In Which Knitcrit Contemplates Giving Up and Finds Herself Wondering What, Exactly, That Would Look Like

What is wrong with knitcrit? Surely she can't be unhappy about this spectacular sweater, which is all finished but for the blocking and weaving in:























It's the Elizabeth Zimmermann bottom-up sweater from _Knitting Without Tears_ with a yoke design borrowed (and modified a bit) from a ski sweater in _The Opinionated Knitter_. The whole thing was done in Princess, a merino-angora-synthetic blend with great stitch definition. I realized somewhere in the middle of the yoke that I had inadvertently chosen the colors of the Indian flag - so patriotic! - but I think/hope that what the colors will say to the average viewer will be more along the lines of "early spring" - because nothing says spring like a fairisle ski sweater, right? It's for db, and it's big enough so it should last her well into next winter.

And db might need it, because it's possible we'll be living in Montreal. Basically, I went on the job market this year because Todd's been underemployed for several years and we really can't continue being this poor in Manhattan. There are also some issues at my university - a top-down restructuring was pushed through by the a*shole chancellor; what it amounts to is a dumbing down of the general education curriculum in order to boost graduation rates. The restructuring's been savaged in the Chronicle and now some of the junior colleges are just plain old refusing to implement it, which bodes well for us at the senior colleges in the system, but still, overall things are not looking too good for public education in New York City. Ugh.























If only the photo would display properly. Hate blogger. Hate iphone.

So the past three weeks have been consumed with job talks - one at a fancy University in Montreal and the other at an an Ivy League school in Philadelphia. I had less than a week's notice for the Montreal talk and I don't think I did a great job; for the job in Philly I gave a slightly better talk but there are some issues with the school as a whole that make me worry. I don't know. I feel totally spent and somehow sure that neither one is going to translate into an actual offer. I'm trying to be happy and grateful for the opportunities, but really what I feel is tired and mad at myself for not doing a better job, and that combined with garden variety annoyances with Todd and our apartment have conspired to put me in a bad mood.

That and today I got db's first preschool rejection letter, and I know that there's nothing more going on here than a huge number of kids vying for a very limited number of spots, but I was haunted by the fear that this was somehow all My Fault and We Could Have Done Something More. And of course the evolving preschool situation also makes me feel like we can't stay in Manhattan - we can't even really afford any of these freaking preschools unless Todd suddenly manages to get a full-time job - but where would we go? The northern jersey suburbs where we can feel isolated and I can enjoy the hellish commute to Manhattan? Somewhere in Queens where we can feel similarly isolated and the commute would be even worse, not to mention the schools?

Is it ridiculous for someone like me to feel trapped and hopeless? Probably.

On the bright side, the British version of Being Human is pretty good and Todd's making a nice dinner even as I type this grumpy post.

end of semester, end of year

The semester is over and the grading is FINALLY done - I'll miss one class terribly and have kind of already forgotten about the other two. This is the first semester where I've really felt strange and sad about the distance I feel from most of my students. I guess I should say that exceptional or otherwise lovely students make an impression on me and I am quite invested in them and their learning progress, but for most students - and especially the "do I have to bring the reading to class?" type students in my 1001-level introduction course - I no longer feel the burning need to be the after-school-special heroic educator who Makes A Difference in their lives. Which is not to say that I am not doing my best - I am - but at the same time I am no longer spending the entire subway ride home obsessing over what I should have done differently to Better Reach Them. I have a child, a husband, and the desire to occasionally connect with friends and/or do some reading or writing in my "area of expertise." This leave limited resources available for going into teaching overtime.

Let's see - in other news, I'm on a search committee for a new hire in our department and I have to say that I have been pretty stunned and saddened by the extent to which identity politics seem to have shaped the attitudes of my committee members. Good lord. Probably I shouldn't say too much here, but it's depressing. We had almost 400 applicants for the position.

I had a book launch on December 9th. I was dreading it primarily because I was sure no one would come, but as it turns out the (small) room was full and several of my dear teachers as well as the colleagues I like the most showed up, so that was cheery. On the whole, I guess the talk I gave went well, which is to say I do not look back on it and feel full of regret.

Knitting content: the Maile sweater I made for a friend's dumpling-adorable little girl has finally been gifted, and therefore can be posted here:


















Gah. SO cute.

