Beginnings

Thanks so much for all the Anniversary wishes on my last post! We had a wonderful anniversary dinner! We wound up going to Del Posto, an amazing Italian restaurant by the owners of Babbo (my all-time favorite Italian restaurant here in NYC). The pasta was *incredible* and just melt-in-your-mouth yummy. I couldn’t have asked for a better meal or a better night. It was all wonderful and a great beginning of our non-newlywed marriage. 🙂

The day after our Anniversary was really busy, though! We hosted a baby shower for a close friend of mine who I previously knit many different things for her, her husband and their soon-to-be-born baby boy. The baby shower was a huge success (she wanted it co-ed so we wound up with more than 30 people here!) with my husband making a great BBQ of hot dogs and burgers as well as his dad’s famous rib recipe. Basically, everyone had a wonderful time and it was a lot of fun! As a shower gift, I knit up a baby blanket:

This was made in Dream in Color Classy in the color Go Go Grassy, which she just loved! It’s a beautiful mix of green and purples. The blanket itself was very easy to knit and quite easy to memorize, as long as I could look at the beginning of every row I was fine to remember it. I am so excited to meet her new little one (due on October 30th, though we’re all hoping for Halloween)!

Pattern – Baby Chalice Blanket by Lykkefanten (rav link | project link)
Yarn – Dream in Color Classy in Go Go Grassy (rav link | store I used)
Needle – US10 (6mm)
Cast on – August 31, 2009
Cast off – September 8, 2009
Modifications – None

To go with the blanket, I also made an extremely quick (2 hours!) pair of baby socks using the same yarn. I think they turned out adorable even though they’re plain… anything that tiny has to be adorable! 😉

Pattern – North Country Cotton Baby Socks by Handpaint Heaven (rav link | project link)
Yarn – Dream in Color Classy in Go Go Grassy (rav link | store I used)
Needle – US6 (4mm)
Cast on – September 9, 2009
Cast off – September 9, 2009
Modifications – None

Both of the patterns are free, so if you’re looking for baby knit ideas, these just might work for you!

I loved hosting the baby shower not just because it was for my close friend who loved the blanket I made (she really did, check out the picture below!), but also because as the title suggests, I love beginnings and the beginning of a new life is extra special! 🙂

For other beginnings, I’ve been working on two different projects. First up, a new pair of socks from the Sock Innovation book. For any readers that do not know, I’ve been knitting one pair a month from the book along with a Ravelry group (Makin’ Cookies). We’re currently doing Devon. Although I love love love the yarn I chose to knit this with, the pattern hates me and this is the third time I’ve had to cast on for it. But just look at the pretty yarn first!

Say hello to Shadow Lake, the August 2009 color of the Fiberphile Sock club. Isn’t it beautiful?

It’s a gorgeous cashmere blend (and you should all know by now how much I love me some cashmere) and just knits up beautifully, as does all Fiberphile yarns! Here’s the beginning of my third attempt at this sock…

I’m knitting the YO’s through the back loops to minimize the lacyness so of course it made the socks a lot tighter, thus the multiple starts. It’s coming out beautifully, though, and the color is even more rich in person.

My last beginning is the beginning of a sweater! That’s right, I’m knitting a sweater! Go ahead, be surprised. I don’t think I’ve made any garments since December and I don’t really remember that experience fondly at all. But when I saw the Vine Yoke Cardigan (rav link), I fell in love and just have to cast on, though I know that sweaters take so long and are much more time consuming than a simple pair of socks. I’m currently at the gauge swatch phase and trying to pick between these two:

That’s Malabrigo Worsted in Applewood (SO soft and such a beautiful color). I’m leaning towards the top swatch which is a little off on gauge post-block (pre-block is dead-on) but I like the look of it more. Also, I’m already picking a size with negative ease and a little positive ease wouldn’t hurt, so I think I’ll stick with it…. we’ll see.

And this isn’t a beginning (more a middle actually) but tomorrow marks two months of me not buying any new yarn! Woohoo! Go me! 😀