Little Cardigan for Little Miss

Now that our little girl is here (born August 30!), I can finally put some of my recent tiny knits into the laundry rotation. This cardigan, Vertebrae, is almost shrug-like in the sense that it wraps the arms and back but leaves the front of the chest open. I think the design is ingenious because when my daughter spits up, only her onesie is in the line of fire.

This was the newborn size, but my gauge was off a little and I still only used one skein of sock yarn. This gorgeous orange-pink-red is Knit Picks self-striping yarn, Felici, which is released in limited-time colorways. This colorway, Matador, had been sitting in my stash for about two years. I love having a little sweater for my daughter that isn't cotton candy pink.

Simple Ribbed Cardigan

Another baby gift: Debbie Bliss's Ribbed Baby Jacket. I love the simplicity and sophistication of her designs, and while this particular pattern looked very feminine in the book, swapping purple wool/cashmere for off-white organic cotton and adding a chunky wooden button made the finished project very gender neutral. It would look equally adorable over a pink onesie or a blue plaid shirt.

I added the buttonhole using a 4-stitch buttonhole. I made no other modifications, but I do kind of wish I'd taken measures to keep the bottom hem from rolling. Other than a stiff blocking - which the recipients will probably not want to do each time it's washed - there really is nothing to be done, but I love the finished product, rolling hem and all.

Little Mustard Seed

A friend of mine from my brief stint as a middle-school teacher is having her first baby in September. She and her husband decided to keep the gender a surprise, which I would never be able to do, so I decided to knit her a sweater in gender-neutral Golden Heather and Marshmallow Simply Cotton. I really like this yarn, particularly the worsted weight, because it's organic, machine wash- and dryable, and softer than your average cotton yarn. It does lose about 10% of length after machine washing and drying, by my estimates, but as long as you take that into account when knitting. . . no problem!

The pattern is Little Coffee Bean, yet another wonderful free download available from a Raveler. I really liked the pattern: clear, well written, and very easy for an intermediate to experienced knitter. If I was knitting this specifically for a boy, though, I would swap out the yarnover increases for M1L and M1R increases that didn't produce eyelets.

This just might be my new go-to baby gift pattern, since it only took 200 grams of worsted weight.

I Haven't Been Blogging, but I Have Been Knitting

School's in again, so while I've still been carving out time to knit, I haven't been as good about blogging. As a sort of apology, here's a quick rundown of what's been coming off my needles this month.

Most recently finished is a monster buddy for my son, knit with partial skeins of wool from my stash. The pattern is Adorkable Monster.



I knit a birthday present for my dear friend Frances, but used smaller needles than called for to get more of a neckwarmer. It's Lion Brand Alpine Wool, which is a lovely and soft roving-style yarn.

Simple Ribbed Cowl (pattern link):

Then there was Turn a Square. I actually made two of these: one for charity, and one for my husband, also in stash wool.

And last but not least, the Little Lebowski sweater has been done for a while, but fall is upon us and my son finally got to take it out for a test drive.

I just ordered more yarn (don't tell my husband), and I think these are on deck.

The Little Lebowski

Almost two months after casting on, and 10 days of drying/blocking, The Little Lebowski is finished. This project was inspired by Andrea Rangel's amazing pattern, The Dude; Elizabeth Zimmermann's EPS sweater design theory; and the perfect yarn sitting in my stash.

.

The sweater has a 25" chest circumference and is 16" long with a 14" zipper. It was knit entirely in 1x1 ribbing and has a shawl collar that I improvised as I went. I used three sizes of needles to prevent having to increase stitches in the sleeves, since increasing and decreasing in ribbing is something I've yet to master.

It's intended to be my son's fall jacket, so hopefully it fits like size 2T or 3T come October. My son, of course, detests modeling my handknits, but since it's so unreasonably warm lately, I'm content to wait and get a picture come fall.

Steek: Eeek!

Okay, it's been 24 hours since I did my very first steek, so I think I'm ready to talk about it.

For those unfamiliar with the technique, it involves cutting your knitting: like, with scissors. Perhaps you understand why I wasn't ready to post about it yesterday. The adrenaline/fear has finally worn off, and since I have successfully sewn the newly-formed edges down with no major unraveling crisis. . .



I referred to Eunny Jang's steeking tutorial for guidance, but really this was a by-the-seat-of-my-pants effort. I hand stitched up either side of front-center and then carefully - so carefully - used my sharpest, tiniest scissors to snip my way from bottom to top. I then whip stitched the edges down, reinforcing top and bottom.

Had I to do this over again, I would definitely have factored in some waste stitches at front-center to make turning back the facing a little easier. If you read Eunny's tutorial, you'll see the beautiful little facings she knits. So, note to self: do it the "right" way next time.

The Little Lebowski: Stalled

This in-the-round Fair Isle sweater is slated to become a zip-front cardigan for my son, and of course, because it is an original pattern and a stash-busting project, I have run out of yarn. As evidenced by the picture below, I'm roughly 95% done.



I have a handful of decrease rounds left and then the collar. I'm thinking about doing the steek and adding the zipper, then picking up stitches for the collar at the end. Originally I was thinking of a short, simple crew neck, but now that I have to buy another skein of yarn, I might as well try a shawl collar a la the original adult version. Now I just have to convince some of the other ladies from my knitting group to help me reach the $50 free shipping magic total at Knit Picks. . .

Fairy Tale Cardigan

Done and done, just in time for the first 90-degree day of the year. This pattern is the Gooseberry Cardigan from Interweave Knits Weekend 2009 issue. I made the 48" size and used 13 skeins of Knit Picks Merino Style, which is DK weight, in Fairy Tale.



It took an eternity to block, but it was well worth the effort to get the collar to lie flat. I really like the oversized collar and the long ribbing at the bottom, but think I may have been better off knitting a smaller size for the sleeves, as they seem to bulge under the arms.

The Little Lebowski: Body

After knitting a stockinette version of The Dude's Sweater from The Big Lebowski last year, I was inspired to knit a child-size version for my son with the leftover yarn (Knit Picks Wool of the Andes Bulky in Bare, Caribou, and Coal). I'm also doing this sweater the "right" way, which means the entire garment is worked in 1x1 ribbing.

I toyed with the idea of using a tubular cast on but fear I might be short on yarn. I am, however, using TECHknitting's advice to eliminate the "icky dots" that result from purling in more than one color. Solution: Knit all stitches in the first round or row of a color change.

And speaking of colors, the bulky yarn combined with a pint-sized sweater led me to do away with the more intricate colorwork and use only the repeating "Z" chart (shown below) at the middle of the sweater.



My intent right now is to knit sleeves, then join them to the body and knit around with raglan decreases. Also, I will be doing my first ever steek to turn this into a zip-up cardigan.