Tag: baby knits

Serendipitous Garter Ear Flap Hat

On By iswimlikeafishIn knittingLeave a comment

One of the silliest children’s movies I’ve seen, and therefore one of my favorites, is Gnomeo and Juliet. I cannot actually articulate specific pieces I enjoy about this movie beyond the fact that it constantly makes fun of itself and doesn’t take itself seriously (which is exactly why critics hated it). Everyone I’ve shown the movie to finds joy in it too, although that may be because I offer companionship and commentary rather than letting them watch it alone on their own time. This isn’t a guilty pleasure, this is a sorry not sorry.

It should not be surprising to anyone when I say one of my favorite houses to run by was covered in garden gnomes. They were everywhere and on everything, it always made me smile to run by and a little sad when winter rolled around because they had to be put away. Despite many best intentions, I myself do not own any garden gnomes and there are limited gnome things around our home. I prefer them out in the wild, or at least I do for now. Perhaps I haven’t discovered the gnome yet.

I have, however, discovered the cutest gnome hat (Garter Ear Flap Hat by Purl Soho) and am in love. I’m not saying all babies will now be gifted this hat from yours truly, I’m just saying maybe they should be. For starters, instead of a classic brim, it has ear flaps. Not big floppy ones that can get stuck in various positions not covering the ears but small ones that should cover just enough to keep things warm. Next, it’s worked up in a squishy garter stitch which is warmer than stockinette because there is more room for air the be trapped. Finally, it works up to a neat little point — like a gnome hat — that is the perfect size for a well-placed pom pom.

For this specific hat, I did not use the suggested smaller needled and opted to work the entire hat using the larger one. It also took me about a day to work it up and required a mere 95 yards, aka perfect for a quick-knit gift. Check, check, check.

Finally, I caved and purchase Marshmallow by tincanknits so that I could make matching fingerless mitts (they’re not done). The set won’t be used until this fall, however, I’m super excited to see my little gnome wandering the forest still having use of her hands to pick up rocks and sticks.

Want to make one of your own? Use the discount YARNVIP for 15% off your total purchase from Wonderland Yarns (discount not eligible on sale items, with other discounts, or on yarn clubs). For this pattern, I used a single skein of Mad Hatter in Serendipitous and worked up the toddler size. A single skein should also be enough for me to work up the mitts.

New baby sweater trend? An argument for 3/4 length sleeves

On By iswimlikeafishIn knittingLeave a comment
An off white baby sweater with 3/4 length sleeves laying on a blue rug. The baby sweater's yoke has thick single stripes of brown, purple, green, light blue and blue and there is a wooden alligator toy next to it.

As many of you know, it’s not hard to accumulate a lot of yarn scraps of different amounts from different projects. In the interest of knitting down as much of my stash as possible over the last few months, I’ve started getting creative in terms of how those scraps are used up.

For starters, letting go of whatever weight the yarn is. It’s so easy to hold the yarn double upon itself or with another skein (or several) to manipulate the weight so that different patterns can be worked. I think this is the whole point of Stephen West’s Penguono and know it’s the point of projects such as Tincanknits Marley. I’m a huge fan of the marled look, so this technique is a lot of fun because it allows me to play with color.

If I’m honest, playing around with color seems to be the main motivator for working through my scraps. For this reason, I opted to do a couple different style yokes for two recent baby sweaters. The first uses up a mini skein pack to create thick stripes and the second is a color block yoke from the leftover messenger henley yarn.

A yellow baby sweater with 3/4 length sleeves and a tonal blue yoke laying on a blue carpet. Beneath the sweater is a paddington book and sneaker slip ons with a monster face on them.

The biggest thing I’ve played around with recently, however, has been sleeve length (Note: All of these sweaters use Flax by Tincanknits. I made my nephew a short sleeve baby sweater and cranked out two 3/4 length sleeve baby sweaters for a couple friends who are expecting. The short sleeve sweater wasn’t anything new, however, the 3/4 length was.

