Category Archives: FO


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fo report: baby cabled cardigan

Amazing thing, how time works. It hit me yesterday that Jakob is growing up. He’ll be 6 months old on Saturday. Already! And while he is getting bigger…knitting doesn’t. Especially knitting that remains unfinished in a Ziploc bag hidden away in the basement. And if I wanted Jakob to wear said knitting, I’d have to get a wee bit of a move on in finishing it.

So while Jakob did this
I turned this
into this.
The sweater had been sitting in a bag just waiting for the ends to be woven in and the zipper sewn in. To be honest, I rushed it. I realized AFTER sewing in all the ends that I think I’d left them unwoven last time because I wasn’t happy with how I’d seamed the sleeves on, but I hadn’t time to fix it then. Now it is too late, and I can only hope it doesn’t look as strange or boxy on Jakob. Not my best work, but at this point it will fit him for a few weeks and then get washed and packed away, so I’ll forgive myself.
I’m really happy with the zipper! It took a long time because I wanted it to be done properly (this was BEFORE I realized the problem with the wonky sleeves). First I pinned it then basted it in place. I sewed the selvage stitch down to the edge of the zipper, then used a small backstitch to sew down the other inside edge of the zipper so it wouldn’t catch on anything.

I’ll try to get some photos of Jakob in the sweater for my next post.


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…a little bit of that…

Hey, look- it’s a vest!
I finished it just in time. All the knitting was actually finished on Thursday night, but I was too tired to stay up and weave in all the ends. I had some time to kill in St-Laurent on Friday morning before meeting Debbie for lunch, so I parked Jakob’s stroller at a cafe and wove in all the ends there (ignoring the strange looks from passers-by). I think it is so cute! I keep calling it his Oxford vest…I can just picture him strolling along a college campus somewhere…you know, all 26 inches of him. With his thesis notes and a well-worn leather knapsack. Yes, I am overtired, how did you know?
The vest was knit in one piece up to the armpits (I think I said that in my last post). It was a really, really fast knit.
I had a bit of trouble with the V-neck in trying to get that nice, straight line down the center of the V. I think it worked in the end, although you can’t tell, but the ribbing on either side of it is a bit wonky.

I will be publishing the pattern as soon as I can get around to calculating a few other sizes and typing it up.

I know, I know, I forgot the most important part. How does Jakob LOOK in his vest?


Adorable, if I do say so myself. I had made it a bit big on purpose to get wear out of it during the winter. Ignore the striped socks, I changed him quickly before leaving just to make sure everything fit. The photos at the Bar Mitzvah itself weren’t clear enough to show off the vest properly.

While I did mention the Bar Mitzvah before, I hadn’t mentioned that it was in Toronto. So Jakob took his very first road-trip to Toronto this weekend. We left bright and early around 8am on Saturday and made it to one of my friend’s places around 3:30. We did have to stop twice though, once to feed Jakob and once to feed all 3 of us. Here’s a cute photo of Yannick and Jakob in a Harvey’s restaurant in Port Hope, Ontario.
Jakob is sporting his lovely pirate pyjamas and the Moss Block Cardigan I’d made.

It was a fun weekend, but a long drive to do in a car with a baby who wants. out. of. his. carseat. NOW. He did sleep most of the trip(s) but when he was awake…whoo boy. As a treat I’m not taking him ANYWHERE today so he doesn’t have to get strapped in for a change. As a treat for me, I’m going to do nothing but veg and maybe knit.


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lotsa fun stuff

There was a lot going on this weekend, here in our little neck of the woods. Saturday was a huge milestone for our family- we started Jakob on solid foods!

Here he is having NO idea what he’s about to get into.

…here comes the airplane…open the hangar…

…and the verdict is…

…he likes it! Ok, he really didn’t express any form of like or dislike over the strange mushy stuff we were repeatedly spooning into his mouth. He did, however, avoid crying or fussing, and kept breaking out in his usual grins, so we’re counting this as a success!

