February Baby Sweater

1.30.2012

Oh, tiny little February Baby Sweater, you rock my world.


You are warm, you hide all the mistakes that I made while knitting you, and you are indeed teeny-tiny.

The only thing that will make me love you even more, is when there's an equally teeny-tiny baby wearing you.

But make yourself comfortable until then, because despite the fact that that I feel that I can't possibly get any bigger, apparently I still have nine weeks to go.


Pattern: Elizabeth Zimmerman's February Baby Sweater
Yarn: Cascade 220 sport weight
Needles: size 4

And We're Back!

1.27.2012

Yes, I'm still alive...just slowly recovering from a week in San Diego with Ben and O.  The trip - our first time flying with O - was amazing but, Oh My God, I am exhausted!  We got home at  a very child-unfriendly 11 pm last night and were rewarded with an over-tired child who cried all night long. Needless to say, I'll be spending most of today laying on the couch - once I get my midwife appointment out of the way.  And for the record, making a doctor's appointment in which you'll be weighed immediately after eating your way through San Diego is a bad idea.  Especially since I could be heard saying throughout the entire trip:

"I'm not leaving until I eat guacamole"
"I'm not leaving until I get at least one churro"
"I'm not leaving until I eat at least one more milkshake"

And so on, and so forth.

Surprisingly, that is not the way to keep your weight down when pregnant and I'm just hoping that the baggage scale that I stepped on at the airport was wrong.


Also exhausting?  Trying to attend a full-day conference while also trying to find time to do some fun things with the family (and enjoy the gorgeous sunshine of course).  But while the entire trip may  have tuckered me out, it was definitely worth it (even if O refused to look at the camera or smile for 99% of the pictures...is it possible to be both a teenager and a toddler at the same time?)








Now, if you need me I'll be fully embracing my laziness today.

Wool Trousers

1.20.2012

Sometimes I wonder where inspiration comes from and sometimes it's abundantly clear.  And it just so happens that these pants fall into the latter category because when it came to sewing these little suckers I was no doubt inspired by the amazingly cute boy's clothes created for this round of Project Run and Play.


The pattern is the Basic Pocket Pants pattern from Meg McElwee's Growing Up Sew Liberated.  For the fabric I turned to my stashed and pulled out yards and yards of wool suiting sample yardage that I bought years ago. The fabric is really unique as it's composed of different suiting patterns so that a fabric store can chose which ones it wants to order (and did I mention that it was cheap, cheap, cheap when I bought it?).


I've always day-dreamed about making a dress out of this fabric but I'm afraid that on me it would just come off as crazy-looking rather than funky-looking so I bit the bullet and cut into the fabric for these little trousers, choosing to make both the pants, the casing, and the bias binding all from the wool suiting (leaving off the cuffs in the process).  In cutting out the pattern I thought that I was diligent in lining up the stripes but apparently I wasn't because the front stripes are around an inch off from one another (damn it!).


Apart from the mismatched stripes though, I love these little pants.  They are a simple and classic cut but can be dressed up or down depending on what contrast fabric (or fabrics) you chose to use).  Plus, as much as I love making dresses for O, pants are really far more practical considering it's pretty chilly around here 9 months out of the year.  So watch out world - you may be seeing many more versions of these pants in the future.



Pattern: Basic Pocket Pants from Growing Up Sew Liberated
Size: Cut out a size 2T with a 3T length because I omitted the cuffs
Fabric: Wool suiting sample yardage

Yesterday vs. Today

1.18.2012

The last couple of days have been crazy and by the end of the day yesterday, I was half-way convinced that the world was conspiring against me.

But today we woke up to a gorgeous blanket of snow, work was cancelled, and all is right with the world once again.


Eating Like Civilized Folks

1.16.2012

I know that I've been quiet on the New Year's Resolution front, but don't be fooled because there are definitely a couple things that I hope to improve upon around here in the coming year - the first being just to waste less.  There's nothing like a massive cleaning spree (which I feel like we've been on for the past three months) to convince you that you probably shouldn't have bought or accepted half of the stuff that you own in the first place.  And so in addition to slowly making our way through all the crap in our house I've also been thinking of ways that I can also waste less every day.


Which has led me to cloth napkins.  You see, we are not fancy, sophisticated people around here and truth be told, we usually just end up using paper towels as napkins for most meals.  And while the majority of those end up in the compost bin, we could probably all benefit from not using them in the first place.  So I dug through my fabric stash (bonus points for using fabric that I already had, right?) and picked out those fabrics that I'm really not in love with anymore and cut squares that measured 20 x 20, aiming to get as many squares out of each piece of fabric that I could.  And then I just sewed a hem around all four sides.  I will say that I attempted to get all fancy and do proper mitered corners, but in the end I ended up doing some made-up version of a mitered corner and while they may not be perfect, they're certainly good enough for me (and for napkins).

