The Year that Was

Last year seemed to be dominated by baby knitting. Four of the girls from work had babies - two girls and two boys. I really enjoyed knitting this outfit. Intarsia is always  a favourite technique for me. I don't usually like stripes, but this knit went well. I used stash yarn.

It is Bellyphant Baby Cardigan by Jennifer Little

I thought the neck was too high, so I lowered it a bit.

I also improvised the hat pattern to make an outfit. 

I liked the blue and navy stripes, so repeated them in the hoodie for boy number two. For the hoodie I chose a cotton blend yarn, as his family now lives at Mt Tom Price, way up in the north west of Australia. It has a fairly hot climate. I improvised the pattern as I couldn't find one which I liked.

The zip was sewn in by machine and went in easily.

This is one of the girl's outfits. It was a Sirdar pattern I bought on 

Patternfish. The hat was a free Spotlight pattern. 

    

For girl number two I gave this cardi, which was my own
design.I had knitted this previously. I didn't have any of the
 pink yarn left,so I did the matching hat in white and lilac.

I was happy with the way the hat turned out.            

Finishing Frenzy

I decided to make an effort this year to finish up some of my long term ufo's. It is hard to change from being a Ufo'er extraordinaire, but I did a count and the total was huge. I have just posted some more finished  projects to my Ravelry page, and the finished total so far is 8  knitted projects, and one crocheted edge. The lace rib socks were my only new project.

Although this was a simple pattern, it seemed to take forever to knit, but I did eventually finish them.

The oldest project was the diamond lace baby cardi. I think this started as a trial for a baby shawl, so it has been languishing for maybe seven years. I decided to turn it into a cardi.

Not sure what I will do with it. I know several expectant mums, so I guess it will find a home.

 It has garter stitch borders, which I don't do 

any more as I find they always curl. I now tend

to do seed stitch instead.

This year is busier than ever at work. We have all sorts of regulatory changes, and Quality Accreditation to put into place. We used to have a very difficult quality system before, but they have now changed it all again. In addition, I will be teaching in the kindergarten from next term. I am looking forward to it, but it will be on top of all my other work, so I think most of my knitting will be fairly easy. My main knitting time is in the car to and from work (DH drives)

Many of my other UFO's are quite complicated, and /or I have messed up and need to take time to sort them out. They mostly need concentration, and are not "Take along knits". Oh well, I will try to rescue some of them from the dark cupboard.

Three blue sheep sweaters (and hats)

Last year, I knitted this sweater and hat for my grandson. I bought the book, Bouton D'or Layette and Junior a long time ago. My copy is very dog eared, as I have used it so often, and knitted many of the designs. I nearly didn't buy it, because it was expensive, but I certainly have had my money's worth. The sweater (or jumper as we Aussies call it) was a bit too big, but three year old's grow quickly, and it fits well this year.

This year, I had several babies and toddlers to knit for, so I decided to do a six month, and a two year size. Because it is in 8ply (dk) they knitted up fairly fast. I did twist stitches instead of 3 stitch cables. They are much faster, and look the same. I also like the slip stitch coloured bands - two colours without getting tangled in fair isle.



This is the six month size. I thought that it is a bit more modern than the traditional fine baby knits I usually do.

This is the two year old size, with pom pom hat.

Once I had sewn them up, and put on the buttons, it took me ages to crochet the heads, and attach the legs. I am still not happy with the faces, but after many tries, I just had to finish. The legs are crochet chain. I think the 3d effect does add to the overall effect.

Six silly sheep

Posting Again

We recently spent two weeks in the South Island of New Zealand, which is amzingly beautiful. We loved the scenery, and every day brought new surprises, and more awesome sights. We started in Christchurch and went across the Alps on the train. Then we did a 10 day bus tour, followed by a train trip to the north to Picton, and hired a car to drive back to Christchurch.

We spent a night on a boat in Milford Sound. When we started it was beautiful weather. It rained all night, and in the morning we had a big storm. The boat rocked and rolled, but it was fun. Everywhere around us were the most amazing water falls.

 I was hoping to buy some wool while there, but didn't get too many opportunities. I bought  5 skeins of varigated baby wool - Touch yarns. I also bought a fine 2ply lace weight yarn, and some varigated aspire (wool and alpaca) which has a felted appearance. Kylie chose the Aspire for a scarf and hat, but as often happens, the yarn doesn't suit the pattern. I knitted on the bus, and I started a scarf in a lace pattern I remembered. Now I have to figure out what to do in the middle. I also started gloves in the lace weight.
I had a lot of trouble because my cataracts are bad, and I am going for operations next week, and then in December. Hopefully I will be able to see the yarn better.

 I have completed quite a few things, which had been languishing in the UFO pile. This is a shawl for my daughter Lisa. It is Touch 2ply, varigated green, blue, 2ply. It was an easy pattern, as I seem to run into trouble with more complicated lace. It ended up 9 feet long, and 2 and a half feet wide (she wanted it long to throw over her shoulder) It is from the Knitted Lace of Estonia book.

The Perfect Pattern

The internet is such a wonderful resource for knitters. Without it I would be stuck with very little yarn choices, or pattern resources. It has certainly opened my eyes to what is available "out there". Now I fear that I spend more time trolling around looking for the "perfect pattern" whenever I want to start a new project.

There are so many sites with great free patterns, and lots of others where you can download a digital copy of a pattern for very little. Ravelry is such a fabulous resource. You find hundreds of patterns for any one thing you would like to knit. Also you can see other people's fo's and check out which colours you like best.

The trouble is, once I find a "perfect pattern", I then need the "perfect yarn". For sure I don't have it in my stash, and so I need to spend more time on the internet finding yarn. This can be quite costly, as the Aussie dollar is much lower than the US dollar, and then there is postage. Oh well, nothing like buying yourself little presents. As the fo's are rarely for me, this isn't as bad as it seems.

Going back to my Resolutions post, I have now finished 5 of those ufo's and done quite a few other things as well.

The Sweetheart sweater became a cardi for Lihle. I enjoy doing the aran knitting. However, the yarn was a wool blend, and I didn't like it well enough to give away.

I had trouble with Helena, as I couldn't think backwards - it was knit from the top down. I did the sleeves in lace, and haven't done much lace knitting in the round.

Resolutions.

Like most people, I made some resolutions at the beginning of the year. Some days I do better than others. My weight goals get sidetracked with chocolate emergencies (who can do hours of accounts without chocolate?) Now that the worst of the hot weather is gone, we can walk on the beach most days. The garden is a bit sad, but DH has done a sterling job of keeping most things going.

We had two weeks at the Sunshine Coast in February, where it was hot and humid, but gloriously rainy. I took a new project away with me (resolutions don't count on holidays do they?) It is finished, and I made up a cap to match. It is of course, Trellis from Knitty. The third one I have done. It is for my brother's grandson in Perth.
Did I mention it was stash wool?









I finished the green cardi for Jess at work too. Now that I know she is having a girl, I might do something a bit lacier.


I looked after my grandsons over the weekend a couple of times while their mum is recovering from an op. They enjoyed visiting the local duck lake, and playing with our animals. They were such a pleasure to have. They love music and stories, and Kylie sewed machine embroidered T Shirts for them.