Here are the booties I knit to match the bonnet. I'm so tickled with them. They are just too cute for words.
The little bees are my favorite part of this whole design. I've used some organza ribbon for the wings and burned the ends to prevent fraying as the pattern suggested.
Can't wait until there are some little feet to fill these. In the meantime, back to knitting the matching romper!
In my ongoing search for cute baby knits I came across the Honey Bee Romper pattern by Marcelline Simonotti.
I wasn't familiar with this designer before but we've been in contact since and I was surprised to learn that she is a fellow wool-free knitter. How great is that? Her many lovely designs are proof that even without using wool you can knit some amazing stuff.
I've just completed the bonnet to this set so far. I am knitting it up in Cascade's North Shore acrylic Daffodil color 18 which I thought had a nice honey bee tone to it and I'm pairing it with a Berroco Comfort Dk Solid yarn in coffeeberry heather.
My favorite thing is the little bee -- I mean does it get any cuter than that? And it's such an easy knit and the pattern is clear and easy to follow.
And if you think the bonnet is cute, just wait until you see the rest of the set. I'm starting the booties next so stay tuned.
After what has felt like an eternity, I am happy to say that the back of my acorn cardigan is now complete and boy, am I glad to see the back of it!
In case you've forgotten, I'd got about 2/3rds of the back knit when I noticed a mistake in the cable pattern so I'd tinked that down and reknit it all back up and was on my merry way when I encountered an issue in my stitch count and it was so significant that I had to take a serious look at the pattern and that's when I realized I had cast on for the wrong size. So I frogged the whole thing and started again.
I'm knitting this cardigan in a finer gauge yarn than the pattern calls for plus I am using denim yarn so I've had to knit the whole thing 12% longer to account for the shrinkage. Which is also why it looks a bit stringy right now -- once it's washed and shrunk the stitches will pull together nicely.
The sleeves are already knit but I still have the two fronts of this cardigan to do. However, I'm thinking of taking a break and working on something else -- preferably with a bulky yarn and no cables. We'll see. What project are you finishing/starting this year?
Years ago, before I was a "real" knitter, a setback like this would have been the end of the story. But I did rip the whole thing out and started over. I'm right back where I discovered my mistake and it's the right size and the cables are turning out well and I'm really glad I persisted with it.
It's a slow knit (and I've got some other things on the needles that distract me from working on this one) but I will finish this sweater eventually and I'll be so glad I did.
Take 2: Acorn Cardigan (back). Pattern by Amy Herzog. Yarn is Kollage Riveting.
I had made it this far up the back of my Acorn Trail cardigan. I had (about 4" into it) ripped back the center cabled section and reknit it to correct an error I'd missed right near the start.
When I finished the first decrease section I checked my stitch count. It was perfect. For the wrong size.
I double checked my count and the pattern instructions and it was then, much to my dismay, it dawned on me that I'd cast on the wrong # of stitches right at the start.
I've ripped the whole thing out and I'm starting over. Sometimes knitting makes me cry.
We were on the plane heading to Cabo and I was happily knitting away on my Diagonal Pinstripe Scarf when a horrible realization hit me. The ball of main color yarn I was knitting with (less than a day's worth) was the ONLY ball of main color I had packed. The other balls were all sitting at home in my knitting basket. I felt sick. Four days of rest and relaxation ahead and no yarn to knit with?
I seriously considered ripping back the scarf, which at that point represented about a week's worth of knitting, just to give myself more yarn.
In the end the weather was so fantastic that I was rarely out of the pool so I had enough yarn to make it through the trip home.
Cabo is beautiful this time of year with or without yarn. But I do wish that someone there would open a yarn store!
We have just returned from a very quick trip to the French Alps via Geneva. We were at the Club Med, Val Thorens for a ski weekend courtesy of my husband's annual company club trip. The drive to and from the airport offered stunning scenery even before we reached the Alps.
Annecy, France -- an enchanting town we passed through enroute that has a beautiful lake with canals and stunning architecture. I would love to spend more time in this historical place.
The hills were vibrant with the new greens of spring growth at least that is until you get up above the tree line.