While a part of me thinks 3/4 length sleeves on a baby may be silly, the other part of me thinks its genius. Hear me out, our kiddo still fits in her newborn sweater at a year. It does, however, look silly because the sweater now looks purposefully cropped and the sleeves look like they’re the wrong length. By making them 3/4 length from the beginning, they are now poised to grow purposefully cropped. AKA the newborn sweater how has the power to get more wear out of it because knit fabric stretches and the sleeves won’t look funny! I’ve asked my friends to report back, but I feel as though I’ve hacked the system!

A short sleeve dark and light green striped baby sweater laying on a blue rug. Numbered wooden shapes are laid around the sweater.

Bright Red Hyphen Sweater

On By iswimlikeafishIn knitting, patterns, ravelryLeave a comment
Red short sleeved handknit cardigan with a hyphen pattern across the yolk. Coordinating multicolored pom pom hat and cabled leg warmers are laid on top of it.

No matter how you swing it, patroning yarn shops with my husband is different from patroning yarn shops by myself. He forces me to slow down and reminds me to take a look at the gorgeous samples that the shop owner/employees have taken the time to knit up, otherwise, I’m often someone who runs in and out to pick up yarn for a specific project (a habit developed out of necessity when working for Webs Yarn Store). In fact, if he hadn’t been there when I impulsively decided to pop into Norwich Knits I probably would have walked out empty-handed instead of with the two coordinating skeins of Malabrigo that I left with.

The initial plan was to make two short sleeved Hyphen sweaters and while it’s true that I loved working the pattern (the yoke stitches were the perfect pop of interesting), my second plan was to work up a coordinating pair of pants. Then I decided to knit the sweater in a size larger and realized that I hadn’t purchased enough yarn for the pants!

With a quick pivot, I worked up a pair of coordinating leg warmers (I’ll do a separate post on that because I translated a pattern from German and it’s worth sharing!) and a hat. So happy with the end result, right down to the red flower buttons I found.

Speaking of buttons, I used my sewing machine’s button stitch to attach the red flower buttons and I’m sold. Despite the knit fabric, they are firmly attached it took a quarter of the time. 100% recommend this technique :]

Baby Messenger Henley

On By iswimlikeafishIn knitting, patterns, ravelry, yarnLeave a comment
Teal baby sweater with yellow stripes across the yoke and sleeves. Three purl snaps are used to keep the henley neckline closed.

Let me start by saying a few things:

1) I probably should have done a gauge swatch because I would have learned the correct needle size to use. Using a size 5 instead of a size 4 has left me with a size ~12 months instead of ~6 months.

2) You can’t tell, but I put the outie of the snaps on the wrong part (I prefer the outie to attach to the pearl snap side). That being said, this was my first time attaching snaps to a handknit and I have to say I’m a fan.

3) I cannot get enough of this blue yarn, seriously it’s gorgeous and reminds me of jumping in a cool brook on a hot summer day.

4) Where is this sweater in my size? Do I dare seek out a sweater’s quantity of Mad Hatter in Glow Worm for myself?

When thinking about baby sweaters, blue and yellow are such a classic combination. That being said, I love the depth that Glow Worm adds to the sweater — in fact, it was very difficult to choose which color to make the contrast color and which to make the main color. If one had a really hard time choosing or second-guesses the choice they made, there should be just enough yardage to make two inverse sweaters.

The other thing that I’ve learned to like about any baby top is the ability to create a large opening at the neckline. Pre-baby, this was because babies have large heads. Post-baby, this is because it takes a while for babies to be ok having garments go over their heads and a large head hole makes it quick and easy (and you can take it off by sliding it along their body if you’re not brave enough to go back over their head.

I’m tempted to knit this sweater again using the leftover yarn (this would mean a yellow sweater with blue stripes) for my new nephew, but there’s a crochet baby sweater I’m tempted to try. After all, why not keep working on my crochet skills this summer?

Want to make a Baby Messenger Henley of your own? Use the discount YARNVIP for 15% off your total purchase from Wonderland Yarns (discount not eligible on sale items, with other discounts, or on yarn clubs) :]