I no longer have the capacity to note yarn type or needle size or much of anything other than I knit this in a worsted and it came out in the 3-6 month range, which was pretty much what I had hoped for. I had it on about 15 dpns to deal with the sleeve construction, but after about four rows the sweater had advanced far enough beyond the armpits to work on a circular again, so even with that pain in the neck, it was a pretty simple and satisfying knit with great results.

I've been thinking a lot about archiving - there's no shortage of digital mediums available to make me feel bad about not recording these early years of my life with db, and I have at least done a great job keeping an organized and well-edited photo series of her (and her parents) over on Flickr. What feels most attractive to me lately, though, is keeping a simple, handwritten diary. I think - because of my job - I associate the keyboard with a standard and type of writing that keeps me from using this blog as a record of db's early years, but a simple paper notebook might feel like a place I can write whatever comes to mind - and I could keep up with images over on flickr. Which is not to say that knitcrit is closing up shop - I love this blog even if I don't have much time for it of late. I just think there might be something to writing simply on paper. Let's see what happens.

And there you have it - the last post before the new year!

ETA: One of knitcrit's elite group of readers who also happens to live with her just read the above post and yelled "No knitcrit! Don't go!" Knitcrit would like to reiterate that she isn't going anywhere - and she even aspires to more than six posts and three knitting projects in 2012 since that is the year that she gets tenure. Oh yeah, baby.

Of posting and preschools

I have been thinking about what keeps me from updating this blog. There are the usual answers: too much work, exhaustion, perfectionism, laziness. But I also think it's because I named it knitcrit and despite meditations to the contrary, I have it in my head that posts should include some knitting content.

If I had time, I would knit a sweater for a New Zealand penguin.

So, there's some knitting content! Moving on.

Oh - wait - more knitting content: I went to Rhinebeck this year, and I am sorry to say that IMHO (as they say) it is a tad overrated. All those idyllic photos over on Ravelry are a little misleading. Yeah, there's a lot of yarn and it's kind of fun to move through the crowd knowing who the knitting stars are and the names for the many knit-especially-for-Rhinebeck sweaters, scarves and hats, but in the end, it's supposed to be about the fiber, and I guess since I live in NYC, it's not too hard to get my hands on a wide range of yarn, and that makes the stuff on offer at Rhinebeck underwhelming. As Todd observed, Rhinebeck is really all about the fleece. He's right, I think - there were some serious piles of seriously beautiful wool for sale. And actually, there was a pretty high entertainment value in seeing how interested Todd got in the fleece rating system. Maybe all the estrogen in the home is finally getting to him.

And of course it is is always fun to see sheep, alpacas, and llamas. Db loved the angora rabbits, and we all loved watching the sheep competition. Real suspense and drama there, let me tell you. And I clearly suck at sheep evaluation, as all of my favorites were eliminated almost right off the bat.

Possibly the main reason I found the whole thing a tad overrated was simply because we went there with db and it took two hours to get there and over three to get home thanks to a huge traffic jam in Sleepy Hollow caused by some annual Halloween festival that shut down the center of town. So it was five hours of driving, three of it with a toddler who had not napped at all. That's enough to dim the glow of even the cutest alpaca.

Let's see. Other reasons for failure to post have to do with awareness of audience and fear of writing something prosaic and lame. Since the trip to India but maybe even before that, writing has not seemed natural to me. This is a big deal. For years I prided myself on writing, wrote reams for fun, liked to think that my writing was humorous and smart, loved the process of putting my thoughts in words. Maybe it was the book. That's a pretty good narrative, eh? The book killed my passion for writing! Does that happen?

And yes, I am certainly busy, but no more busy than a lot of friends who still manage to maintain humorous, wise, inspiring, informative, and/or entertaining blogs.

There is also the fear that even though I don't use my name other easily google-able information, some terrible ex-boyfriend or current student will find this blog. The thought of that is enough to make me step away from the keyboard.

And something has happened with my laptop's fan so that most of the time when I sit down to write, I'm serenaded by a raspy whirring noise that gets louder and quieter at random intervals but never goes away. Plans are afoot to replace the laptop, but it's slow going and in the meantime every minute I don't have to spend feeling like I'm typing directly behind a jet engine, the better.

