Finishing Girlchild's projects

I loved this dress on the cover of "Handknits for kids". Girlchild loved it and asked me to knit it and a mouse from the book for her. So we ordered some Knitpicks shine to knit the dress up (it would have cost me about $95 to knit it out of the yarn specified, a smidge out of my budget for a dress the kid will stain even if I put her in a white room alone). And I knitted. And knitted. And knitted. She would stand next to me on occaision and ask if she could try on the pieces and when would I have it all done. I finished up the crochet edging (which wasn't as bad as I feared) last night and this morning I wove the ends in. As I wove in the last end Girlchild was standing next to me stripping out of her jammies to put the dress on. I explained gently to her that there's still some embroidery to do on the dress, and she explained not so gently to me, that she doesn't want the embroidery on the dress she just wants to wear it. The dress is so large on her (she's on the thin side) that when it becomes to short to wear as a dress we'll find some pink, red or turquoise leggings for her to wear and she should be able to wear this for a long long time (or at least until it's stained or ripped, because I'm sure one of those will happen before she outgrows this.

So we'll see if I can get this little project finished. Perhaps tonight when we pry her out of it to wrestle her into her jammies I'll sit and do the embroidery, or perhaps I'll just let it stay an embroider-less dress. Either way, she's paid me the highest compliment by wearing it (as I type this she's matching shoes to the dress)



Edit: There was a box awaiting my attention at the post office today. I thought that it was, perhaps, a sweater that Engineer-boy had ordered me for Christmas. It was not. Which is okay because it was from my secret pal!!! I now know her name and that she has a way of knowing just when I might need a pick me up package (she calls it being very tardy, I call it perfect for how my today was going).....Okay so I still don't know how to put pictures where I want them here. You can see what was in my package above. A yummy smelling candle, some chai mix (I love chai), a beautiful beautiful flowered tote with my name inside, a tin of lip balm (my favorite and my last tin is almost empty), a nifty little hand knit sweater, and a lovely hank of koigu!! Thank you!!

Merry Christmas

Happy Christmas, Merry Holiday and all that stuff. Santa has come it looks like a wrapping paper company has exploded in the den. Don't think any knitting will be happening today, just lots of fun family stuff. Hope yours is happy too.

Is your holiday knitting finished? (for this year, not last year)

I am famous for thinking that I 1. Knit faster than I truly do 2. Have more time than I truly do and 3. Will not bore of knitting a dozen of the same project. (I'm sure there are others but at the moment that's the best I can do). Shortly after Christmas last year I decided that the perfect gift for my husband's two sisters and their husbands would be lap afghans. My mother swore that knit on big needles this light and lofty, or soft and fluffy or whatever the name of that terrible yarn is, would knit up super fast, after all she knit up a couple of them. So I optimistically bought the yarn and cast on. Nearly 12 months later after avoiding knitting on this albatros I finished up one, smaller than it should be, lap robe. It will go to my sister in law with the 4 kids that I swear break everything they can get their grubby little hands on. My other sister in law with the grown civilized son and her husband are getting a lovely pottery garlic holder from a local potter. My sister is getting a pair of socks and a pair of fingerless gloves. My husband is getting a pair of fingerless gloves (he requested a new pair a few months ago) and that dear reader is the extent of my holiday knitting. I have knit a few tiny sweater ornaments and given away, but this year I am not madly knitting up until Christmas Eve and then hoping that my knitted object will block dry before Santa shows up and I can hide and wrap it. Nay dear reader, this afternoon I have cast on a sock for myself and plan to knit on it over the school holiday while my kids are home and my mother (who talks through any movie or tv show you try to watch) visits. I plan to drag my mother to a yarn store in Boulder that I've never been to, but hear is fabulous. So yep, my holiday knitting is gloriously finished. (okay, but the house still needs a good cleaning, and I've done no baking or candy making.....but...the knitting is done)

I hope you have a wonderfully relaxing Christmas!

Madeline has a new sweater

Girlchild loves her Madeline dolls. I remember seeing them in a toy store a couple of years before she was born and thinking how fun it would be to have someone to buy these neat dolls for, they had so many clothes, and they were so much cuter than Barbie. Flash forward a few years and I have a daughter to buy these cute little dolls for. The toy store where I found these dolls is gone, but no problem right? There's lots of neat toy stores out there right? Well, this is when I found out that my beloved Madeline dolls have been discontinued. Yes, just as girlchild is getting old enough to have the dolls you can no longer find them. So you visit ebay. Often. You buy a couple of dolls from a local toystore that still has a couple and you visit ebay to get your Madeline fix. Then at Christmas time you knit up a few sweater ornaments and you realize that with just a few modifications you can make these sweaters fit Madeline (forget trying to get the Barbie sweaters to fit her). You spend a morning knitting instead of doing the myriad of holiday things you should be doing and this is what you end up with:


I am sure that there are plenty more Madeline sweaters in my near future. Perhaps the next one will be a cardigan. This little number was knit from the top down and completely seamless. There is a slit in the back because there is no way that big ol head of Madeline's was going through the little neck opening. It was knit with Bernat Sox yarn on size 2 needles (size 1 for the ribbing, such that it is)

Girlchild's felted hat

Okay the pictures came out backwards, the hat didn't grow, but boy did it ever shrink!! This would be the yarn that girlchild and I dyed the other day with Easter egg colors. I felted the hat this morning and she modeled the still wet hat for me. It's first trip through the washer it barely felted at all. I was disappointed because it was still pretty big on her (enormous) so I threw it in again with a pair of jeans I keep for this purpose. It didn't do much and didn't do much and suddenly it was tiny. So I pulled and stretched and the child now has a very bright, very felted hat. I had considered poking some holes in the top of it, running some i-cord through and calling it a purse....