FO: Waterloo and Ottawa Baby Sweaters

Baby Sweaters

As I mentioned a while back I have two cousins both expecting babies last month.  Back in February, over Family Day Weekend, my Aunt hosted a joint baby shower for Heather and Lara at my mom's house in Parry Sound. There were about 40 family members and it was a great chance to see some of my cousins I hadn't seen in a couple of years.

The shower had a book theme and I gave both copies of Brambly Hedge, one of my favorite books as a kid.  However, as a knitter I couldn't resist adding some handknit woolies to the parcel.  I pulled out the Puerperium Cardigan pattern which is quickly becoming my go-to baby knit.  It is quick, can be done from a single skein of DK weight yarn and gets good reviews from moms.  I've been considering getting more of Kelly Bookers patterns for kids, because these babies are going to grow up (rumor has it) and I really like the way she writes and formats her patterns.

Neither of these babies has made their arrivals yet, but I'm looking forward to meeting these new additions to my already large extended family (I'm 7th of 14 grandchildren).  I'm glad to know that they will have wooly goodness and that I have a go-to pattern for the babies that will continue to show up in the years to come.

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Projects: Waterloo Puerperium and Ottawa Puerperium

Pattern: Puerperium Cardigan by Kelly Brooker

Yarn: Tanis Fiber Arts, Yellow Label in Spearmint and Pink Grapefruit

FO: Forest Baby Vertabrae

So yesterday you saw the Legwarmies, they matched up really nicely with the Baby Vertabrae.  This knit too way too long in my mind, the pattern is great, but I would do it in DK, because working up fingering weight yarn on 3.25 and 2.75 mm needles is too much purling at sock gauge.

However I find the design brilliant, keep a baby warm and make sure their bellies are washable.  I did make one design change to the pattern, on the advice of a new mom, I knit 10cm of the arm in stockinette, and then did another 10cm of 1x1 rib.  By extending the rib I gave the option of wearing the sleeve folded back (and not falling down) or pulled down over the hands if the baby gets cold.

This along with legwarmies make a great gift for someone who doesn't want to knit for a brand new baby but in 9 and 12 month sizes.

- Details -

Project Name: Forest Baby Vertabrae

Pattern: Baby Vertabrae by Kelly Brooker of knit.so.quaint

Recipient: Forest Baby

Yarn: KnitPicks Stroll Tonal Fingering in Kindling

Modifications:

  • Changed sleeve to shorten and increased cuff length

New Skills:

  • Picking up a sweater collar - Worked out fine, but I slipped the edge so the collar seems to really pull in.  Whooops, live and learn for next time.
Feedback?:
  • Yarn - The color of Kindling was nice, although there were all sorts of funny felty joins in the yarn.  Not enough to find concerning but after the Felici incident I was kinda of annoyed.  I have other sock yarns I like more, but Stroll Tonal is great for those who are looking for a hand dyed look at not indie hand dyed price.
  • Pattern - Nice pattern, although there was some errata that thanks to Rav pattern system I was able to get the updated pattern while I was knitting so there was no trouble for me.  It is great that you can make a whole bunch of sizes in all sorts of different yarn weights on the same pattern.

Re-Knit?: Quite possibly, but never again in fingering, DK would be a nice weight.