The altitude of Val Thorens is 2300 m. Let me tell you folks, you don't doubt the fact as you drive up, up, up, the curvy mountain roads.
We took the three gondolas up to the top lift (a mere 3230 m). And no, I did not ski down from that height (although some of our party did), but it's an amazing 360 degree view of the Swiss, Italian and French Alps.
On Monday we had about 4 hours to explore the old town of Geneva before our final dinner and departure.
The famous floral clock in the center of the city was made up with colorful spring pansies this month -- so stunning.
There was a lot of plane time for knitting and I started (and finished) the second sleeve of my Acorn Cardigan. We have only made it back as far as Toronto so there's another 6 plus hours of flight time tomorrow night as we wing our way back to San Francisco. I might start on one of the front panels.
When I first returned to knitting I was a very monogamus knitter, slightly horrified by tales of knitters who had to buy multiple sets of needles because other sets were tied up with WIP's. Stories of large stashes of yarn made no sense to me either (except, perhaps, in the case of those who lived far from a local yarn shop).
But now I have a good sized stash (and still never the yarn I want in the moment) and several sets of needles in my most-used sizes and at current count 4 WIP's which is, for a mostly monogamous knitter like myself, 3 too many.
So I'm finally working away again on my Sonoma Stole. This gets discarded regularly because it's the kind of project you really can't travel with (not even around the house). I'm working with 7 different colors of yarn (yes, a great scrap project) and I need to have scissors, chart, colored pencils and so forth scattered about me as I knit. I"ve not been measuring the fringe "exactly" as I go, so I'll have lots of measuring and cutting of that let to do at the end. Maybe because I work on this project so infrequently I find it hard to keep track of where I am and where I'm going so I also need peace and quiet to work on it. Then after awhile I get bored of knitting in peace and quiet.
So this one sits in the basket by my knitting chair and now and again (like on this rainy Saturday) I pull it out and work on it. It's pretty and I want to finish it because I want to start wearing it but I'm not even to the half-way point yet. I think it's going to be the WIP of the year because you know, I've got 3 more WIP's yet to knit and I'm sort of itching to start something new!
Florence and I are taking a little time apart. It all started when she pretended I was finished knitting all her stripes -- like 7 stripes were actually 9 and I bought the story hook, line and sinker. Because at a quick glance with my 50+ year old eyes those numbers can look the same, right?
And then she didn't 'fess up until I'd done the border increase row and frogged it about 5 times before realizing I'd never have the right number of stitches because I was 2 stripes and 80 stitches short. Florence knew this all along but revealed nothing.
But I forgave her and I knit the two extra stripes adding the missing 80 stitches as we went along. And we were all good with the stitch count. I counted it 3 times. And then I started the border and stitches went missing, and then there were too many stitches, and then there were just the right number but then not really and I tried and tried and tried to make it work but Florence was having none of it. So I left her behind in SF and I flew to Boston knitting the first sleeve of this.
You might have noticed that the pattern calls for an Aran weight yarn. I'm using Kollage Riveting Sportweight. I was considering this other pattern by Amy Herzog which calls for sport weight yarn. Then I saw Acorn Trails and decided I liked it better. And during some sudden absence of all brain activity I just "assumed" that it too was written for sportweight yarn. Because that's what I was looking for. So, I purchased the pattern, I printed it off, and only then did I notice that the pattern called for Aran yarn. I was dumbfounded.
The good news is that I did the math and by knitting the largest size in this pattern it will give me the right gauge for the size I need and that makes it pretty easy to adapt the pattern to the yarn. Although I still had to do the math for the shrinkage factor you get with denim yarn.
So far, the stitch count is perfect. No frogging has taken place. Proof positive that despite all evidence to the contrary, Florence is the problem not me!
I've finally gotten around to trying out the Black Pearl yarn I bought last fall (pink and grey) and I'm knitting it up into this Florence shawl. So far the stripes are done and I'm starting on the lace border.
The Black Pearl yarn has a lovely smooth feel and a pretty sheen to it. The yarn is not quite a solid color --there's some variation with the dye but it's very subtle and I like it.
This has been a VERY simple pattern so far - I'll let you know if I feel the same after I've completed the lace border.
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