Bella Knitting

Happy Birthday, Measure!

Sarah

How did we go from this...

To this...in just one year?

F.O. Friday

Sarah

Sorry I'm not posting to say that the new Bella web site is done...apparently the shopping cart isn't working for anyone with Internet Explorer, which is kind of a problem, so Laura is in the midst of another round of "I'm paying you to make this work, so please make it work now" with the shopping cart vendor. Fun! Except not really.

At least I do have a new F.O. to show you -- my Minimalist Cardigan! Sure, I started it way back when, but it's done now, and I like it. In fact, I was going to wear it today, but it's pouring rain, so I'll settle for posting about it. The pattern called for working the cardigan in moss stitch, my main modification was to work it in reverse stockinette instead. Since I didn't think to do the edge stitches in a stockinette stitch selvedge, sewing this thing up was a complete and total pain. Also, the yarn I used was a wee bit finer than what the pattern called for, so I used a smaller needle and followed the directions for a bust size a little larger than my own. Overall, I'm quite happy with it, and I think I'll be wearing it often, with a camisole and jeans. Now I just need to find a nice pin with which to close it -- for the photo, I just used a hair pin. It works, but it's not the most elegant solution.

By the way, don't you just love the big gob of drool hanging from Measure's chin in the photo? Classy. Thanks to Jason for taking the photos. You can see more here, on my Ravelry page.

Little Devil

Sarah

Arlette and I hung out yesterday, and while we watched the Creature Comforts DVD she brought over (hilarious, by the way) she knit up this super-cute little devil hat for Measure!

See how he's rubbing his hands together? I think he's plotting something...

Teeth!

Sarah

I finally got a photo of Measure's brand new teeth! Slightly blurry, but still, you can see them. It seems like he's been "teething" forever, so it's nice to see some actual teeth. I think he's drooled enough to fill a swimming pool over the past couple of months, though I don't know if that's going to subside anytime soon -- after all, he's got a couple dozen more to go!

Growing Up

Sarah

Every day, several times a day, I act on the overwhelming urge to scoop this little guy up and twirl him around in a big hug, saying "I love you, I love you, I love you." The rapidity of change astounds me -- one day he can't sit up on his own, the next day, he does it with ease. And yet, despite all the changes, I still see the same person when I look into his eyes. Since the day he was born, he looked out at the world and drank it in.

Watching Measure grow up is more wonderful, and more difficult, than I could have possibly imagined. Startled, his eyes widened the first night he heard thunder. He is hypnotized by leaves swaying in the wind. When a dog spins around with uncontainable joy, he lets out a peal of laughter. To him, new and fascinating experiences are hiding behind every corner. That's the beautiful part about being his mother -- I get to watch him as he revels in a world full of novelty.

The hard part is knowing that someday he will learn that the world is also full of ugliness. I can't protect him from this, but I want him to go out in the world knowing in his heart that despite cruelty, despite horrors, despite profound injustice, life is still staggering in its beauty. That the mere improbable fact of existence is worthy of awe. That every living thing is worthy of kindness. That, no matter what, I love you, I love you, I love you.

Tomten

Sarah

I've been admiring Brooklyntweed's gorgeous adult version of Elizabeth Zimmermann's Tomten Jacket for a while now, and planning on knitting one for myself -- I have some gorgeous cranberry-colored tweed in the stash which should be perfect. I'm planning one for Measure in a different color of the same yarn, as well. In the meantime, I decided to knit this as a quick gift project for Ingrid's baby, Gwyneth. (If you're reading this, Ingrid: surprise!) This was an extremely quick project -- less than three days from start to finish -- and I love how easy it was to construct. The only issue I had was in the directions for a hood -- it was too shallow, and I decided I wasn't that into it anyway, so I instead made a long collar with a contrast-color stripe at the bottom. Click on the photo for a link to more detailed shots on my Flickr page.

My Little Monkey

Sarah

Sorry I haven't updated in a few days -- I've had homework, houseguests, and of course Mr. Baby to take care of, not to mention the siren song of Ravelry calling: "enter your staaaaash! look at all these paaateeerns! you want to kniiiiiit theeeem!"

Exciting news, though: I made it to my knitting group. I hadn't been since the week before I had Measure, so it was fun bringing him in, even though I only stayed for an hour or so. I also destashed a little yarn, and was very proud of myself for doing so. Unless it's yarn that obviously ought to belong to one of my friends because it is so perfect for them, I generally have no concept of de-stashing yarn. My standard for destashing is something like "if I can think of something I could conceivably knit with this, I'll keep it," and that's really rather lax. But I've been entering stash into Ravelry and I found a few things that were great yarns in their own way (Rowan All Seasons Cotton, some Adrienne Vittadini marled alpaca stuff, some sock yarn) but that I honestly just knew wasn't ever going to make it onto my needles. The sock yarn and the Vittadini were pretty, but not the right colors for me or anyone I'm planning on knitting for in the near future. The All Seasons was from a striped sweater project that I ended up loathing, and I figured someone else could do something great with the odd balls I had left without looking at the yarn and thinking of the evil, evil project.

