Hats

And it came to pass that Stitch N' Bitch taught Erin (girlwhoknits) and Erin taught Kara (knittinglemonade) and Kara taught Heidi (stixandstring)... thus the knitting continued.  Now Erin and Kara are uberknitters and I'm just beginning but let me show you some of my proudest achievements so far.  The "Jon Merrick" was made under Kara's ever vigilant eye.  She taught me how to knit in the round, decrease, and pick up stitches all in one night.  Genius.  It is called Jon Merrick because before it was felted, it could have fit atop the Elephant Man's head and covered it entirely.  It is just the cutest thing.  It doesn't look so great on me right now since my hair is short but it was sooo cute before I cut it off.

Pattern: Brooklyn Cap from Interweave Knits Summer 2006

Yarn: terribly sorry-no idea but some kind of feltable wool

Needles: #11 16 inch circulars and #11 dpns

These two are my favorite and my best.  They were the first thing besides a scarf that I did completely on my own after being abandoned by Kara who callously moved to London!  

Pattern: The Crown from Just Hats

  Yarn: Lion's Brand cotton-ease 50% cotton 50% acrylic 

  Needles: size 8 16 inch circulars and size 8 dpns

Adjustments: I just left the petals off of Will's hat to make it more fitting for a boy.  I must say, they wear these things everywhere and get so many compliments!  Yay me!

Okay, these are the cutest things ever invented.  They take me about 3 hours and I've been making them as the most special baby gifts ever given (except the booties Erin gave my kids when they were born).  People just about die when they get a hand knit item as a gift (I should know... booties) and these are so simple I've even taught friends and family how to do them (yes, me!).  

          Pattern: Children's Cotton Hats from Last Minute Knitted Gifts

           Yarn: Mission Falls 1824 100% cotton or Suss Yarn 100% cotton (Suss is a bit softer)

          Needles: size 7 circular and size 7 dpns

         Adjustments: the only thing I've done is to shorten the i-cord for boy hats 

      so I can just tie them in a knot instead of a bow.  Or you can 

       just skip the eyelet round and  forget the i-cord.  I also did one 

       with two half skeins I had left and made it yellow and green 

      stripey.  SOOO stinkin' cute.  I gave that one to my nephew 

Asher but I'll try to get a photo on here. 

So-I'm working on two shrugs right now (yes, I know I'm a multiple knitter-I'm still scared!) and I will post those photo's as soon as I can.  Mostly this post is for my girls Erin and Kara (especially Kara who did the actual hands-on teaching of me).  Thank you both so much for introducing me to something that has become such a thrill in my life!  All my love! 

OOOHHH! How lovely!

Here they are.  My beautiful KnitPicks  options needles!  Notice how the case sparkles and shines, just begging me to use them.  I am so excited to use them that I'm abandoning a project (my precious alpaca blanket) in order to start a project that requires them.  Also, I've haven't tried socks yet so I couldn't resist the urge to buy this lovely self striping sock yarn in delicious colors like "gelato" and "arugula" and "atmosphere" (not quite as delicious sounding).   I'm so happy, I must away to knit!

Anatomy of a Fit

Lizzy has been eating cookies.  I think she is done so I close the lid.  Here is what happens...

She doesn't like to speak,  she just points and screams.  I try to get her to say "please" or "cookies" so we can cure this siren thing...

She knows that when she screams she gets a hand over her mouth, she has started putting her own hand over her mouth to beat us to the punch...

She is still not saying "please" or "cookies" and I still won't give in so she tries the "hit the deck" routine.  Sometimes she does this so dramatically that she smacks her face into the carpet!

She finally utters some variation of "please" so I unscrew the lid and give her some cookies.  End of fit.

I cannot believe this child.  Will is dramatic but Lizzard takes the cake!  We do this at least 32 times a day.  Don't say it, I already know- Mother of the Year.

Cruisin'

Sorry about the amount of time it's taken me to post.  We've been sick, on vacation and sick again.  STUPID winter.  I hate its stinkin' guts.  We recently got back from Disney World and a Disney Cruise to the Eastern Caribbean.  It was fantastic and the kids (especially Will) had tons of fun.  The weather wasn't so great in Florida so we froze our buns off for the most part but the islands were wonderful (except Castaway Cay on whom we didn't land because of either dodgy boat driving or bad weather-Disney says weather).  I had this great idea to take pictures of my cute cotton baby hats I'm knitting right now on Castaway with the sand and water as a backdrop.  Truth be told, that was my main reason for wanting to go to Castaway (who said taking a 1 year old to the beach was fun?)  Kidding.  Here are some pictures of us on the cruise.  

This is the Lizzard modeling one of the knitted hats I'm whipping out.  Doesn't she look cute?!  The picture shows most of our state room.  It was a 1x1 cell with a TV.  Actually they're really nice but unbelievably small.  

Here's the four of us on the last day of the cruise, never a great day.  We can't wait for the 6 hour wait in the airport and the 5 hour flight home!!!

And here is Will singing (with his personal accompanist A.J.) singing Edelweiss for the Ship talent show.  This was one of the cutest things I've ever seen.  He wasn't scared at all and remembered every word.  And NO, we are not stage parents, he got crazy one night at karaoke begging to sing so we let him and the rest is history.  Also, the outfit of rash guard, swim trunks and broken orange crocs was Will's idea, I tried to dress him in a tux be he would have none of it.  

So, I took some pictures of some more of the knitted hats I've done but I will post them later so those of you berating me for being the worst blogger in the world will have something to look forward to.  Laters!