We’ve been giving him a sippy cup with some purified water after each meal to help wash down the cereal, and he has yet to refuse the cup. If he continues to take it we’ll see if we can get him to take breastmilk or formula in it, and since he’s still refusing bottles, this might be a way to be able to leave him for longer than 2-3 hours. (Of course, I’m not going to try to get him to take bottles any more, because there is no sense in getting him started on them just to have to wean him. I’d rather him go straight to the sippy cup).

Here’s another photo of him, just because. 🙂 I can’t stop taking photos of him and I can’t stop staring at them, so now you all get to see what I get to see every day. My gosh I love this boy!

Does anyone remember the Froggy Hat and Socks set? I finally found the bag of handknits I made while pregnant. Just in time too…the socks are too big still but the hat barely fits! I think he will have worn it just for this photo, and it is now going to go into the “grown out” bin.
Sunday was another exciting day- I attended an all-day Fiona Ellis workshop! She is so nice and warm, so genuine, and I am really, really happy I took the course and got to meet her. In the morning I took a class on short rows, and in the afternoon it was about slipped stitches. I felt bad because Yannick had to bring Jakob to me twice so I could feed him, but it was remarkably non-disruptive. The first time he brought him in was during the morning class, but they came in silently, I fed Jakob on my lap and then they left, all within about 10 minutes and all without causing any interruptions to the class. The second time we called a bit more attention to ourselves, but that was because it was during lunch hour and we played with him for a bit. It might also have had something to do with the fact that he wore his Superman costume. (I had been asked to bring it in).

This is my short row swatch. The pink section uses the “wrap and turn” method, which I usually tend to use in garments (like the bum area of the Superman costume). It works well, but if you look closely you can see the 3 turning points. The blue area uses a “yarn over, slip first stitch” method, which I enjoy. I find it shows less than the wrapped one, and I tend to use it a lot on short-rowed sock heels (and toes). The yellow sections use what I think she called the “Japanese or catch method” where you grab the back of the stitch in the row below to close the gap. I didn’t mind it, but it was fiddly. I was knitting fast on Sunday so I had enough time to make a second “catch” swatch and do the short row/3-ndl bind off shoulder method. I didn’t really need practice on that, however, as I almost always adapt patterns to enable that bind off on the shoulders. I really, really like the professional look it gives.

Before the short row class was over we were given the time to work on a creative swatch. The assignment was to work the short rows while interrupting a pattern, and the examples given were lace and cables. I decided to see what would happen if I worked short rows while working a striped pattern. This was the first time I used 2 different colors to cast on (I did the long tail method) and I was able to practice my Fair Isle. I tend to pull too tight when switching colors (probably because I do a lot of intarsia) so I was trying hard to keep things loose. I was also holding the green with my left hand and practicing the two-handed technique. I was able to knit pretty fast using both hands, but I had to remember to knit that color through the back loop on the following rows because the stitches I knit from my left hand wound up mounted the wrong way on the needle.

This is my swatch from the slipped stitch class. There are 6 different techniques shown, I did the first 4 twice each for practice. I never before realized how much fun slipped stitches are, and how much I enjoyed working them and how much I like the look of them. I think this is something I will definately have to play around with some more!

Two last things. First of all, I tried a new recipe tonight. I found this on Caroline’s blog not too long ago, and remembered that I had some apples in the fridge about to go bad, so I made it for dessert tonight. The only modification I made was to bake it in individual dishes instead of one larger pie plate.


It was delicious! Thanks Caroline! Next time I would probably try adding just a dash of lemon juice (I like how it brings out the flavor of the apples) and I would put less sugar, because I found it sweet. I would also probably make up for the less sugar by serving it warm, with vanilla ice cream. 🙂 What I also found cool was that I’d sprayed the dishes with Pam first and the resulting dessert was able to pop out and still hold its shape…so I would try making it in smaller ramekins next time I entertain and each person could get their own little one for dessert, maybe with some melted chocolate drizzled across the top…

The other last thing is my current knitting. I have been working on something but I can’t show photos of it here. I can tell you it’s a hat, but I can’t say much more because it is one of my Knitty.com submissions. My mom’s manicurist saw a photo of it and wants me to make her some to give as gifts, but before I can figure out how much to charge I need to make a second one and record how long it took, the exact yardage it took, etc. So I’ve been working on that for about a week now, but today I decided to put it aside temporarily.

