Knits for (Baby) Mitts ... and Pattern

Last week I showed you some of the things I sewed for a baby shower gift. Today, here are the things I knitted up :: a pair of booties and some scratch mitts to match.

The booties were a relatively easy, quick and satisfying knit and I've used this pattern before, many, many times. They are the Stay-On Baby Booties found in Knitting for Baby by Melanie Falick.

They really do stay on, and they are so snuggly warm. I can't wait to see them being used. Can anything be cuter than baby toes? Really?

The scratch mitts were a on-the-hoof made up pattern. I do think people overlook scratch mitts in gifting. Scratch mitts, from my experience, are as essential as nappies in newborns. My two had a persistent disposition to scratching their eyeballs out, lacerating their faces and an obsession bordering on pathological compulsion with trying to rip their noses off. In short, my newborns looked like they'd been pulled out of rubble half the time. Scratch mitts were my (their?) saviour.

So why not share the love. Here is the on-the-hoof pattern for Scratch Mitts for you as well...


Scratch Mittens

Needles :: 4 x 3.75mm DPNs

Yarn :: any DK yarn

Guage :: 22st 28rows stst = 4x4 in


CO 25 st
K in rib - *K3, P2 - rep from * til piece measures 2"
K in the round til piece measures 2" then decrease:

*K3, K2tog - rep to end of round
K a round
*K1, K2tog - rep to end of round
K a round
*K1, K2tog - rep a few rounds til only a few stitches remain. Thread a needle with the yarn, sew through these final stitches and pull.

Weave in ends.
Repeat for another mitten.


And there you have it. An easy knit and an easy way to ensure noses stay firmly on their faces.




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Somebody stop me...

More stripes! Another hat! So easy and mindless and they're cascading off the needles at a rate of knots! Both brothers stripey and co-ordinated... if I don't run out of leftover yarn soon you will probably see more in the future...



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More Stripes...

Do you need a reason to knit a hat? No. You do not. They are simple enough makes which engage the hands and leave the mind to zone out without taxing the brain or demanding anything except deciding what colour to work in.

I told you I felt we had more stripes in our future! The scrap cardigan itself had leftovers (leftovers of leftovers, you can't say I don't make the yarn work for us) and so in an attempt to finish all scraps off, I opted for knitting a hat or two to add to the woollen pile.







And there may even be more waiting in the wings, you never know....




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Mama Knits

The Scrap Cardigan is done. Woop. A totally mindless knit from beginning to end, hardly no time at all and with a few weavings of sticks and a little patience et voila - something from nothing. It's almost witchcraft.

The midget declared he likes it and now the eldest wants his cardigan ASAP. No hardship at all - a little bit of mama witchery and some weaving of those magic sticks and hopefully he too will have a weird-looking cardigan of his very own. How easily pleased my babes are; how lucky I am to have children with zero interest in fashion quite content to wear anything so long as it makes them look like escaped convicts or a cartoon character. I wonder how long it will be before they get a clue and refuse me to make them things? Perhaps even burying the evidence that they wore such monstrosities... I'd better get it while the good times are good and knit like I've never knit before... I feel a lot more stripes in our future!



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Knitting Woes and Highs

You may recall seeing last week, and indeed several weeks beforehand if you have a beady eye, some lovely mustard-coloured yarn on the sticks. I was working on designing a new pattern for sale. That little project was sailing along nicely until I tried to order a couple more skeins in the same colourway to finish it off only to be told it wasn't being made any more *insert one of those needle-scratches-off-the-record-to-dead-silence noises* - I beg your pardon? Why did you fail to mention that those skeins I ordered were the last on earth?? And so in a mad flurry of 'it'll be alright on the night' I purchased some more yarn in a slightly different colourway, because I was hoping, in some weird twisted way that they would match.

They didn't. They complimented each other rather nicely, but I did not envisage a rather large stripe along the bottom on my new creation. Of course, what I really need is another large batch of yarn in one colour, to start and finish the new pattern properly. I don't have the cash for that right now. So what does any grown woman do when things don't go her way? She sulks. Of course.





But rather than letting that niggle spoil my evening, I grabbed a new pattern - and every left-over ball of yarn I have - and began a very satisfying project - The Scrap Cardigan. I've made one of these before; it is an incredibly easy knit - mindless, even. (I know that should be 'mindful', but it really isn't).









It is very stripey, ironically, given that it was because I *didn't* want stripes in a project that I began this one. But the midget will love that - he loves stripes, because 'it makes me look like I've just broken out of jail'... *shrugs*... when you're six and a half that's a *good* thing. Apparently.

I am enjoying this knit, in fact I can't put it down. And that's really what it's all about, because like the ladies say, "knitting is spozed to be fun". Amen.

And the best part of all in this knitting fiasco? I have four skeins of complimentary-coloured yarn to now knit something else just for me.

I think that's what they call a win-win situation.


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