Keeping Warm

It seems like my knitting time is now all about necessities. After Siggi could not keep a pair of socks on (except the ones that left ugly red welts on his leg), I decided to knit a pair that were called “Stay On Baby Booties” from Knitting for Baby: 30 Heirloom Projects with Complete How-to-Knit Instructions, a book I found at a discount book shop near me.

Sure enough, they work. I knit them in Koigu, but I don’t like this yarn. They looked worn after he wore them for one day! I knit them in the 0-3 months size from the book, but his feet are so big that they are too small, really, so I’ve started a new pair with different yarn and more stitches.

I also wanted to make him some “longies”, wool tights he can wear over a cloth diaper. These are by Elizabeth Zimmerman, from Elizabeth Zimmermann’s Knitter’s Almanac.

I think the legs are a bit big for the waist; if I make a bigger pair, I’ll make the top part bigger and leave the legs the same. The yarn is some Shetland yarn that has been in my yarn stash for ages. They are really handy for chilly mornings, I’d like to have another pair and make several for autumn.

The elf doll in the picture is something my mom made for him. He really likes it; he smiles at the face. He also is starting to hold the frog rattle in the picture.

Ungbarnatreyja

This has been sitting in my knitting bag waiting for buttons and crocheted button loops since Siggi was born. Úps. I figured with all that work, I should finish it up. It’s hard to get hand sewing time, but we took a ride in the car so I was able to get it done.

It fits him perfectly now. He just had his 2 month checkup and is 11 lbs. 7 oz (5.2 kg.) and 23.5 inches long (58.75 cm). It would have been fine on him as a newborn too; we could have just rolled up the sleeves. It’s perfect for the weather we’ve been having to wear outside when it’s kind of warm.

The colour is more of a dark blue-green but the flash photo doesn’t do it justice. The bottom photo is a little closer. I am really pleased with how it came out; it makes me want to make another. Maybe for the next baby gift I have to give.

One issue: in a moment of pregnancy fogginess, I convinced myself that there was an error in the pattern and I should knit the chart the opposite way. It made total sense to me at the time. Then when I finished the front I realised it was just me and the big rose was suppposed to be in the centre, not the way I have it. Oh well, I still like it.

Design Flaw

When I was pregnant, I started a baby sweater of my own design. I used Knitting in the Old Way to get the percentages of when to decrease, and used “standard baby measurements” to get the size figured out.

Now that I have a model (underarms are not seamed and ends not woven in), I discovered that I made the ribbing WAY too small. I think the sweater itself is an OK size. So now my dilemma is how to fix it. I am thinking of cutting it and redoing the bottom and then grafting it onto the existing knitting. I’d hate to rip the whole thing out. Thoughts?

Back To Work

Well, due to the American lack of a decent family leave policy, I start back at work tomorow, but at least I can work from home all week. It’s kind of overwhelming. Siggi has just gotten to the point where he doesn’t nurse constantly, I actually get some time to take a shower or maybe even cook food. Ingi will be working all week too so it will be the first week where I am on my own all day and then I have to work on top of it. At least we don’t have to worry about trying him on bottles yet.

It’s funny that the latest knitting project that I started is getting the most use. Siggi has been wearing this hat almost every day. The other hat that I knit I didn’t secure the ties very well and now I have to figure out how to sew the one that broke back on.

The pattern is Baby Domino Bonnet by Lucy Neatby. It was a really fun knit and you can buy the electronic pattern online. I used this and that leftover sock yarn. I went with gender neutrals, but I had a lot of blues, which I guess came in handy since I have the boy. (I figured blues were safe for a girl but pinks were not really safe for a boy, so I didn’t use the pinks). I didn’t think to knit in the ends as Vivian Hoxbro teaches in Domino Knitting until partway through, or I could have made the whole thing without weaving almost any ends in. I still didn’t have so many to weave in.

My mother bought me a Maya Wrap sling for my birthday, which has been a lifesaver. I am actually able to get things done while holding Siggi now. Plus, it is good for when he is crabby and tired but can’t fall asleep, I walked around with him in the sling tonight and he fell asleep.

Stalled

Tuesday night I woke up with pretty regular contractions, 5 minutes apart, but not all that strong. They kept going, and kept going, and kept going, and we got up and cleaned the house and I made yogurt (because I thought it might be nice to have for the labour)… the contractions were still going steady. They kept going at that pace for the rest of Wednesday but not getting any closer together or any stronger… so we went to bed early and when I got up Thursday morning, the contractions had gone away for a while, and then came back sporadically. So we took things fairly easy, went to the mall for a while (to get some walking in, to try to get things going)… stayed until I was pretty tired, came home and had supper and watched a documentary while I worked on finishing up a few things (one the knitting is done and the ends are not weaved, the other is below), and then went to bed.

Today the contractions are stronger, they were really erratic before, I am not sure how they are doing now, but this has been a long prodromal labour and so I don’t want to get any hopes up. So anyone reading this will have to sit on the edge of their seat, same as we are doing here.

I made kjötsúpa for supper and did some work to take my mind off things.

