Room for two heads

Baby opening tucked in
closed position

Right because two are better than one.

Baby opening
open

It's my hope that when I don't need an opening for baby the button panel will tuck under discretely and not be too noticeable.

I'll have to sew on buttons, but the button holes are ready on the flip side of the baby collar/ opening ribbing.

Weird, uh?

Baby and Me Sweater

Here's the beginning
of the baby opening.

While it's spring, I'm still keenly aware of how awkward staying warm while baby wearing was this past winter. Waiting till next winter to come up with a solution seems silly, and now's the time to solve this problem. There are a few baby wearing coats being made which retail for anywhere from $100 to $200, but most need to be imported from overseas. I might still opt for a shelled baby wearing jacket eventually. However, for the moment I'm working on something which I hope will work for most winter days, save the most extremely cold ones, as our Virginia winters aren't too terrible. Often a heavy sweater or fleece coat is sufficient given you're properly layered underneath.

Preteen Wool turtle neck dress

This one took about a month to complete. I'm mighty proud of the fact that I only had to tuck in three yarn tails. I hate seams, and there's not a single one in this dress. My next project will have at least two, :(  as I've not come up with a way to avoid them with the method I'll be using. There's got to be a way, I've just not figured it out yet. ;)  
While this may look a little "huggy" my experience with this yarn is has been that it will relax some after the first hand wash and might not continue to hug quite so snuggly.... at least that's my modesty seeking mama hope. It's a natural wool color, but it may return as a dye project in the future, as I've told my girls they can dye them if they so choose with any Kool-Aid they prefer.

Woolie Sweater Dress

 We're all really happy with how this dress turned out. With no seams, knit entirely in the round, from top to bottom using circulars from the turtle-neck collar, down in a yolk sweater method, and finally the sleeves were completed using double points, leaving only three yarn tails to tuck.

So I just cast another turtle neck collar onto the small circulars and will try again for the pre-teen version of this dress up next.

Silk Alpaca Sweater

For Christmas I got a gift certificate from my sister-in-law for a semi-local yarn shop, FiberSpace. So a month or more ago we made our way up to Old Town and I spent my certificate on some super soft alpaca silk, sport weight yarn. I purchased 4 skeins  so I'd be sure to have enough for whatever child-sized project I decided upon. I made this raglan cardigan with just three skeins. So I have one more skein left for a beanie or something...maybe a pair of teeny socks.

This sweater was cast on at the neck and knit on two needles much like a yoke sweater, almost in the round, except it's a cardigan. Then I placed the sleeves stitches on holders (a string of yarn) and proceeded to work the rest of the way down on the straight needs. Then the sleeves were knit with double points. So there are no seams. All I did was tuck in the tails and sew on the buttons after I was done knitting.

I don't like it...

Nope, I don't like how this turned out at all. It doesn't appeal to me in the least and I loath how the lines don't connect and how the patterns don't exactly flatter my recipient.

My DH said, "don't worry, you can always make me another sweater."

Ugh...November, December, January, and into February...hours and hours, and hours...and I don't like how it turned out. Oh well...after I finish tucking all the tails, I'm done with this thing.

At least my model is cute! And he did say that he would wear whatever I made for him. What a sweet guy!

The sleeves

The sleeves of that sweater are done...finally! Last night I ripped back the neck and picked up the new neck line stitches. I hope to have this sucker finished by this weekend.

Baby's Alpaca Sweater

I started this about 20 days ago...that's a long time for me...and long time in the life of a quickly growing baby. But it's still big enough for my little one.

The yarn came from an impulsive purchase at a local shop. It's 100% alpaca wool, and just looked so chocolate and pinkilicious! I had to make my princess something girly with this.

Old project, new model

This sweater finally has a model to fit it. The wool longies I made four years ago for her sister and I'm glad I hung onto them. Not terribly girly, but it's warm and cozy!

Merino Angora Sweater

This sweater is hand knit from yarn I spun myself. It's the first fruits of my first fleece purchase...which I bought, washed, carded, and processed almost a year ago. I've not finished the spinning of the entire fleece, but I'm very tempted to drag out the wool box today and do a bit of spinning so I can work with more yarn. Then again, I'm a realist and I don't think I quite have time for spinning right now. So just admiring the fruits of my hard work might have to suffice for today.

This little girls is getting this sweater for her birthday in a couple weeks. It's not a surprise, but she's very happy with the turn out non-the-less.

Most importantly, "it's not an itchy sweater...it's a soft sweater." Praise the Lord!

How I find time to get my work done

Set a good example of what diligent working should look like and the kids will hopefully follow suit.

So here I am knitting while one child works on phonics and the other works on math.

And I'm getting to knit! Win, win for everyone!

Baby Sweater

I took a break from knitting longies to make a sweater for the new baby. My child will not be cold this winter...if anything overheated is more likely the scenario with all my fervent knitting. Well...socks, I've not been much for knitting those. Perhaps I should consider some socks now.

One of my goofiest creations

(Models with candy in their mouths don't smile very well...but don't she look contemporary!)

This could be one of my weirdest sweaters ever. I made it up as I went along, but I had in mind to make a sweater that would go nicely over a dress. Well, it does go over a dress well enough, but my husband said, "are you going to sewing some elastic into the bottom of that?" Okay, it's a bit different. I'm going to focus on the parts I am proud of.

The light brown part on the top and sleeves is knit in a texture pattern that slowed this completion down and make the painstakingly arduous to complete...just so you know.

Perhaps I should have skipped the dark strip on the arm, it's just not wide enough and leaves me thinking, "why?" But I hate to rip things out, and so that's why it remained.

Then I decided to add some laced stitchery...or whatever you'd like to call that. Initially I had this idea of having it go all the way around the skirt, and then two contrasting laces going up the sleeves too...but I got tired of this project and stopped with the first 6 laces. Sigh... But she does like it, she's wearing it now, so I guess I should be happy with the end results.

More of my hats

So funny story: I gave this brown raglan to my youngest for Christmas. Well...she open up her present, and her dear brother declared, "it's an itchy sweater!"

Then said child proceeded to carry on and on about how "itchy" and "scratchy" the sweater was. His little sister, of course, wanted nothing to do with the sweater (that I slaved over for countless hours). I had to bribe her with candy to get this photo....UGH!

Some of my favorite peoples wearing my hats.

On the needles

I cast this on this past Tuesday. Charlotte has grown out of all the sweaters I made her. And her older brother isn't always nice enough to keep his sweaters nice enough to pass down. So I've got to make her a little something special for Christmas.

A reglan tweed knit sweater

I bought this yarn over a year ago, and started several projects with, but was never happy with anything. This was something I had to push through, and finally it's done.