Plus, since having db, my capacity for ironic commentary has taken a serious nosedive. Knitcrit has nothing to critique. Db is so...um...perfect. I love her to distraction. Often all I feel capable of doing is posting a bunch of photos of her without comment, because what can one say, really? She's just so awesome. Except of course when she isn't - but when I've had it with her, I am much more interested in watching something from Netflix than exorcising demons through the production of cathartic prose. Plus I think sitting around assisting in the construction of block towers and reading Dr. DeSoto a billion times in a row has done a lot to take away any edge I might have once had.

We started the preschool application process. It's not quite as bad as Nursery University would have you believe, but that's probably because we're not applying to any of the really exclusive preschools - like the one run by Barnard, for example, which had a website so backwards and full of hoops that we gave up on it pretty early on, only to learn later this year that it's the chosen preschool for Sarah Jessica Parker's progeny, which explains a lot.

No, for us it's just the normal Upper West Side preschool process, which means we've applied to five - or is it six? - schools. FYI: you are "supposed to" apply to at least 10. Because what if you don't get in to your first six choices?

Application fees to date: $400. Oh, yes. We went to our first parent orientation and as I sat there listening to the (relatively speaking) likable director of the preschool discussing how they are not like other preschools because they really do believe in a play-based curriculum I couldn't help but feel panicked and annoyed at the same time. Panicked because in many ways this preschool is my first choice because it gives the most time for the tuition dollars and annoyed because all the parents there were doing their absolute best to exude a "we're not like all those crazy Manhattan parents" vibe when in fact I know that if it came right down to it, they would climb over the cold, lifeless body of my daughter if it lay between them and admission to, say, PS 9 or Trinity.

We could, of course, leave Manhattan. Though of course since we had to move this summer and spent about $4,000 to do so, that might not be the best choice right now. Plus I haven't really driven a car since 1995. And I don't know how to operate a gas pump. And being in the cavernous emptiness of the suburbs makes me feel like the rapture has happened and I didn't make the cut or I have somehow, perhaps owing to some genetic quirk, managed to survive the detonation of a neutron bomb. And db loves going to our local sushi restaurant so much.

Maybe everything will work out and db will get in to one of the preschools. Or maybe my mother is right and we shouldn't be sending her to preschool until she's four. As she said to me on the phone the other day, "You didn't go to preschool!" I think the implication there was I turned out fine, which is I think the closest my mother has ever come to voluntarily complimenting me.

So that's a positive note to end on. Post!

Archie goes to India

Classes started before Labor Day - one of the less charming things about my school - and after five or six or however may years it has been at this point, I sort of feel like things are under control. Which of course prompts simultaneous feelings of guilt and boredom, because I apparently somehow still don't know how do be a normal adult.

Some good friends recently had their second child - a boy - and I managed to finish an Archie Vest for him the day before he left (with mom, dad, and big brother) for nine months in India. It gets cold in northern India and stunningly loud vests are a special part of the Indian male's wardrobe - a yarn seemingly made entirely of sparkly plastic plastic "fiber" was especially popular last winter. I thought Archie evoked these subcontinental masterpieces while still managing to be wearable.

My swatch was knit to gauge but goodness gracious, blocking increased the size significantly - I knit it for 6 months and I'd say it's an 18 month size now.























I knit it in the round until the armpits and added the buttons at the shoulder because folks on Ravelry noted that the neck opening was quite small. I think I used Artyarns superwash sock yarn, but honestly I don't remember and in the rush to finish it labels were misplaced. Oh well. I loved knitting it but I'm not doing anything in such a small gauge again until after I get tenure.


















A particularly - exceptionally, actually - gifted employee at M & J Trimmings helped me find the buttons. I think they are perfect.

Let's see. I've wanted to use this blog as a place to record charming moments with db. She's two now, and generally incredibly fun.

Todd and I agreed that today she woke up from her nap it seemed that her language abilities had taken another leap.

For the first time, db used "I love" without prompting - it was quite sweet to see, even though the recipient was her toy giraffe, who she hugged as she made her declaration.

When classes started and she saw that I was leaving for the day, db grabbed one of her Hindi-English books and requested that I read it, referring to it by the Hindi title rather than the English one. She normally requests these books using the English title, so the clever girl had strategized that if she requested the Hindi version, Mama would not leave since Dada can't read Hindi.

And so much more! But I am tired from a long day of teaching - obviously, given the not overly polished prose - and must sleep.

