Heirloom Knit Baby Blanket

I'm really not sure what possessed me to knit a baby blanket. A some point I got thinking about all the knitting my Gramma Fearnley did and how so much of that knitting was baby things. This certainly wasn't out of a quantity of babies in my family! They are pretty few and far between really. So many women of her generation knit baby things compulsively it seems. I can see the attraction of those small, portable projects, you only have to look at my socks to see that. Also, often vintage style baby things are lace knitters Mecca, so much details in such a small space.

So I ended up picking up some cream coloured yarn. Apparently the yarn fumes got to me and it's not wool. Not sure how that happened?! Then I landed on the Heirloom Baby Blanket (rav link), a pattern by the Craft Council of America.

What attracted me was that the blanket is knit is strips. Sounds good huh? Small portable just became even more portable. It never occurred to me that all those strips needed to be knit together. Then the lace edge, knit separately, then sewn on. Yup, that's about 4 billion miles of seaming. So, the blanket sure wasn't done for the fall fair 2009, maybe I'll still have it around for 2010 because I don't see any bellies developing in my immediate vicinity.

Check out this pic though.... that's me working on the blanket last summer!

A Great Little Knit

I have been rolling along finishing a bunch of projects this week that are hanging around both physically and emotionally. I agreed to knit this little hat up for a friend's Mom for a Christmas present. She has lost all of her hair to chemo and is finding things a little cold.

From "hats gloves scarves" by Louisa Harding (rav link) this is a great hat. Knit out of Lang Silk Dream it's going to be super warm and extra soft on her head. I hope she enjoys it!

What's On the Table 2010

I have spent a few days working in an area I'm not always completely comfortable in. Home dec and upholstery. Now that it's all wrapped up, I'm pleased. Curtains are always a challenge working in the space that I have. Throw pillows are something I could do more of though, each are little pieces on their own. I'm not sure if there is a market around the area for this kind of work though. Making them is time consuming.

Revival "The Making Of"

Before Christmas I spent a bit of time helping out my friend Matt with his latest Creepy Puppet Project. He bases many of his zombies on a 1/4 scale molded skeleton. Conveniently, in school I learned to draft most of my flat patterns using 1/4 scale slopers and still have them. So, making zombie clothes is just like making real people clothes only using less yardage. Excuse the bad photos of these, they were meant more as a visual communication between Matt and I as we live 6 hours apart.







I'm sure Matt worked his butt off for weeks in the interim but when Jenn, Paul and I arrived at his place he got us to give him a hand doing some green screen dancing skeleton work. This is a screen grab of what we were up to. For three non puppeteers that's a lot of limbs to get moving in coordination.




Ultimately, this is what things ended up looking like.



Please, take a minute to go and subscribe to Matt's channel on Youtube. He's working hard to expand the CPP and those numbers help.

A Slow Start

It really is better to creep up on the new year isn't it? Where have I been? I've been resting a lot, I think I am fully recovered from night shift over the holidays, trying to get lots of exercise and get my strength back to where I was before my car accident, working on the back log of sewing jobs that seem to pile up. As well I have been keeping up with my schedule of therapies to get my bod back. In my defense of my lack of blogging... I give you a Year in Socks....

mmmm.... only eight pair. That's less than one a month, I'd better get crackin'. My goal this year is twelve pairs of socks.