes (my grandmother's recipe). These will probably be dinner tonight, supplementing an entire flat of organic strawberries from County Line Harvest in Petaluma, CA, where a friend is working. She also gave us a few bunches of basil, mint, and thyme, so maybe these shortcakes will accompany some sort of pasta-pesto dish.

Baby Time

I wish more of my friends were having babies! I see all these cute baby patterns for hats and sweaters and booties... and I only know one couple with a baby. And they live in Hawaii, and hence have no use for sweaters. Maybe they can find a use for this, though...



There are a LOT of cute babies in Berkeley. Many of them come into the bakery and press their little faces up against the glass of the counter, staring at the cookies. None of them bother with the croissants or danish or brownies- no, just the cookies. And I'm not talking about the small, drop cookies, or the oatmeal raisin or sunflower sesame cookies their parents point out to them. No, these children demand the Tollhouse, which is often bigger than their head.

It's been suggested that we should make an adult-version of the Tollhouse in relation to children. That is, a Tollhouse cookie that would be larger than an adult's head. Can you imagine eating that? I can't.

UPDATE: I'm still figuring out this whole Blogger thing. The first time I labelled this post, I labelled it "Baking babies" instead of "Baking" and "Babies". Woops!