Moving on, in, up

Cousin Liz had a girl a few weeks ago, and after I finished turning in grades for the Worst Semester Ever and Todd and I signed a lease for a new place that we found through the Worst Real Estate Agent Ever, I got to work. It's a six month size and wow, a tiny sweater in Malabrigo worsted superwash flies off the needles. Malabrigo's superwash is amazing - I kind of don't believe it's a superwash.















The pattern is a Ravelry freebee called Striped Smock Top. Clearly the designer focuses her creativity on pattern writing rather than naming. Donna at the yarn store rightfully talked me into buying the yellow yarn.
















It still needs a button. The orange and red were leftovers from two aviator caps that I knit for friends who just had twin girls. We visited them last weekend and I don't know what was more exhausting - the simple thought of twins or keeping db calm for the last hour of the car ride back to the city. To be fair, db is remarkably easy for an almost two-year-old: she flips through mountains of books, "reading" them out loud; imagination play with toys and stuffed animals can go on for a very long time. Even saint-like hopefully genius children have their limits, though, and db's carseat maximum is about two hours. Not bad for a city kid who is so unaccustomed to cars that she now thinks that they exist solely to go to the beach, since all five car trips we've taken since arriving back in the states have been to the ocean or homes with pools or by rivers.

And I say "hopefully genius" because without a scholarship or a high score on the so-called "gifted and talented" exam, her mom and dad really are going to have to move to New Jersey.

Speaking of maxing out carseat time, one of the beach trips was to visit a friend in Montauk. In theory this was a good idea; in practice the heavens opened the moment we arrived. We sort of managed to get to the beach in between storm fronts, but it was so cold db wore her rashguard over pants and a shirt and we had to keep her from getting hypothermia splashing around in the surf. And then on the drive home we hit rush hour traffic going into NYC and the fried clams I ate immediately prior to departure began to disagree with me violently and the only thing that seemed to keep db calm was a recording of sweet old songs that Woody Guthrie composed for his children. I think we listened to the album at least 15 times in a row. Every time I thought I couldn't take it anymore I would ask myself if another round of "I want my milk and I want it now" was better than the cries of an understandably sick of the car toddler and of course we all know the answer to that question.

On the brighter side, I am kind of excited about our new apartment. It has a dishwasher and a third bedroom that we'll be using as a home office. If I think about it, the fact that these two features make me happy suggests that I have finally developed a terminal case of adulthood.

But on the brightest of the bright sides, my editor wrote to me today saying my book is in. My. book. is. in. It's on Amazon! Look at it. Tenure incarnate. Eight years later, my book:























And for the record, that lady on the cover is not dead. She just looks dead. Read the book to find out more.

She's alive!

This happens with blogs. The long hiatus, often followed by a lengthy (or mercifully brief) explanatory confession to the blog gods, complete with reasons for absence and oaths/promises/best laid plans to never, never, never let things go for so long again.

Basically, we got back from India and ended up hospitalized for food poisoning. Thanks very much, Continental Airlines. Five months in India without so much as a single funky day in the bathroom, and then some suspect overcooked eggs at 35,000 feet and eight hours later, after the drama of trying to find our prearranged car at the airport and a totally illegal and terrifying ride on the Jersey Turnpike with db on my lap, we got home and had about an hour before the uncontrollable barfing began. And then uncontrollable diarrhea. It was kind of like labor after the castor oil kicked in. But maybe worse because in this case there was an actual baby requiring care and after a few hours of this insanity, we were both unable to stand upright.

We called Todd's parents, who had actually come over to see us but left because I was so sick. I got sick about two hours before Todd, so I didn't know that they had left because I was retching in the bathroom. I don't really understand why their thought process was more along the lines of "daughter in law is desperately ill after 18 hour nonstop flight with one and a half year old. Must leave" rather than "daughter in law is desperately ill after 18 hour nonstop flight with one and a half year old and therefore likely could use some help." Actually, I do understand. It has a lot to do with the Chiropractic Lifestyle (tm) worldview, or as I like to call it, the church of the holy spine. Illness is in your head. Ignore it. It will go away. And if it doesn't and you die, you won't be around to call attention to the fundamental insanity and lack of humanity inherent in such a worldview.

So we called them for help, twice, and they basically said stop whining, have some tea and get a better attitude about the dry heaving. In fact, you are not really dry heaving. So we called my mom, who while crazy in her own way, definitely understands that both parents being unable to stand up is a Situation, and she immediately got in the car and drove down to the city to take care of db.