We have a family event to attend this coming weekend and I wanted to dress Jakob up a little. I decided to knit him a little vest to wear with a white button-down shirt and dress pants. After rooting through what little of my stash is unpacked, I found some gray Patons yarn left over from the Glam Coat. I have two balls left, which I’m sure is more than enough for a baby’s vest. I didn’t feel like hunting down a pattern at the right gauge, so I spent today writing one up. I was able to knit the ribbing too, and hopefully I will have a vest in time for this weekend.

Here’s my swatch, before I unravelled it. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to use a garter or ribbed edging for the cuffs, so I swatched it with both. That’s regular garter on the bottom, sideways knit-on-as-you-go garter on the top left, and ribbing on the top right. I like the look of the regular garter the best but the swatch kept flipping up really badly along the first stocking stitch row, so traditional ribbing it is.

Tomorrow I get to go knitting with Robyn, Tara and the blogless Kate, so I hope to have some vest progress photos by night time.


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up up and away!

May I present…

SuperBaby!

SuperBaby’s special powers include drowning his adversaries in massive amounts of drool, and the ability to shove anything into his mouth. Foes are often foiled in their plots by his awesome cuteness which requires all who pass to stop, come closer, and kiss him.

SuperBaby also managed to stand by himself (leaning on the sofa) for the purposes of taking this photo.
His detatchable cape is this season’s “in” accessory. No SuperBaby would be caught dead without a cape this year, and we hear that shiny red is the new black.

The pattern is my own, for both the outfit and the cape. I had Yannick’s help in creating the baby, and the Superness is all his own. 🙂

By the way, these are the pumpkins that Yannick bought for outside our house. Should I be insulted that the “Daddy” and “Baby” pumpkins are perfect, and the “Mommy” pumpkin is all lumpy and deformed?


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some goodies

I forgot to show off some new yarn I got on Monday of this week. My Blue Moon order arrived, finally, after sitting at customs for about 3 weeks. See, when I’d placed the last order with Maaike, Yannick was really taken with how soft and luxuriuos the yarn felt. He offered to treat me to a skein if I’d knit a pair for him. How can I refuse an offer like that???

I chose the Fire on the Mountain colorway for my pair. I had a hard time deciding between this one and Sherbet, but in the end the darker colors prevailed. I still might order Sherbet in the future though…

Look at the colors!
I think this will look great on my feet! I might browse Ravelry to see which patterns others have used, but I’m thinking of either doing stockinette with a bit of a rib, or possibly a feather and fan leg. I’d like to see how this knits up before I decide officially.

After some further deliberation, Yannick chose Obsidian for himself.
I took a closeup of the yarn because you can’t really tell from the above photo, but it is actually a blend of black and brown.
I will try and get him to agree to a pair of Potomotopomotomoses, or Rpms or Cablenets but will (probably) wind up doing stocking stitch with something fancy added to relieve the boredom. I think I might do 2 tiny cables and maybe make a similar pair for myself with a row of eyelets between the cables. Hmm…

Now that Jakob is actually reaching for and grabbing for his toys, it is more fun to introduce new toys to him and see how fast they get yanked into his mouth. This week I introduced him to Sheldon for the first time. The boy and his turtle got along well, and Sheldon was only slightly sucked on before being discarded in favor of toes.

Oh, and one more thing…

It’s done.

Tons of photos and all the details in my next post. Happy Hallowe’en!


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playgroup and knitting

It’s been a really hectic week! We are part of a playgroup that meets every Thursday at a different mom’s house. This week was our turn. With a baby you don’t want to leave stuff for the last minute, so on Tuesday I made my lists of what I needed, and picked up all my groceries. On Wednesday after the movies (we saw The Feast of Love…it was a tearjerker but which was totally NOT for kids…lots of nudity and sex and stuff…) I went home and began to prepare whatever I could prepare in advance. Finally, on Thursday at lunch time, everything was ready. We’d locked Sam in the basement, vacuumed, cleaned, set out the food, arranged all the furniture and toys for maximum space, and voila- this was how my house looked:

This is the view of our dining room from standing in the living room. Normally the table is in the middle of the room and there aren’t any toys in there.