A February Baby Sweater For A Baby Due In March

1.13.2012

When I was pregnant with O we decided early on not to find out what we were having and I was completely at peace with that decision throughout the pregnancy.  The only downside to not knowing I suppose was that anything that I made for our baby-to-be was rather gender neutral and so I ended up not making the one thing that I would have loved to make for O had I known that she was going to be a girl - Elizabeth Zimmerman's February Baby Sweater


I'd made this sweater twice before - once it was knit serenely for a newborn niece who is now so much bigger than a newborn.  And once it was knit manically while my dad was in the middle of a two week hospital stay.  While the circumstances in which I  knit the sweaters were so different, I loved the sweater each time that I made it.  The lace pattern is complicated enough to be interesting, but simple enough to be easily followed.  And the sweater can be seamlessly knit, which is by far my favorite way of knitting (Sewing up seams?  No thanks!).  And so when I found out that we were adding another girl to our little family, I knew that this was the one thing that I wanted to make for our new little one.  Of course, it took until I was six months along until I finally got around to digging up the pattern and heading to the yarn store to pick out a skein, but I'm so glad that I did because once again I'm loving making this sweater.  In fact, I'm just loving knitting lately.  I love the fact that I can sit upstairs with my family and knit, rather than having to sequester myself away in the basement where I sew.  And so while my sewing machine has been gathering a fine layer of dust on it over the past several weeks, my knitting needles have seen more action in the past month than they probably have in the past year. 

So here's to warm, cuddly knits...and the little babies that go in them.

Behold! A Painter Is Born!

1.12.2012

I wish that I were one of those parents who is constantly coming up with great arts and crafts projects to do with their kid, but really I'm not.  Or perhaps I should clarify.  Sometimes I have the great ideas...I just never get around to doing them. 

Until now.

I finally remembered the gigantic canvas and paints that I had stored downstairs and with a little begging prompting from O I finally got my butt in gear, lugged them upstairs, and set up a little painting station for her (otherwise known as our dining room table).  My initial grand plan was to trace her body and have her color it in but she had more of an abstract vision, so we decided to go with that instead.

Behold her awesome painting attire - which is actually just my painting shirt rolled up.


And behold the amazing concentration of two year old when she's doing something that she's actually interested in.  This actually kept her busy for hours with only small breaks to eat, drink and nap in between.


And a happily occupied little toddler, makes for one happy momma.

A Purple Pixie Hat

1.10.2012


I know, I know - it's another repeat project, but at least you can't say that I didn't warn you, right?

Plus I love this little hat pattern, so can you blame me?  It's so incredibly simple to make - just comprised of simple ribbing - and the entire time you're making it you wander "how the hell is this going to turn into a hat?"  But then you finish, sew up one seam, and ta-da...a hat is born!


And the other best thing about this hat?  Because it's made up of so much ribbing, it fits your kid's head forever since it stretches so much.  The one I made for O back in the day still fits her head perfectly (and looks pretty darn cute on her, if I do say so myself).

This new little pixie hat, however, is destined for someone else's house and someone else's head as a good friend from college is currently pregnant with her first kiddo.  And I'm happy to report that I actually finished this hat before the baby shower that'll be this weekend.  Woo-hoo!

As for my little model here, O would like you to know two things.

1) A roll of tape is her new favorite toy.  She tapes yarn and paper and books and even attempted to tape her mouth shut the other day. 


2) A tutu is now her default outfit and if it were up to her she would run around the house in just a tutu all day long (with a naked butt underneath, no less).  As much as that look cracks me up every time I see it, we do her require her to wear undies most of the time. I know, we're totally mean parents.


Pattern: Pixie Hat
Yarn: Louet Gems - sport weight (less than one skein)
Needles: Size 2 DPNs

Oh, and the tutu I made a couple years ago using a tutorial similar to this one, although I just used a length of elastic rather than a headband.  Easiest tutu ever!

Sundays

1.09.2012

If you're looking for me on a Sunday night, you'd be smart to look for me in bed, because chances are that I've collapsed in there somewhere around 7 pm.

Because between my ridiculously large and growing belly


And cleaning and cooking meals for the week, I'm usually exhausted by the end of the weekend.

Having something to show for the weekend though - even if it's something ridiculously simple and easy - makes it all worthwhile.

Like baby curtains.  They are sewn and they are up and while they couldn't be easier to make, I am over the moon that they are done.


In fact, I'm pretty sure that I'd be doing a happy dance if I weren't so damn tired.

Little Red Winter Hood

1.03.2012

I should probably just warn you now - there's going to be a whole lot of deja vu going on in this blog in the next couple of weeks.  I don't know if my brain is just not working properly or if I'm just drawn to the comfort of objects that I've already made, but I can't stop making things for a second, third or even fourth time.

My excuse in this case is that the first time I made the Cozy Winter Hood, I actually made it for someone else's little one.  This one, however, will be for our little one-to-be.


Again, I made the smallest size - which supposedly is made to fit a newborn to sixth month old - but again it came out big enough that it fits on O's head.  Oh well.  Maybe the baby will get many years of use out of it.


The outside is made from some uncut corduroy and the inside is some super-soft fleece purchased as the ridiculously fun Seattle Outdoor Fabric store (where you can buy neoprene and Goretex and all sorts of other awesome things).  I didn't have matching ribbons on hand so I just made two fabric ties from the uncut corduroy.  They're a little stiffer than ribbon would be but I suppose that they get the job done. 

And in the end, that's all that I really care about.

Some People

1.02.2012

Some people begin their new year in a hungover daze.

And some people begin their new year with a celebratory trip to ChuckECheese (because somebody has peed in the potty many times by herself.  Don't get too excited though.  That somebody has also decided that her favorite place to poop is in her underwear.  But that's a whole another story...).




On a side note, let me just say that 10 am on new years day is an awesome time to go to ChuckECheese.  Surprisingly, adults don't want to be surrounded by bright lights and beeping sounds after a night of partying.  Go figure.

We, however, had a blast - despite what our mugshot-like pictures may lead you believe.


Yeah, that's right.  We're one totally badass family.