While waiting for the upstate cavalry to arrive, we were lucky enough to get some help from Laura, our pre-India babysitter. It was Laura who took me to the ER and later, after Todd passed out on the way to the bathroom, it was Laura who called the ambulance that brought him to the ER. Why hadn't Todd sought help sooner? Well, it would seem that while you can check out of the Church of the Holy Spine, you can never leave. Practically speaking, this means that you will keep saying you are fine (in between dry heaves or crawls to the bathroom) until you wake up strapped to a stretcher.

Todd and I got to share the same room in the ER, side by side on his and hers drips. It was lovely. Depending on the kind of person you are, the ER room in an NYC hospital will either destroy or restore your faith in humanity.

Anyway, we were eventually discharged and we spent the next two weeks trying to get over jetlag (so much harder with jetlagged toddler), unpack, and get ready for what turned out to be the worst semester I've ever had not counting my first year of teaching, which is in a class by itself, or perhaps a class shared only by acute food poisoning after an 18-hour flight with a toddler.

Basically, 120 students is too many. Prior to this semester, I never had more than 60. So a smart professor would have maybe done away with some of the writing assignments. But that would not be me. As a result, I have been hopelesly behind since January, and until the spring semester ends this Wednesday, I do not anticipate catching up.

Plus - post for another time - the new owner of our building has been systematically not renewing leases in order to convert livable nice two bedroom apartments into illegal four bedroom apartment shares (8 x 10 bedrooms, anyone?), so in March we got our not unexpected letter saying get out at the end of May. I negotiated a slightly later move out date, but the stress of teaching plus page proofs plus having to move AGAIN caused hives and insomnia and general shittiness beyond my ability to convey in a single humble blog post.

On the bright side, db is now night weaned and sleeping in her own room.

So there hasn't been much spare time here, and much of my non-work time has been spent watching 30 Rock, The Wire, The Amazing Race, and (oh, the shame) Outsourced. Joss Whedon, save me! I did actually knit a Tiny Tea Leaves for db out of some brown Blue Sky Alpaca that I bought a long time ago and perhaps I will post pictures another day, now that I am apparently blogging again.

And yes, about the blog. It occurred to me recently that because I am busy, I have no record of my days other than iphone videos and photos and that most of the reason I haven't posted in so long was that this was supposed to be a knitting blog. Well, f*ck that. I could, I suppose, set up a "personal" blog and use it as a venue for long, photoless, humorless posts about My Life, but why have two blogs when one is more than I can handle?

Plus, there are about six friends' babies due this summer, so chances are pretty good there will be some knitting.

Noooooooooo

This morning our lovely cook/nanny called us with some exciting news: her daughter-in-law, who lives with her, had a baby boy last night. We knew that a baby was coming, so this was not unexpected, although it was on early side. The surprise is that the baby had to be delivered by cesarean section, and that means that unless the maternal grandmother wants to stay with the in-laws and help out, we have lost childcare and cooking help for the next few weeks.

Hence the Noooooooooo.

The internet came back today after a week of server problems (apparently when the guy who deals with broadband goes on vacation, no one else at MTNL is capable of solving server problems), and I was wondering what the next crisis would be. Now I know. The most devastating part of this is the timing - I am supposed to finish proofing my copy edited manuscript by 1 December. Which basically means I am screwed.

Let's try to cheer ourselves up with some recent photos of everyday Indian absurdity, shall we?


















But before '88 he was a really nice guy.
























I guess we wouldn't want any vehicles running over those manhole covers.


And a recent photo of db - playing in our sort of probably clean enough local park, which is closed from 8 am to 6 pm. That's right. 8 am to 6 pm. Don't try to understand. Unless you want to go totally mad.

















The Aviatrix hat is snug, but still wearable, and great for fending off intrepid end-of-season mosquitoes.

Delhi ate my brain and then pooped it into an open sewer

Ah, Delhi. Who knew that you would be ravaged, wrecked and otherwise generally destroyed by the upcoming Commonwealth Games? It didn't have to be this way - with the right management, you are capable of producing wonders like the Delhi Metro: built on budget and on schedule, clean, fast, beautiful, air conditioned. But the Indian government has had seven - SEVEN, count 'em - years to get ready for the games and it's come to this: the entire central part of the city is a torn-up dengue-mosquito breeding construction site from hell and the games are a week away. Today in a rickshaw I passed one of the games venues and noticed that the games countdown clock had stopped working: it's possible the clock just broke, but it's equally possible that someone disabled it since at this point all it's doing is reminding everyone exactly how hopelessly behind schedule everything is.