Each mom who hosts provides the food so no one has to bring anything. We usually provide finger foods because it’s a bit unweildly to wrangle a baby and a knife and fork. I put out pasta, Caesar salad, cold pizzas, veggies and dip, nachos and salsa, and 3 different kinds of cheeses, cubed, with crackers.

This was the “dessert” area, LOL. In the bowls there are Smarties, tropical dried fruits and Ringolos, then popcorn, then a platter with 3 different kinds of cookies.

This is the view going the other way, looking into the living room.

And this is how that same view looked a few hours later! In this photo there are 11 moms and 12 babies, and by the end of the day there were a total of 15 moms and 17 babies (2 sets of twins). Whew!

It was a lot of work to get ready, it probably doesn’t look that way but each time I’d get in the middle of something, like slicing veggies or boiling water for the pasta, Jakob would cry and need to be held, or fed, or changed, or I had to make dinner for Yannick and I…it’s a lot of “stops” and “starts” with a baby around, but in the end it was all worth it. I love to entertain so we had a really good time having a house full of people. Plus I’d invited my neighbor (literally 2 doors over) who has twins 6 months older than Jakob, and it was the first time we’d gotten together since we’ve moved here, so it was nice to get a chance to get to know her a bit more.

On Wednesday I’d finished the Montego Bay Scarf. Yay! I was really, really happy with how it came out, and needed only to wash it and it would be ready to give away.

Here’s a closeup of the stitch pattern.

Finally, on Thursday night I started swatching for the Hallowe’en costume. No one has guessed it yet… 🙂


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the week so far

On Saturday I spent my time crocheting to have the face/wash/dishcloths done in time for our dinner Saturday night, as they were a hostess gift for my mom’s friend who was having all of us over. I managed to finish 4 in time.

I used worsted weight Bernat cotton from Wal-Mart and a 4.5mm crochet hook for all of them.

This Brick Wall dishcloth was inspired by the one in the Mason/Dixon book. The free pattern can be found here. I followed the pattern but added a row of single crochet around the outside to finish off the side edges nicely.
This one is called the Chain-8 cloth and the free pattern can be found here. I really enjoyed this one, and plan to make more for our house.
This is a closeup of the cloth. What is really cool is that you knit the cloth much wider, with these chains of 8 chains wide on every row (hence the name). Once you are done your height, you use your fingers or a crochet hook and link the chained areas up in exactly the same way you would hook up a dropped knit stitch. As a variation you can give the loops a twist first before linking them up. I did. It gives a nice raised line that would work well for scrubbing.
This is the Diamond cloth and the free pattern can be found here. Instead of working to 21 rows then doing a fancy border, I did only 17 rows then a row of single crochet around since I had to leave for the dinner.
This is the Sunshine cloth and the free pattern can be found here. If I knit this one again I would make one of 3 alterations: I would either do it all in orange or yellow, or I would do the last row before the border in the border color, or I would do it the same as I did it, but I would do the border through both loops not just the front one. Doing it as the pattern states leaves a clear “front” and “back” whereas any of the other ways would have it reversable.

We had a nice dinner to break the fast (not that I fasted) and Jakob was a big hit, being passed around from person to person and behaving wonderfully.

Sunday we had my friend’s daughter’s first birthday party, and again Jakob was scooped from my arms the moment we arrived, and only given back to me to feed him. My friend had moved to Toronto and the guests were all of our old high school friend and her family, so even though most of them were people I have known since I was 12, none of them had ever seen him before and it was great to show him off. Everyone was amazed at his smiling, bubbly personality, and especially how, when it was time for his nap, he fell asleep in my arms (even though I was sitting on the floor in the middle of a crowded room while everyone talked and laughed and the birthday girl opened her gifts and cried and screamed).

