Chicken sitting! Chicken knitting!

Things have been - how shall we say - busy here at Knitcrit central. Busy. Like the chickens in one of db's favorite books. Busy busy Chickens. What are they doing? Chicken walking...chicken talking...

Excuse me. Db cut three teeth this month and each one of them took a great big meaty bite out of my sleep. In the past 30 days, while db was cutting three teeth and my babysitter was out of town at a yoga teacher training, I turned in my grades and completed an idiotic but totally necessary Institutional Research Board application so when I go do my research in India this fall, it will be with the approval of a small group of people who have never been to India and know nothing about it. Most importantly, though, I mailed off my manuscript to my editor at University of California Press! I think hearing it hit the floor on the other side of the mail drop wall at the local post office will be one of the moments that stay with me the rest of my life, right up there with the moment that db's head was out but her body was still in and I looked down at her and thought "cute head. lots of hair. boy or girl?"

Speaking of babies, an old friend of mine just had a little boy - or rather, his wife did - and I decided that I'd knit him a cute little asymmetrical cardigan. Behold the Mossy Jacket, a freebie on Ravelry.


















The yarn is a beautiful Irish wool with a hint of angora - it's actually not that much fun to knit and even just thinking about hot water while standing within 10 feet of it might cause it to spontaneously felt, but it looks absolutely beautiful, and is perfect for this pattern. Officially, the yarn is Debbie Bliss Donegal Luxury Tweed Chunky, and at $20/skein it certainly lives up to its name. Last time I bring stuff to the counter without checking the price first.


















It's being knit at the 1 year size - now that I have my very own baby, I totally get that there is very little point to knitting anything smaller than a 3-month size. Tiny babies look best in tiny baby onesies and they barf on everything, anyway.

And on that note, it's over and out. Db is asleep and it's time for her mom to take a nap.

Cardigan Confessional Redux

I had this plan to make db a blanket; loyal readers will recall that there was a lot of pattern research and swatching and hand wringing and finally a decision to make db a blanket in Blue Sky Alpaca Silky Alpaca (50/50 silk/alpaca) in the most beautiful silver-gray color imaginable.

But then my aunt gave me a hand knit blanket that I had made for her son, and Todd's mother gave me the blanket made by Great Aunt Nettie and Todd's mother's friend gave me a hand crocheted blanket and THEN the mother of one of my oldest and closest friends gave me a jaw-droppingly stunning hand knit blanket.

































The photos are from January, which is a sad meditation on how busy I have been these past few months. Anyway. How many hand knit blankets does one baby need, particularly given the fact that all we ever put her in anyway are those overpriced Halo sleep sacks because we are paranoid about SIDS?

I did make some limited progress on the silk alpaca blanket, but upon realizing that I had made a slight error 20 rows after the fact, I kind of lost interest and drowned my frustrated sorrows in a little worsted-weight instant gratification - so there was the aviator cap phase and also the pink top-down raglan, which is now finished and adorable.


















Cute, eh? Db is currently obsessed with buttons, so I am leaving them off for the time being.

So I decided that there were better uses for my beautiful silk alpaca; currently I'm about 3 rows into this vintage-esque cardigan for me -

http://www.garnstudio.com/lang/en/visoppskrift.php?d_nr=88&d_id=17&lang=us

It's a freebie from Drops. I'm hoping that I finish it by Christmas.

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.

Aviatrix redux

I decided that db needed her own damn aviator cap.















Three hours later, after digging some leftover Malabrigo out of the stash bag, voila. I love this pattern.

Aviatrix

Posting photos in haste - it's midterm week (and curse email for making students think they can ask me questions 24/7), book deadline looming, not a lot of quality sleeping going on at the moment...but despite the general mayhem involved in living a relatively normal life, I have somehow managed to knit a cute little aviator cap for a friend's incoming baby girl. The almost finished cap is being modeled by db, who was fascinated with the un-sewn-in end:




















Aviatrix, a Ravelry freebie, is truly an amazing pattern. I also think it may be the only reasonably cute baby hat that will actually stay on a baby's head. I knit it in Blue Sky Alpacas worsted weight 50 merino/50 alpaca - an absolutely lovely yarn. To get gauge for the worsted version of the pattern (which is written for three different yarn weights!) I knit the body of the hat on a 10 and the ribbing on an 8.



















All that remains is to sew on buttons so it has a functioning chin strap - let's see if I manage to get a finished object photo posted. I hate to bet against myself, but I don't think it's going to happen.

Now if I could only figure out how to download the medal

The Wintergreen mittens were finished around 4:00 pm est on the final day of the Winter Olympics. I can't say that I really enjoyed knitting them - it could be the pattern wasn't fun, but more likely I don't like knitting to a deadline that isn't a real deadline (e.g., Christmas, a due date, etc).

















I think I screwed up the thumb opening - or maybe there's something I don't understand about "work in pattern for 5 stitches, work 9 st in scrap yarn, sl 9 back to the left needle and continue working in pattern." Doesn't this essentially result in a grafting the scrap yarn into the knitting? And if so, when you remove the scrap yarn, how exactly do you pick up the top stitches? The bottom stitches are simply loose stitches - no problem. The top stitches, however, aren't really loose stitches, even though they are not stable, either. I just picked them up "doubled" - and k2 tog as I joined the yarn to make the thumb. I am sure this isn't clear but the instructions weren't either. I don't know what type of thumb this is (e.g. afterthought?), so I couldn't even look it up online.

















But anyway, they are done and it wouldn't have been an exciting Olympic finish without the thumb crisis.

I'm most proud of the fact that I finished these AND kept db fed, clean, and happy AND kept to the editing schedule for my book manuscript AND did my regular teaching/meeting work AND kept to my usual yoga schedule AND didn't get in horrible fights with Todd because of all the stress.

Cunning mittens

Looking at the teams over on Ravelry, I saw that (1) there was a Big Damn Heroes team and (2) one of the team members was none other than my long-lost spinning teacher from a very unhappy year I once spent in central Pennsylvania as an assistant professor. Shiny, right? So I decided to join the Browncoat Olympians and go for it. It is amazing how many hard core Joss Whedon fans also appear to be hard core knitters. I am apparently absolutely typical after all.

I figure if I do 15 rows a day, I'll have my Wintergreen mittens finished by the time the gimpy Canadian Olympic torch goes out. This cold calculation doesn't make for much Olympian drama, though of course the chances that I will actually manage to keep to this schedule are minimal. Plus of course I have dramatic back story - the Mitten Comeback - to keep things exciting.


















I decided that tara is right - if I did the original gray/cream color combination even though I didn't think it had enough contrast I would always and forever think about how I should have re-knit the mittens using better colors. So I've taken the cream from the originals and added a lovely natural brown - both Blue Sky Alpaca sportweight.

The brown alpaca/Browncoat tie-in is pure serendipity.