I wish I could conjure up the energy to say more, but setting up a household in Delhi has basically rendered me catatonic, and all writing energy has been directed towards field notes. I considered setting up a blog for posting my field notes, but for now anyway I think that's a little more pressure than I need, given everything else.

No knitting has happened except the hour it took to put the finishing touches on this sweater, modeled by a walkin', talkin' ever-changing, ever-charming db. This was my first knitting kit: it was a gift from a friend and while I normally don't use variegated yarn, I am happy with the result. The yarn was, I think, misti alpaca sportweight 50 pima cotton/50 silk: nice to knit with amazing drape; it's also incredibly soft, and what I like most about it is usually a yarn this soft has pilling issues (Debbie Bliss Cashmerino, anyone?) but this one is wearing like iron. The pattern was Spring Garden Tee by Alana Dakos (aka Never Knot Knitting).























I hope I get my blogging grove back soon - I do genuinely love writing, but so much happens in a day here that I generally don't know where to start. That and after a while I find that speaking Hindi puts a real damper on English. Not that my Hindi is setting the world on fire, either. So basically I don't speak anything well at the moment.

Sleepless in Delhi

Also photoless in Delhi because the little drive I use to connect my photo card to my mac is in New York and right now finding an apartment that won't kill my daughter is a slightly higher priority than finding a way to upload photos. The past two months have been mad: getting an Indian research visa ended up being the living, breathing, monstrous embodiment of the soul of Kafka, just beating out getting IRB approval for my research project for that title. Finding a subletter who would not pee on our sofa or sell Todd's DVD collection to support a crack habit was also time consuming, and then there was the small task of packing for a five-month trip to India with a one-year-old in mind. So much could be written, and will be written, but at the moment I've been up since 2:30 am local time (and it's now 8 local time) and I think I need to have some protein and drink a lot of tea in order to have any hope of making it through the day. Db and Todd are still asleep, as they were for pretty much the entire night. I guess I should just be glad that someone will be functional today.

And knitting has, remarkably, been happening, though not on the 14-hour flight from Newark to Delhi. I actually put some knitting in my carry on and didn't even think about it - much less touch it - for the entire flight. I am not sure why I thought I would be doing anything other than keeping db from climbing me and the seat and all the other passengers as though they were here own personal Mount Everest.

Cardigan confessional

I decided that I wanted to knit db a cardigan for spring. Because spring has more or less sprung here in the city, I also decided that I needed a pattern written for worsted weight in order to have a chance in hell of finishing it in time. Enter Little Coffee Bean, a top-down baby raglan freebie pattern on Ravelry.















Yeah, I know it's pink. In fact, it's two shades of pink. Technically, the colors are "Mulberry" and "Orchid," but I think we can just call a spade a spade here. Next thing you know I'll be buying db Disney Princess products. I'm so ashamed.
















Maybe my taste has been warped by extreme sleep deprivation. About three weeks ago, db's sleep pattern changed - basically, she no longer sleeps for more than 3 hours at a time and when she wakes up she almost immediately becomes hysterically upset. Teething, growth spurt, developmental leap, night terrors, hunger - take your pick. The almighty boob normally calms her down, but of course that has meant some pretty rough nights for the bearer of the boob.

Holiday madness

Db is very small and I am still on paid leave; therefore, it was actually possible to knit her a fine Christmas ensemble in less than one month:






















Yes, I should have been editing my manuscript rather than knitting this. And yes, db does have a neck somewhere under those jowls.















The dress is the Ravelry freebie Kaia Babydoll knit in the 6 month size for my 85th height percentile 5 month old daughter. I knit it in Zara (red) and Aurora 8 (gray); the red was held doubled and knit on 9 dpns; the gray was held single and knit on a 7 circular.















Modifications included knitting long sleeves. Basically, I followed the pattern but put the sleeve stitches on a holder; after I knit the dress I picked up and knit the arm stitches, picking up 8 stitches in the armpit and knitting in the round. I also did a k1p1 rib on the collar because it looks neater than a single garter stitch edge. To make it long enough, I also did one or two more skirt increase rounds than the pattern called for.















The necessary soaker is another free soaker pattern on Ravelry, searchable as Wool Diaper Cover by Cynthia Combs. Obviously I didn't pick the pattern because of its pithy name.