In other news, Measure has a Halloween costume. I'd been thinking of knitting something, but dude -- it's a monkey suit. I couldn't pass it up. It's extremely snuggly and cozy, and he didn't mind me putting it on him this morning (unlike Syrus -- the dog -- who hates his little moose costume with a passion and tries to bite the moose head off when he's wearing it, which is hilarious to watch). I think it's  a winner. If you're curious about what Measure has been up to (and of course you are -- like any other parent, I am keely aware that my child is fascinating), he's been doing quite a bit. He'd started staring at our food as we ate, then grabbing at our food, our plates, and our utensils, so we decided to start him on a wee bit of rice cereal, and he likes it. Last night he even grabbed his little baby spoon out of Jason's hand and tried to feed himself. As I've mentioned in an earlier post, he's also teething, but while his itty-bitty bottom teeth are definitely close, they haven't quite popped out yet.

When Ingrid and Gwyneth were over recently, the babies really interacted with each other. They stared at each other, laughed at each other, and even sort-of held hands one time when they were next to each other on the couch, which was adorable. When we held them up so they could "stand" facing each other, Measure would raise his eyebrows, smile at Gwynnie, and say "urrrrr." In response, she would grin and try to touch his face by swinging her arms around until she made contact. Clearly, the foundations for a solid friendship.

Babies = Difficult, Baby Pants = Not So Much

Sarah

If you don't want to hear me whine about trying to get my reader for the one class I'm taking this semester (and why would anyone want to pass up on that?) scroll down to the bottom of the page for the cuteness.

Right now, Measure is teething. It's not as bad as I thought it would be, actually: he cries now and then, but most of the time he's still my happy little guy. The problem is that teething makes him a little more irritable than usual, so when I try to put him in his carseat and take him anywhere, it's a recipe for Screamy Baby with a side of Pitiful Tears. Not something I like to see on the menu. (Measure is, as you may have guessed, decidedly not one of those babies who is quickly put to sleep by the soothing sussurations of a car's engine.) And so, when I realized I had to go to campus to buy a course reader -- a half-hour drive in zero traffic, not counting time to park, which can double that on a bad day -- I was presented with a dilemma: take Measure with me and hope he wouldn't go completely ballistic in the bookstore, or go at a time when Jason could take care of him at home, and simply be as quick as possible.

So yesterday morning I left bright and early (hoping to beat traffic), leaving a very calm baby with his very bleary-eyed daddy. I didn't get much traffic on the freeway, but as soon as I got into the city, things took a turn for the worse. Everyone in the world, it seems, had decided to try to enter the city at 19th avenue at the same time I did. Grrr. It had already been 45 minutes since I left the house. Then, a small bit of luck -- I was able to find a metered parking spot right in front of the Humanities building, which cut parking time way down from what I expected. I hurried to the library, trotted down the stairs, rushed over to the spot where my reader should be....and it wasn't there.

You can imagine what sorts of words I was muttering under my breath as I stomped (as much as anyone can stomp in flip-flops) over to the service counter, so I won't repeat them here. I asked a clueless looking "help" person if there were any copies of the reader at hand which were not on the shelf. He futzed around with the computer and said no, but I could get the reader "today." I asked if I could simply order a copy, then, and pay to have it shipped to me overnight, because I needed to get it soon in order to prepare for m Monday evening class. He seemed confused by the request. After repeating the question a few times with minor variations in phrasing, I apparently hit upon a combination of word-sounds which provoked a new response: "Could you ask someone whether this is possible?" Apparently yes, he could ask someone. He toddled off.

After a good five minutes or so (five minutes isn't a long time, unless you are picturing a baby at home slowly coming to the realization that MOM ISN'T HERE!, which to a baby means the Apocalypse is surely upon us) he finally toddled back.

"Yes," he said, we can ship it to you. I sighed with relief. "But it won't go out today," he added. Relief evaporated, and was replaced by a chill fog of intense irritation. "Excuse me?" I asked.

Turns out, my options were to either have the reader mailed to me at an indeterminate point in the future which would essentially guarantee I wouldn't get it in time, or to go to the library and have it printed up on the spot. Service Desk Guy thought it would take about twenty minutes to do so, which I thought was a laughable bit of naiivete on his part -- San Francisco State is incapable of anything approaching such efficiency. To illustrate: before Jason and I were married I used the school's insurance and picked up my prescriptions on campus. To do so, you get in one line, where you present your prescription, then go away and get in a completely different line, in a completely different room, to pay (and if you want to pay with a credit card, you have to get in yet another line to do so on one of three computers), then go back to the first line to actually pick up your prescription. It's like they have competitions to see who can come up with the most ridiculously inefficient way of doing things.

