Little Booties

A few weeks ago I found out that Anna Maria Horner's new book, Homemade Beginnings, had released! I ordered it at a nice discount from Amazon and when it arrived, started looking through it for fun ideas. It's a book full of maternity, baby, toy, and nursery patterns. I haven't decided which ones I'm going to make for Baby Luce yet, but I do have a friend's baby shower coming up. I made two sets of these cute little booties in size 3-6 months this evening. For the most part, they were pretty basic to cut and sew. This is the second time I've felt that Anna Maria Horner's patterns have an awkward way of assembling a lining, but in the end I made it work! I used flannel to line the burgundy set with, and am super happy with their fluffiness.

Local Yarn Shop Tour 2010

This past Thursday through Sunday was the yarn shop hop in Western Washington. I participated last year, making it to 13 stores. This year, Baby Luce wasn't as excited about visiting yarn shops as I was, even though I promised to find things to make for him/her. I managed to make it to 4 on Thursday, and Tom drove me to 3 more before church on Sunday. There were a few more I would like have made it to, but they were all a significant drive. Making it to my favorite local ones ended up working well! The patterns the shops gave out this year (each shop creates a free one skein project and discounts the yarn they use) were not as impressive as last year. However, I did end up with a super cute crocheted scarf pattern to try.

I found a few projects to start working on in the near future. I'll post again as I finish them, but for now here are the ideas.

This yarn is for a little baby hat. If Baby Luce is a boy, then this hat will have to be a gift for someone else.

I've also recently started following the Spud & Chloë blog and keeping an eye out for their cute patterns and yarn. Hilltop Yarns East in Bellevue happened to have them! The yarn was even their project discounted variety. I picked out this cute polar bear pattern and some blue yarn to make the middle sized teddy out of.

Main Street Yarn in Mill Creek had quite a few samples of baby sweaters knit and displayed around their shop. One of my favorites is found in Elizabeth Zimmermann's Knitter's Almanac, which I bought for a good deal.

Lastly I found this un-spun wool at Acorn Street Yarn in Seattle. I've been looking for some for a while to use with Wool Pets, a book my sister got me for Christmas!

Giraffe or Horse?

I made this cute horse with some giraffe patterned minky last week for a cousin's baby shower. I'm still not sure if it's a horse or a giraffe! It was a simple pattern I found at Ben Franklin. It takes about a fat quarter off a minky bolt, a few buttons, E6000 glue, yarn, a dowel, some kind of ribbon or strap for the bridle, and of course stuffing. The only problem I had with it was working around the minky stretching. Because the base of the head is turned under and gathered, it ended up not mattering that it didn't quite match.

Wedding Invitations

I made these a few months ago, and figured I can finally post them without having to edit info out since the wedding is over! These were for my sister's recent wedding. Her colors were (of course) purple, teal, and brown.