Todd's family has a disturbing tradition which involves the family patriarch (or whoever has had enough holiday wine to be suggestible) putting on a Santa suit and scaring all the babies and small children at the party. The small children receive awful plastic gifts to compensate them for their trauma; tiny babies, however, receive nothing more than a crippling blow to their developing subconscious.















Db looks annoyed, which of course makes me proud. The crying baby on the left is db's new cousin - the lucky recipient of the flower hat, pirate hat, and nautaloid toy of blog posts past.
















Db's adorable mary janes were also knit by me using the Tiny Shoes pattern by Ysolda Teague. Perhaps my daughter has exceptionally narrow patrician feet or perhaps I didn't quite pay enough attention to the gauge, but the medium size was immense. I knit one on December 23rd and despaired; on the morning of the 24th I did a little emergency surgery, taking a pair of scissors to the bottom of the bootie, frogging the bottom half, and then doing a three needle bind off after the 5 rounds of garter stitch called for in the pattern. I then knit the second bootie in a mere hour and a half (including all finishing) and wove in the ends of the dress while Todd loaded the car. Rock star finish.

Creepy materialism-teaching visit from Santa notwithstanding, it was actually the least painful Christmas Eve party ever because of db:

knitcrit: baby baby baby baby baby. babybaby?

annoying libertarian relative: baby babybabybaby baby!

knitcrit: baby baby.

strung out on Valium relative: babybabybaby babybaby baby. baby?

knitcrit: baby baby baby. babybaby! baby baby baby.

Babies - the new, non-alcoholic way to survive the in-laws' annual Christmas Eve party.

bottoms, tops, and a disturbing bustier

We haven't been so much with the blogging this past month here at knitcrit mission control, though there has been a fair amount of knitting and also a fair amount of criticism, the latter mainly taking the form of yelling at the TV whilst helplessly watching the public option die a slow, painful death. The former, a much more pleasant subject, involved knitting a soaker to go with Topaz out of the leftover light green - baby girls don't sit like ladies (the bulky diaper gets in the way, I suppose), so one way to help them pull off the dress is to provide a coordinated underlayer. In this case, the soaker I knit to go with Topaz also looks very cute with db's monkey onesie.

This was a freebie on Ravelry, searchable under the name "Fancy Pants." I had no idea what a soaker was before about three weeks ago and it turns out there's quite a range of soaker patterns out there, so I can't say that I had any reason for choosing this one - I can't even remember how I found it, actually.

For the past few winters, Todd has worn an embarrassingly ugly black knit hat emblazoned with the ASCAP logo (American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers). In some ways, this is the type of hat that one can indeed get away with wearing on the northern fringes of the Upper West Side, but I finally got sick enough of looking at it to make him probably the millionth Koolhaas to be worn on the streets of New York City. No matter - it looks great, of course - it's really a bulletproof pattern.

Db wonders why her dad gets the cool hat.























And finally, as I begin to contemplate my return to work at the end of January, I find myself looking at this this lovely image and wondering what exactly I find to be profoundly wrong with it. Besides everything.

Topaz complete!

Not too much to say about this uneventful, cute little knit.






















It's surprisingly wearable - normally I think dresses look stupid on very young babies, but db pulls it off, I think.






















The rather pricey Hanna Anderson tights, however, are immense - I will definitely have to knit a pair of matching green mary-janes to conceal how big the feet are.

Fast, easy and cute. Should it be babywear?

The back side of Topaz is complete - it took longer to find a moment to photograph/blog it than it did to knit it. It's a shock to knit with a worsted again - in this case, the Malabrigo called for in the pattern - rather than a DK or sport weight. I can't remember the last time I knit with a worsted, actually. I understand why knitters with less of a protestant work ethic than myself love Malabrigo - it's fast, easy, a single (ply), and has just enough variegation to entertain without challenging. But whatever - the finished product is going to be awfully cute.























This is a very hasty photo - in person, the shoulder straps are actually the same width and the hem is straight. My major modification was to knit the straps in seed stitch - the original pattern calls for stockinette, which rolls and looks like crap.