Anyway, I then asked Service Desk Guy if it would be possible for a reader to be made and placed on hold for me so that I could try to come back later, perhaps Saturday. I don't know if this guy was just not caffineated or what, but he was not so quick on the uptake, but after a couple of minutes I convinced him that yes, we could do this, we have the technology. "But you'll have to pay for the reader now," he said, apparently already having forgotten that I had been trying to throw money at the Bookstore in exchange for my reader for the entire preceeding conversation. Naturally, this being SFSU, I couldn't pay him, so we went upstairs, I paid, put my name on the reader order form, yadda yadda, and finally I was free to go home to Measure, who by this time was probably by this time probably speeding through Anger and kicking in the afterburners to reach Incandescent Rage. Of course there was an accident slowing traffic on the way back.

The good news is, Jason's grandma stopped by to visit Measure yesterday, and she is now officially the Sweetest Person Ever, because she has offered to pick up the reader on my behalf. Now I just have to hope that they actually have it ready and on hold -- but don't worry, this time I'm going to call first and make sure they have it. (Which I should have done yesterday, I know.)

Aaaaaanyway...More baby pants! Cheryl made this adorable pair out of Lorna's Laces Shepherd Worsted in Envy. You know how they say "great minds think alike"? It's totally true. I have a ball of the same yarn in the same exact color, which I bought to use for the same exact pattern. The yarn works up like camoflauge, which I think is really cute. I like to imagine a team of babies going on a little recon mission in the forest in these. "The teddy-bear tea party is two klicks away over that ridge, Captain Cutiepie, sir!" "Good work, Schnuggums. We'll waddle out at dawn."

Little Boy Blue

Sarah

Since Measure was born in May, he hasn't exactly needed much in the way of sweaters. In fact, most days he hangs out in just a diaper, only wearing his (many, adorable) shirts when it's time to go somewhere, as I don't think bare skin would feel very comfortable against the carseat straps. The other day, though, it was a little on the cool side, and when it's cool here, it's even chillier at the farmer's market in San Mateo, so I busted out one of Measure's handknit sweaters.

This is the Kai sweater from Louisa Harding's "Natural Knits for Babies and Moms." I used this pale blue Blue Sky Alpaca cotton instead of the organic cotton, and added a couple of stitches to make it somewhere between the 6 month and 12 month sizes. Good thing, too, because the neck was just wide enough to fit over his head -- and he's not even four months old yet. Measure's torso is a little on the long side, but still, it seems odd that the sweater is just long enough lengthwise and yet the arms are so long I had to turn up the cuffs. It's okay, but this is just further evidence that designing for babies is difficult. Newborns can vary tremendously in size, and their proportions can also vary.

Here's what I learned from all of my baby sweater knitting: make the neck much, much bigger than you think you need to. Make the torso longer than you think you need to -- if a sweater is a little long, it's no problem, but if it's a little short, it looks weird. Baby arms are kind of short relative to their body size, so for very young babies the arms can be a little shorter than you might think. But I think the main lesson I learned is that for me, the most useful handknit gifts tend to be things like blankets and hats -- I get a lot more use out of Measure's Honeycomb blanket (his looks like this) than I do out of his sweaters, because blankies are so easy to throw on and off as the day warms or cools.

Pretty much every knitter has knit for a baby at some point, and I know many of you have kids of your own, as well -- so tell me, what has your experience been like when knitting for wee ones? Are there styles and patterns you like, or designs that drove you batty? What's your stance on the use of acrylic for babywear? Leave a comment -- I'd love to hear your stories!

P.S. Knitting Hawkeye is having a really funny contest, with gobs of sock yarn as a prize! I thought you might like to know.

P.P.S. I turn 27 today! If I could share birthday cake with all of you via the internets, I totally would. So I will imagine handing out cake, and if you want some, you can imagine eating it. This way, everyone gets their favorite flavor!

Hooray for Babies

Sarah

Babies seem to be popping up all over the place -- I know quite a few people who have either recently had babies, or are expecting. For my next-door neighbor, I decided to knit a little silver blankie kind of like this one my friend Carel made for Measure (which I later knit my own version of, as well.) I'm using four balls of Muench Touch Me chenielle, and I'm planning on edging it in the Louisa Harding Nautical Cotton. It's a simple basketweave stitch, and the edging will be some easy crocheted scallops. Right now, it looks like a silver blob, but when it's washed, the Touch Me shrinks to become a lush velvety fabric -- I can say with confidince that it is, indeed, as soft as a baby's butt.