On our way home from the party we did an impromptu stop- I bought a Nintendo Wii! I was talking about it with Yannick and next thing I knew we were in front of the store…and it is mine! We didn’t set it up because we had planned a date to go out and celebrate my birthday. My sister and her boyfriend came over to babysit Jakob and Yannick and I went for dinner and a movie. Dinner was great ‘cus we got to watch football at the restaurant, and I had a really yummy steak sandwich. Then we saw Good Luck Chuck which was a very cute movie. Also very wrong…in a few ways LOL. Penguin pr0n. That’s all I’m saying.

When we got home it was still early so we hooked up the Wii and played some Big Brain Academy with Laura and Mike.

Monday Yannick babysat while I went to have an old root canal worked on a bit (over a year later and the tooth still hurts), then I spent the afternoon both tidying up the house and playing on the Wii some more. When Yannick got home we challenged each other in the bowling and golf games that came with the system.

Tuesday I went into town to hang out at Robyn‘s house. I didn’t get any knitting done, but we had a good walk and some lunch then watched Knocked Up together. I found it cute but hard to catch all the jokes with the kids playing, so I’d like to watch it again with Yannick once Jakob’s asleep.

And finally today I took Jakob to the movies with Robyn, Sean and my aunt. We saw Across the Universe- the movie with all of the Beatles songs. I really enjoyed it, although it was REALLY trippy. Now we’re at my mom’s for supper then will be heading home later. I plan on putting Jakob to bed then knitting while I watch CSI:NY so hopefully I’ll have some knitting progress to post by tomorrow.


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can i go to bed yet?

It’s been a long day and I’m so tired! I only went to bed at 2am last night and was up to feed Jakob at 7am. I napped a little until his 10am feed but only for about a half hour, and once I finished the feed we left for the day and didn’t get home until after 6pm! This morning we went to the LaSenza outlet so I could pick up some stuff. They are liquidating all of their off-season merch, and the prices were just crazy! (For my American readers, LaSenza is kinda like Victoria’s Secret, which we don’t have in Canada). There was a full room of bras in every size and color, all for $5 each…but I can’t wear those padded, push-upy things while breastfeeding and I don’t know what size I’ll be after…so it just isn’t worth saving the money to buy something I might not end up able to wear. Another room had bin after bin of really cute panties all for $1 each, so I stocked up there. I almost wrote “underwear” instead of “panties”. I don’t know why that word seems almost naughty somehow. I’d love to see the look on the guy’s face who accidentally finds this blog now after Googling some of those words! Hahaha

Before we left I got some photos of Jakob in his new hat. I’m not super crazy about how it looks on him, but I do think it’s cute.
It’s kinda like a helmet. I can’t decide if its too big or too small…or just right. I’m not reknitting it, so he’ll just have to wear it and look cute in it as it is! For new readers- the details and link to the free pattern are in yesterday’s post.
After the shopping we went to our playgroup, then for groceries before heading home. He could NOT stop pulling at his ear today, and yelling at me. Not fussing, not crying, just yelling over and over while chewing his fingers and tugging at his ear. The poor boy…he’s upset all day and instead of his father getting home to play with him, he tries to give him a bottle…which gets him into a huge upset for over an hour. It’s so hard for him and so frustrating for Yannick.

Luckily we’re seeing the doctor tomorrow morning for his 4 month vaccines and I will have him check to make sure there is no ear infection, and I will also ask what he thinks about the bottle refusal. Maybe we’re trying to give him too much at once, and should wait until the teething stops. Maybe we’re doing the right thing and should keep pushing. I don’t know…Yannick is very upset that when he gets home after work he has to make Jakob all sad, instead of getting to play with him, so we will start trying to give him the bottle feed first thing in the morning instead of in the evening. Maybe when he’s half asleep he’ll be hungry and take it without realizing, and then when Yannick gets home they can play together and bond instead of getting frustrated.

This kid thing is tough! :}

Here’s a photo of Mommy and Jakob at 18 weeks. Man my teeth are yellow, which is strange ‘cus I quit smoking 5 years ago and I drink very little tea or coffee. I’ve GOT to find a whitening system safe for during breastfeeding, LOL.