Db is finally asleep. I say finally because we all woke up late and I was feeling cranky about having not accomplished anything and so after breakfast even though db was clearly sleepy I decided to give db some face time/play and tummy time (I resent that I have to use that stupid phrase, but I can't think of another that would both convey the concept and be wise and ironic) so I could feel like I had accomplished something before noon, and of course db reacted like a normal baby, which meant she got overstimulated and therefore uncharacteristically cranky and unable to fall asleep on her own, forcing me to bouncy walk her around the apartment until she calmed down enough to fall asleep on her own.

I am not sure if blogging about my failure to accomplish anything before noon counts as an accomplishment.

Rage, rage against the pale pink blight

Despite a recent trip to the local second hand store with several bags of the most egregiously pink baby gifts, I still feel as though there's way too much pink in db's wardrobe. Not that pink seems to bother her.















She's just started smiling.















On the one hand, it's very gratifying to finally have an interactive baby after six weeks of newborn aloofness. Adorable aloofness, of course, but still. On the other hand, I feel strangely sad about db's passage from newborn to baby - she's totally different now. Probably this won't be the last time I marvel at how much she's changed.

I've also been forced to take it really easy for the past few weeks because of the abnormally long hard labor, and one can only watch so many episodes of the Sopranos before cabin fever sets in. The solution to both problems was, obviously, stenciling. The internet is full of free stencil images, and a few trips to the local art store and several swipes of the exacto knife later, we've begun to build a onesie wardrobe befitting a thinking, hip baby girl (as opposed to a wardrobe befitting a Barbie dream mansion-esque baby girl):































I'm quite pleased with the results so far.






















Probably db is, too.

The stencil patterns are all from this website: http://www.kittybuttons.com/stencils/categories/index.html

Instructions on stenciling here:
http://www.melissaclifton.com/tutorial-stencilb.html

In other thinking-hip-girl-baby wardrobe news, I'm knitting an earflap hat for Todd's brother's incoming baby girl. This is the swatch of the jolly roger motif:















The pattern is a highly improvised combination of this free adult-size hat design:

http://cmeknit.blogspot.com/2006/10/skull-flap-hat.html






















With this free baby hat pattern

http://heyjulie.wordpress.com/2007/03/20/babykids-earflap-hat/














I'm knitting it in Zara (salmon) and Aurora 8 (gray) merino. So far, so good, except of course the earflaps curl. I'm hoping blocking and applied i-cord will solve the problem but thinking maybe I should have done the earflaps in garter stitch. Oh, well. It's amazing what acute sleep deprivation will do to one's perfectionistic tendencies.

It's a Girl!

Contrary to the freely volunteered (which is to say, largely unsolicited) opinions of friends, family members, and random New Yorkers on the street, it was in fact a very active, carried- high-and-all-in-the-front girl. She arrived at 7:27 pm on Saturday 25th July and weighed in at 7 pounds, 11 ounces. About the 77 hour labor that preceded her birth I will not say much at this moment since said daughter is maybe finally asleep and I want to get this post done before she wakes up.
















Isn't she adorable? I can't believe how bonded to her I feel already, and that is saying something given how hellish it has been establishing breast feeding. Two choice bits of information on that front: (1) She came out of the womb sucking so hard that she'd sucked her upper lip into her mouth, causing the doula to exclaim "I've never seen such a powerful suck before! Wow!" and (2) Mastitis.

But yeah - 77 hours. For real. By which I mean real labor - strong, extremely painful, regular contractions that progressed quickly to 5 minutes apart and then continued for three days and three nights. And the best guess the doula and midwives have is that she had too much room in my pelvis and so my contractions wouldn't force her head down onto the cervix properly, and this made me EXTREMELY - we might even say INSANELY - slow to dilate. As in, my daughter had so much room in the pelvis that when the midwives would attempt to check her position vaginally, they would feel the top of her head shaking back and forth (in a "no" gesture - as in "no, I will NOT leave the womb"), which meant she had tons of room up there - a crazy, abnormal amount. Which means that, combined with a genetically-bestowed large pelvis, maybe all that yoga opened things up a little too much. Oh, the irony. With a regular doctor I would certainly, absolutely have been c-sectioned, but my midwife team was just brilliant and in the end, I was able to deliver vaginally, so there's a happy ending to the labor story. Plus, I don't have stretch marks at all and I can fit into my old clothes already, so those are some nice consolation prizes.
















But mainly, I love my little girl! I really do. It's amazing. I'd post a picture of her in her hat and booties, but the hat was too big and the booties were too small. Already, she rebels.

And she also has great comic timing: