Quick knitting update.

Just an update about my knitting. I have not been good with posting. I am currently 12 weeks and 3 days pregnant, and have been so tired it is a miracle when I get anything done. So my blogs and knitting have been suffering here lately.

I have been doing some knitting in the evenings when I can manage to stay awake, lol I scrapped that gray pair of socks for my husband and restarted with a much more stretchable stitch pattern. I am done with the foot and heel, and have a couple inches of progress on the legs. I think they are looking nice so far and hopefully I'll manage to have them done in a week or two.

I started an over sized sweater for my 7-year-old daughter recently. I think I talked a little about converting a poncho I didn't really care for into a sweater for her. I actually started on it! It is a pinkish hued (the color name is Parfait) LionBrand Homespun yarn, which will be good for a little girl who loves everything pink. I am almost done with the body and will split for the arm holes in a couple more rows. I am using size 10 needles so it will go a bit faster. I was going to use my size 11 needles, but the threaded part on the cable broke off inside of my needle (wasn't using anymore force than normal to tighten it) :( So much for that cable and set of needles :( Next time I make an order to Knit Picks I will buy a replacement. I was pretty upset over it, as I love my nickle plated Knit Picks needles. Thank goodness their needles aren't expensive.

The orange dress is done. I finished the knitting a while ago. I crocheted around the edges a couple days ago, and just finished weaving in all the ends last night. Feels great to have it finished! I think it turned out pretty nice. Now comes the hard part though, blocking it. The skirt is huge! I have no idea how I am going to block it unless I just do sections at a time. I'll post pictures after I get it blocked.

I have a ton of projects planned for the future. My baby is due in May, and I have a huge stack of patterns already. I have patterns for hats, blankets, leggings, pants, wool soakers, rompers, sleep sacks, bibs, washcloths, and anti-scratch mittens. Besides the stuff for my baby, I will need to find a pattern specially for my niece's baby that is due in March. I usually make blankets for expectant babies of family and friends, and I never make the same one twice. To make things harder (in the area of gift giving anyway), the couple is waiting until birth to find out the gender, so whatever I make will have to be gender neutral. It may be tricky finding a gender neutral pattern and yarn that is still unique and pretty. I will be doing a ton of knitting!

That's all for now. This is my 3rd blog post today, and frankly I am all blogged out, lol Hopefully I'll remember and post a picture of those socks later today. :)

Knitters block.

This past month has not been good for knitting. I managed to get a set of placemats made for a wedding gift, but everything else I touch goes horribly wrong. Of course I forgot to snap a quick picture before wrapping it :( The socks I was making for my husband are a mess! The pattern just didn't have enough stretch to it to compensate for the cotton yarn. I don't even want to look at the orange dress anymore with all the problems I've had with it. I am having issues shaping the top :/ I have reknit that top at least 4 times. I am trying a very simple approach now, but it's looking like I may have to go an entirely different route with the top of the dress.

I have never really had problems shaping garments as I knit. I am a pretty good progress knitter and do most of my knitting this way. I just seem to be stuck in a bit of "knitters block" if such a thing even exists. This has been quite frustrating and is sucking the joy out of knitting. I may need to make something from a pattern just to feel like I can knit again.

I will be working on the orange dress again today, though I don't have much hope for it going well. Would it be too weird to knit the bodice from the top down, then join it to the skirt? If this attempt doesn't work any better than before, I may consider making the top separately. I will be so glad when the dress is finally finished. It is such a large project, so will be nice to have it complete. Obviously I won't be wearing it to a wedding (wedding was nearly 3 months ago) but will take some pictures.

Besides the orange dress I don't really have any projects going. I am done messing with the socks for my husband. I will reuse the yarn to make socks, but I am still too upset to do that now, lol I saw a really cute baby blanket on Knit Picks website, but can't spend the money on the yarn right now. I have random scraps of yarn that I should find a way to use up. I have an afghan stored away that needs finished still. It was a crochet afghan I had nearly finished several years ago. I really should finish that someday. Speaking of crocheting, maybe I should just crochet the top of that orange dress. It would be much easier to control the shaping and make a much more drastic increase without it looking bizarre. How sad I didn't think of this before, and frankly a bit embarrassing...

Wish me luck, I need it!

Kid's dress.

I completed this dress awhile ago, but didn't post it until now. I made this using Knit Picks Shine Worsted in the color "Sky." it looks a bit disheveled, but she has been wearing it a lot and being her usual high energy self (in other words, it is a miracle the dress is still in one piece).

Socks in progress #4

One heel complete, one in progress :)

Yarn.

I ordered some yarn for my recent 28th Birthday, and it just came today! Funny thing about it is that nearly all the yarn is for things I plan to make for other people.

This is the cotton "Dishie" yarn. I am hoping to invent something double knit with this. I know in my head what I want to make and how I want it to look, so we'll see how it turns out ;)

 More "Dishie" but different colors.

 These skeins are all "Comfy" fingering weight for sock making. All of these colors were on sale.

 Lastly here is the last skein of "Shine" to complete the dress for my 7-year-old along with my promotional free skein of "Brava." I'm not sure what I'll use the "Brava" yarn for, as it is 100% acrylic and I buy from Knit Picks to get something besides the locally available acrylic yarn. How could I turn down a free skein of yarn though?

Socks in progress #3

Today is day 7 of my sock knitting. I had planned to post my progress daily, however that didn't work out so well. I am done with the instep and will be starting the gusset increases tonight. I really like the socks so far and hope to make another pair in a different color later.

Kid project

Blanket she made for her cousin's wedding.