These mittens were sitting in my bag for months waiting for strings, so I finished the strings last night. The pattern is from some 1960’s knitting book that I found at a church sale, and the yarn is the same yarn from the hat I posted the other day.

Maybe the baby was just afraid of having cold hands and waiting for me to finish them. I can always hope, right?

Finishing

On the way to the midwife’s yesterday I decided to finish some things that needed sewing/weaving ends in. Both are from free patterns.

Pattern is The Curly Purly Soaker

Pattern is Djevellue/Sweet Baby Cap. Yarn is from Farmhouse Yarns (we bought it on our drive on Ingi’s birthday last year).

And the best news of all? The baby has indeed turned to the proper head-down position. What a relief! The midwife was pretty positive from feeling it, and we had a sonogram tonight to confirm (and got to see the baby sucking its thumb).

Endless Ends

Well, the knitting part is done, but I left myself a LOT of ends to weave in. You can see the pile of already woven ends that have been snipped, I am maybe halfway through (I wanted to show the ends that were yet to be woven in, but the fabric of the knitting curls too much and hid them).

I still have to sew everything together and find and sew in a zipper, and crochet around the front of the hood. But I hate weaving ends so much that I thought I would do them first.

In the meantime, my cat likes to snuggle with my sheep that I use to store my tape measure and sewing needles and so on.

Baby Socks

It’s less than 5 weeks left until my due date. I can’t believe it. I have had baby on the mind. On my last midwife visit, she gave us a list of things to have on hand for when the baby comes. We washed the newborn size baby clothes that had survived the basement, and are getting the supplies ready. It’s fun to be able to pick out the first clothes that the baby can wear after it’s born.

I’m also frantically trying to finish up my baby knitting projects.

We had to switch midwives because my midwife’s daughter is due around the same time as me, and lives really far away. My midwife had been hoping she was going to come stay with her in February, but that looks really unlikely now. It’s really sad, because I think she’s great and was looking forward to having her at the birth. Her backup is a 45 minute drive away. So at least I get knitting time in the car on the way to and from appointments.

Inspired by the list of supplies, and Silja’s beautiful socks, I felt the need to make some baby socks with leftover sock yarn.

The pattern is Better Than Booties Baby Socks, and I did the Chevron Lace pattern. It was written a little confusingly, in the pattern photo, the lace pattern is on the sides on the top, maybe I misread something, but it’s cute as it is.

This week has been a little exciting/stressful. At my midwife visit Monday, it seemed the baby had turned itself wrong side up (which if it stayed that way means an automatic surgery delivery in my area), so I was stressing over that. Then I had a doctor visit today, and the baby seems to be back to the proper position, but it looked like things might be getting in place for the baby to want to be born… so we want it to stay in there a little longer. Nothing really drastic, I am just supposed to rest and get lots of water and protein. Maybe I will get some knitting done.

Snjór

We are having our first big snow storm of the year. According to the news, we had 10 inches of snow yesterday (25 cm). Everything looks beautiful and white. I love these storms when I don’t have to be out in them. (Now it’s just lightly snowing, and we are supposed to get more sometime tomorrow). I got off the hook from the outside obligations I was supposed to have today, so theoretically we don’t have to go anywhere (although I have to go grocery shopping at some point or we won’t be having supper). This is great, because there is quite a lot to be done before Christmas here. Somehow, the house has managed to get messy again since K’s birthday party last week (maybe it has something to do with us having to use the dining room as an office right now). I have to finish assembling a few gifts, and I am hoping to make time to sew a dress for Christmas Eve. And of course, I want to do some Christmas baking that I could actually eat (no wheat, no butter, no sugar). I think I will make pepparkakor with spelt flour and maple syrup instead of sugar.

Since I haven’t had any knitting content in a while, here is something I finished a while ago and never had a chance to blog about:

I used this pattern. I didn’t sew the little circles on… I thought about doing something more unique, but I may just leave them off.

Working away

I haven’t posted in ages… I’ve been really busy cooking (including making goat’s milk mozzarella and cream cheese and many loaves of spelt bread)… having a special diet really makes you take a lot more time cooking, because most processed foods are not able to be eaten, even some mustard and ketchup!

I have had some knitting time, but it’s dark when I leave for work and dark when I come home, and my camera doesn’t work well without natural light, so I don’t have many fun knitting pictures to post. I had a checkup today with the midwife (everything is going well, although I haven’t gained very much weight) so I was working at home and could take a picture of one of my in-progress projects:

Ingi is busy too. We are trying to get the living room done before Thanksgiving next week, since we are having company (more cooking!). Not sure if that will happen, but at least it looks like a wall and not a big hole anymore.

The joint compound goes on pink and dries white. This would have been really handy when my sister was helping me paint the dining room and we used joint compound to cover the wallpaper-covered plaster wall… it seemed dry until we tried to paint it and made a mess out of it.

I am happy to say our squirrel friend has not come back into the house. I think he’s one of the guys that steals things out of my compost bucket on the back porch. I’ve started leaving old bread and cakes on the porch railing so that they won’t dig in the compost for them.