Shades of Green

The Squid found the Surprise Jacket and put it on. She loves it. She loves the short sleeves. She loves the cotton yarn. And it actually kind of fits her. If I had more yarn I'd take out the bound off edge and add more to it, giving it a bit more length and width. Alas. So I think I'll just add buttons, let her wear it for a bit, and then when she's done with it I can add the extra length that the Mole needs to make it a long-sleeved sweater. I have enough yarn for about 10 more rows on each sleeve.

I have to say this color is perfect for the Squid. She has these mercurial color-shifting eyes and this olivey-sagey-green is the exact match of one of the colors they sometimes become (and they fixed color they were before they started changing this past spring).

Oh, and I have no idea what the Mr. Roboto pose is in the photo. you should see the others.


I also got back to work on Arwen a bit, taking some time off from the Tomten. It'll be January before it's cold enough for such a heavy jacket if this weather keeps up. And I wanted to work with more reasonable sized needles for a bit.

I got a big ahead of myself and made some "improvements" which resulted in tearing back to before the sleeve cast on a total of three times. I'm taking notes, though, and I hope my "improvements" do indeed turn out to be useful. Remind me to check the knitalong notes for future projects.

Surprise!

Surprise! I loved the bootees so much, that I've finally decided to take the Baby Surprise plunge. I have 3 skeins of Elsbeth Lavold Cotton Patiné that I'm lukewarm about, so I figure that's a good test run. If nothing else it'll work for an over-the-jammies extra layer at home.

I'm knitting on 5s and getting 5.5 stitches to the inch, which is exactly halfway between the gauge cited for "baby" size (6 stitches) and "1 year and more" size (5 stitches). The Mole is 6 months old, so halfway should do it. If not, he'll grow into it. And cotton will work year-round. I've incorporated the extra arm stitches into the cast on, and plan on picking up and knitting down to extend the sleeves to full length. I have to say the 3/4 length sleeves on the Baby Surplice we have are a very practical length, but if I get this right I'm going to want to make another one knit tightly with wool as a jacket, and I'll want longer sleeves.

The yarn is fine, not so splitty. Soft enough. The color is fine. It feels a little weird in garter, so we'll have to see how it drapes and wears.

Oh, and for everyone who asked: the bootees pattern is from The Opinionated Knitter, page 108. I cast on 43 instead of 51, picked up 10 on each side, and only did 3 "ridges" of plain garter before the toe decreases. My gauge was 4.25/inch using worsted weight yarn, and they fit perfectly.