Baby’s bed buddy

Evelyn came to visit her grandmother. Grandmother Me. Evelyn is two. Evelyn’s parents were comfortable with her still sleeping in her Guava. Well, she doesn’t sleep in an actual guava. She sleeps in a Lotus when she visits. OK. She sleeps in a Guava Family Lotus. It’s a…a…fancy Pack ‘n Play. It seemed sturdier to me, when I purchased it for her brother. It has served well for visits.

Anyway, Evelyn’s favorite stuffie is not something handmade. It’s a doll. Sort of an odd doll, actually. She goes by the name of “Baby” or “Baby Doll” or sometimes “Doll Baby.” Whatever you do, do not even think of separating Evelyn from Baby.

The Guava Lotus looked a little empty for a just-turned two year old. I thought Baby might like a pillow and a blanket. So I knit them. The blanket is actually Dishcloth Diva Deb  Buckingham’s pattern, Neutrals. Baby’s Neutrals is hot pink though. It suits her better. And the pillow is just a two motif, folded-in-half Neutrals.

I had a little extra time waiting for the young ones and their parents to arrive, so I added a teddy bear for Baby to sleep with. This one is a teeny version of Lesley Anne Price’s fine pattern, “The Bears.” I knit him with leftover sock yarn, Quaere Fibre‘s sportweight, in the Spring Flowers colorway. You just never know when those little bits of leftovers can come in handy. I knitted Teeny on size one needles. One leg is the width of a U.S. dime. So, very very teeny.

Baby only seems to have eyes for Evelyn. Baby ignored her new bedding and toy. But Evelyn was quite taken with this little set. She mostly kept them in her Guava Lotus. During Evelyn and her family’s week-long visit, I regularly found Teeny tucked under his blankie. Teeny couldn’t quite get the hang of the pillow thing, but all told this grandmother declares her knitting effort a success.

Turkish Bedsocks

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Last week it was Bosnian slippers. This week it’s “Turkish Bedsocks,” the very popular Churchmouse Yarns and Teas Pattern. As their slogan says “Bring a little churchmouse home.” Well, not literally. And the company logo prefers to capitalize Churchmouse. OK. No more wordplay. Turkish Bedsocks is a seriously good pattern. And it’s great fun to knit.

The pattern calls for fingering weight yarn in one of my all-time favorite known-by-its acronym yarns, KPPPM (Koigu Painter’s Pallette Premium Merino). The little secret about KPPPM is that, I’m sorry Koigu, it isn’t really a fingering weight. It’s more sport weight in my view. And lots of others agree. My Turkish Bedsocks are knit in Quaere Fibre Sportweight Self-Striping Merino, a superwash.

A lot of the versions of Turkish Bedsocks are rather staid. But mine are more to my liking. I look at my feet and smile. And if you met my feet in person you would find that’s quite a feat.

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I’d no sooner finished one pair when other lept onto my needles. These are knit in Schachenmayr Merino Extrafine, a DK weight.

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A bit more dignified, but not much.

My only modifications for these two pair were to lengthen the main body of the slipper to 30 rather than 24 rounds. The unusual construction requires mattress-stitching the heel wrap to the heel flap. So you do have a seam. I have no problem with that. There are modifications available on Ravelry project pages if you’d rather do a short row heel. But with my self-patterning yarn, I love the way the various directions of the yarn all collide at the heel end.

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My size 8.5 feet fit into these quite nicely. At the moment they are aimed for my holiday pick-your-gift basket. But I’m thinking I need to keep one pair for me.

Rainbow Vera in her raingear

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Recently I’ve been on an Annita Wilschut knitting frenzy. I’ve knit Joris, Karel, Jacobus and Saar, and Vera. Mostly I’ve knit in Quaere Fibre Self-Striping Sportweight Superwash–a wonderful yarn, including for stuffed buddy projects.

Here’s my entire Wilschut gang, including Rainbow Vera decked out in her raingear.annita_gang

Vera’s clothes, a separate Wilschut pattern, are very detailed. Apparently Vera is a bit fussy about how her clothes fit. You knit linings, pockets, and even some short row shaping.

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vera's_raincoat

That teeny raincoat even needed blocking to assure that its seams laid properly and that the garter stitch band didn’t curl. There are three small yarn over buttonholes knit into the band. But Vera is headed to a little one and so right now buttons are not a good idea.

Vera is especially pleased with her hat.

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She thinks the color shows off her stripes quite nicely and even tones down her red nose a tad.

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She isn’t sure why she’s got both a hood on her raincoat and a hat, but she’s not complaining. I told her that the hood could come in handy in a major downpour.

Vera pleaded with me not to show her naked, but I told her knitters and readers would want to see her pretty rainbow skin. I did agree that I’d not put her butt on display, though.

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Karel

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I’ve got an already-identified thing for knitting bunnies. In fact, one of my early bunnies recently surfaced and put in an appearance on the blog. Isaac’s baby bunny was a recent addition to the bunny hutch.

This is Karel, Dutch knit designer Annita Wilschut’s enhancement of the knitted bunny kingdom. Wilschut’s patterns are available on her blog and on Ravelry. My Karel is knit in an extravagant luxury yarn for a critter: Cricket, by Anzula. Cricket is DK weight, 80% merino, 10% cashmere, 10% nylon. Perfect for socks and for small rabbits. Karel’s overalls, which are included in his pattern, are knit in Quaere Fibre self-striping sportweight.

The details on Wilschut’s patterns are wonderful. Not just the obligatory bunny tail hole. (But isn’t it a cute one?) She is a master of short row placement. This gives just the needed shaping for rounded bellies and for butts that let the animals sit upright. And, as with all her patterns, when you finish the knitting there’s no parts to sew together.

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Jacobus and Saar

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Meet Jacobus and his buddy Saar, more Annita Wilschut designs. In fact, she’s also designed Jabobus’s overalls and Saar’s dress. All of Wilschut’s patterns are available on Ravelry.

These little monkeys tickle my knitting funny bone more than anything I’ve knit in a long while. Vera was fun. Joris was a hoot. But these guys are possibly the best monkeys in all the knitting kingdom. And we’ve got lots of monkeys in the kingdom.

monkey_pair_back_dressedHere’s a closer look at Saar.

saar_dress_frontsaar_dress_backSaar’s a tad vain and kind of likes this shot of her in profile.

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Jacobus is sitting on my desk telling me he should have been featured first because he’s older than Saar (by a few days). He says I’m always fighting against female stereotypes and then I do the “ladies first” thing. Sigh.

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There. Jacobus has quieted down some. Now Saar is tossing little gobs of yarnie bits at Jacobus. She found them on the desk. He’s making spitballs out of the yarnie bits and…

“Cut it out you two.”

A hush falls over the pair. They’ve spotted it. My payback for their silly bickering.

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The two of them, in the flesh, wearing only their Quaere Fibre self-striping sport weight skin, in the Hanukkah colorway.

Jacobus, who plans to study law, is telling me I need a signed release before I can publish his photo on my blog. He’s threatening to sue for invasion of privacy and misappropriation of his likeness. I told him to add false imprisonment to his complaint because he’s about to put into my cedar closet.