Ready to ride

Tomorrow afternoon we will hit the road, headed for vacation time with family. You can rest assured that I have my priorities straight. In packing, first things came first:


Here are the contents of my knitting bag, ready for at least 400 miles of fun. (The trip is 800 and if My Old Man and I split the driving equally, that means at least 6 hours of knit time for me). As you can see, I'm overly optimistic about how much of Cozy I can get done on the drive - I've put all the skeins of Mandalay in my bag because I can't risk running out en route.

And in case I tire of Cozy, I've got my Simply Lovely Lace Sock (pattern in IK Spring 2006) ready to do back-up.



But I can't leave for 2 1/2 weeks with only my knitting bag. So here is a little suitcase I've packed, with extra yarn, needles, and patterns. Believe me when I say I placed severe limits on myself in packing this. I'm only bringing 2 skeins of the Lamb's Pride for the cardigan, when I really wanted to bring all 6 (but even I'm not that unrealistic). And I took out the three balls of Manos cotton that I thought I might make a Log Cabin square from. In addition to the Lamb's Pride, I limited myself to the rest of the yarn for the Simply Lovely Lace Socks, the JaggerSpun Zepphyr for the Peace Shawl, the Lorna's Laces Worsted, some Bernat Cottontots in case I decide Baby J needs one more little hat, and a skein of bamboo for a headband. Plus almost every needle I own. Do you think this will be enough?

And for those of you keeping a tally at home, here's something you can add to the list of things I suck at: embroidery.

Here's my Wee Wonderful bear. It only took me a day to put him (her?) together. But it took me a week to get the face on, and the eyes are all wonky and I'm going to have to take the nose off and reattach it along with at least one eye. Am hoping Baby J doesn't mind too much. My boys are crazy about him/her. I have all the pieces cut out to make them each a cat, which I had hoped to do before we left tomorrow. Think I'll stay up and do it?
Stay tuned....

Taking the whole "earthy" thing a little far...

Amazing Lace Challenge #5: Where's Waldo?
In honor of that slightly crazed I-see-lace-everywhere mental state that’s a symptom of obsessive lace knitting, your challenge is to post one photo on your blog in which your lace is a hidden or unexpected part of the picture.

As earthchick ponders her wardrobe, she realizes it lacks a certain something.
Color.

Perhaps she should've chosen to knit Cozy (pictured far left) in something other than an earthtone.

Yarnmail!

Monday was yarnmail day here, so now I'm stocked before I leave on vacation. In the back is six skeins of Lamb's Pride Bulky in Spice. I am so thrilled with the color. I had a really hard time choosing from among all the beautiful red options on the color card. I finally went with this deep, rich red and it is perfect. This is for my SweaterBabe Lace Cardigan (I'd provide a link, but the site seems to be down this morning).

Next is a skein of Lorna's Laces in Chocolate. Since I was already ordering the Lamb's Pride from Kaleidoscope Yarns (one of my favorite online yarn sources), I decided to throw in one more purchase. This will make some yummy basic fall socks for your truly. [What ever happened to the Simply Lovely Lace Socks, you ask? Those are still on the needles and I still plan to finish them in time to wear them at least once this summer. I just haven't made any progress ever since I started really getting going on Cozy.]

Finally, in the front is brand new territory for me - real lace yarn. This is JaggerSpun Zepphyr, which I ordered from Bo Peep's Wool Shop. It's for making this shawl, again for myself (you know, Summer of Selfish Knitting and all). Ambitious much? Why yes, yes I am.


Yarn acquisition isn't the only thing going on around here. There's been a little knitting, too. Just a little, because we're frantically trying to get ready for our vacation. Still, I'm making steady, unfrogged progress. 23 inches done on Cozy - that's 1/3 finished!













Finally, I want to say a big thank you for your very sweet comments about my 100 Things. It was with not a little trepidation that I posted all that stuff, so it was extra-nice to get kind comments. Thank you!

A little sewing

It has been almost a month since our niece HK turned 24. Here is the homemade part of her belated birthday gift.



Hooray for Headbands headband from Heather Bailey. A sweet, simple little summery project (but don't look too closely at my pic or you will see that all my details are sloppy). This was a great project for a beginner like me.