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maybe it’s just me?

I took Jakob to the movies today. I almost didn’t go…the two “Stars & Strollers” movies were Superbad and Evan Almighty. I definitely didn’t want to see Superbad, but I’d heard really bad things about Evan Almighty. All the reviews I’d read said it was a horrible movie. I really don’t know why- I loved it! Jakob woke up about a half hour into it, and after feeding he spent the rest of the movie sitting on my lap, watching the screen. He LOVED the animals and laughed out loud when he’d see them…which is odd ‘cus he shouldn’t be able to see that far, I don’t think. Anyways, I really enjoyed the movie. I found it funny and sweet, and very well done.

After the movie we went to my parents’ house for supper so that my brother Aaron could see Jakob (he’d spent the last 10 days in Shanghai for work and missed his nephew!). I sat outside with Jakob and knit, and when he woke up we both enjoyed the cool evening air. His teeth were really bothering him, and he kept chewing on his fingers. At one point he didn’t realize it- but he was giving me the finger!

I love this photo of Jakob and my mom…

I kept knitting after supper when I went outside so Yannick could give Jakob a bottle. He was only marginally more successful tonight, but I think it helps when I’m not physically around for Jakob to hear/smell/see. Plus Yannick doesn’t feel like I’m judging his skills as a father in feeding his son if I’m not there to watch…and I think they need time alone anyways, to bond and get to know each other. So I sat outside and knit.

I kept knitting when I got home tonight and guess what? I have a FO!

I saw this cute little cap on someone else’s blog yesterday…don’t ask me who…I think I’d followed a link for something else and kept browsing. I didn’t think it would take too long to knit, and voila- from on the needles to off in one day. I’m not sure if it will need i-cord or ribbon straps, but for now I like it as it is. The only mods I did were to not do the k2togs at the end to go from 7 to 1 st…once I got to 7 I threaded the end of the yarn through and pulled. I didn’t want a pointy cap. I’m going to take photos tomorrow ‘cus Jakob’s sleeping now.


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maybe it’s just me?

I took Jakob to the movies today. I almost didn’t go…the two “Stars & Strollers” movies were Superbad and Evan Almighty. I definitely didn’t want to see Superbad, but I’d heard really bad things about Evan Almighty. All the reviews I’d read said it was a horrible movie. I really don’t know why- I loved it! Jakob woke up about a half hour into it, and after feeding he spent the rest of the movie sitting on my lap, watching the screen. He LOVED the animals and laughed out loud when he’d see them…which is odd ‘cus he shouldn’t be able to see that far, I don’t think. Anyways, I really enjoyed the movie. I found it funny and sweet, and very well done.

After the movie we went to my parents’ house for supper so that my brother Aaron could see Jakob (he’d spent the last 10 days in Shanghai for work and missed his nephew!). I sat outside with Jakob and knit, and when he woke up we both enjoyed the cool evening air. His teeth were really bothering him, and he kept chewing on his fingers. At one point he didn’t realize it- but he was giving me the finger!

I love this photo of Jakob and my mom…

I kept knitting after supper when I went outside so Yannick could give Jakob a bottle. He was only marginally more successful tonight, but I think it helps when I’m not physically around for Jakob to hear/smell/see. Plus Yannick doesn’t feel like I’m judging his skills as a father in feeding his son if I’m not there to watch…and I think they need time alone anyways, to bond and get to know each other. So I sat outside and knit.

I kept knitting when I got home tonight and guess what? I have a FO!

I saw this cute little cap on someone else’s blog yesterday…don’t ask me who…I think I’d followed a link for something else and kept browsing. I didn’t think it would take too long to knit, and voila- from on the needles to off in one day. I’m not sure if it will need i-cord or ribbon straps, but for now I like it as it is. The only mods I did were to not do the k2togs at the end to go from 7 to 1 st…once I got to 7 I threaded the end of the yarn through and pulled. I didn’t want a pointy cap. I’m going to take photos tomorrow ‘cus Jakob’s sleeping now.