And a little tote bag from (*gasp*) Sew Fast, Sew Easy. As a knitter, I should be ashamed of myself. But I bought this book before I really was a knitter, and long before I realized the SFSE folks were trying to sue Debbie Stoller (of Stitch 'n Bitch fame) for copyright infringement (for using the ubiquitous and very old phrase "stitch 'n bitch," which the SFSE folks seem to think they invented). The second pic of the bag shows the pink lining and the little inside pocket. It also shows more sloppy detail work, so avert your eyes from all but the pocket, and even then try to let your eyes go out of focus a bit so you miss how I messed up the pocket details too.


All in all, I'm fairly pleased with this set. I love the fabric, though I think it looks better as a headband than as a tote. It turns out I am terrible at reading sewing patterns. It takes me several readings before I really get what's supposed to happen. Also, I tend towards sloppiness, which I already knew.

Am still learning how to take pictures of inanimate objects. I know natural light would've been better, but I was too excited about finishing these to wait till daylight.

Next up: I'm going to make a bear for Baby J from Hillary Lang's wee wondeful put-together book. And then I'll do kitties for my boys. Have you seen leilalu's kitties? They are absolutely completely precious.

You can call me Granny now. Once.

Baby J was born at 10:26 p.m. last night, via c-section. Poor mama and baby had a long, long day, but were doing well when we spoke to them after midnight. They induced early yesterday morning, but things didn't go as planned. At one point, contractions were coming too quickly for baby to recover so they had to cut off the pitocin and then later start it back at a lower rate. Then at 9:00 they decided labor was not progressing - she had been at 5 cm for 3 hours. So they took her in for a c-section. That went all right until after the baby was removed and she immediately began feeling the pain of the surgery, so then they knocked her out to sew her back up. I'm bummed that they didn't get the kind of delivery they wanted (I'm certainly well-acquainted with that experience!). The whole reason for the inducement was to avoid a c-section (they thought the baby was getting too big and didn't want him to get any bigger). I can't help but wonder if the inducement actually led to the c-section since perhaps if her body had been ready to labor she wouldn't have stalled out at 5 cm. Of course, I'm not a medical professional, so who knows....

Anyway, it was rough going, but a happy ending. We are told that Baby J is absolutely beautiful. We will get to see for ourselves in 11 days!

the picky pants

Thanks for all the kind comments about the little layette. I'm very excited about it. Here is a shot of the pants that I couldn't add yesterday due to blogger restrictions (thanks Red, for the suggestion about photobucket, will try it sometime - and it's great to hear from another redheaded Gemini!).

I love making Picky Pants (this is my 3rd pair so far). I did the seed stitch cuffs (love seed stitch!) to match the seed stitch on the sweater. I wish I had a better picture of these, but you get the idea.

I can't wait to see these on Baby J!

Ready for baby

My Old Man's daughter called yesterday to say that she is going to be induced tomorrow morning, a day before her due date. The docs think the baby's shoulders are unusually wide and she is rather petite, so they don't want to let her go any longer. I'm always biased towards letting the mama's body do its thing naturally (but who am I to talk? I had every possible medical intervention, due to multiple complications), so I'm a tad disappointed that they are just going to go ahead and take the baby. Still, we're all excited.

And of course, I had to snap into gear and finally put the buttons on Baby J's sweater, something I had put off for weeks (and now I know it was with good reason. Man, they were a pain!). But now the entire layette is complete!

Child's Cotton Hat from Last Minute Knitted Gifts
Bernat cottontots

Dreambaby Booties from fabulousyarn
Bernat cottontots

Diagonal Garter Stitch Blanket
25 inches square, unblocked (hence the crease in the middle)
Rowan Soft Baby

Child's Placket-Neck Sweater, Last Minuted Knitted Gifts
Bernat cottontots

I couldn't get blogger to upload the final pic, which is of the pants. I'll try again later. They are Picky Pants from Little Turtle Knits, in Bernat cottontots.

I really loved working with the Bernat cotton. Good thing, because I have a ton left and a friend with a baby due in September. The Rowan Soft Baby is super-soft but I got tired of working with it. Boy am I glad to be done with the never-ending baby blanket.

Today is My Old Man's birthday. He was kind of hoping that Baby J would arrive today. It could still happen. But please, no one call me Granny!