baby knits

Progress is being made in the baby knitting department! Now that I’m at home and have all day to tackle the last preparations before the little one joins us I get a bit of knitting and sewing in almost every day.

After the ‘Baby Sophisticate’ pattern the ‘Short Notice’ cardigan is the second newborn sized cardi I’ve finished.

Baby knits are such satisfying little projects compared to adult sized clothing! There are so many cute patterns and they are usually done in just a few hours.

Baby would absolutely need a little gnome hat, so I used some leftover Cascade yarn from my Alpenglühen Cardigan for the Small things Bonnet pattern. I thought this little hat would fly off the needles but I ended up ripping it out and starting over four times. Turns out it makes sense to actually follow the instructions to a t instead of thinking you’d be fine eyeballing it…

Hopefully we’ll also get some use out of the mitts before the weather turns warm.

I was on a roll stashbusting by that time so I used some leftover sock yarn to make a pair of baby socks and matching hat (no pattern for the socks, I jumbled together a few instructions and length guidelines and ended up winging it).

The cabled baby blanket I finished before christmas is waiting for a cotton backing to be sewn on. I made up my own pattern for this. It’s quite simple but I’d be happy to share the chart if anyone is interested!

I think I’m nearly done making newborn sized clothing because, honestly,  how many woolen sweaters and hats will a newbown wear anyway? Time to move on to bigger sizes!

My own handknits will be joined by a few items from my own babyhood – how marvelous that these look almost new after 30 years in storage!

Baby’s colour palette is definitely leaning towards greys and blues which is just fine since I think blue is a great colour no matter the sex. I do want to plan for some yellow and orange knits though.

On the needles right now are these cute baby pants in a cream white yarn.

I’m also hoping to finish some sewing for the nursery (a mobile and fabric baskets) plus sew some summery baby clothes. It is quite the effort to haul the belly up two flights of stairs and in front of the sewing machine though, so we’ll see. Right now knitting cozily on the couch while watching ‘Making A Murderer’ is definitely more enticing. Plus, the company’s not bad either.

What’s on your needles right now?

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an announcement

I’m so not good at announcements. It’s like they suddenly make me centre of attention which introvert me doesn’t feel comfortable with at all (which is weird, considering I’ve had this blog for 6 years and somehow chose to make myself centre of attention here).
You maaaay have already guessed from my Pinterest activity in the last few weeks, like a friend of mine has.

Ok, no more beating about the bush. Fact is, in addition to just buying a house and all that, I have some other big news to share.

We’re expecting a baby next spring!

We’re excited – and still incredulous (growing a tiny human inside you? how crazy is that!) – and a little bit scared (how will we even like our new life as a family of three?).

I’m due in late February so hopefully we’ll have plenty of time to get our new house ready and move in.

Twenty weeks along today and feeling pretty good! After the queasy first weeks which were followed by exhausting weeks of fatigue (say what? I have to work 10 hours a day and cannot take a 2 hour nap in between?) things are great now.
The bump is growing, baby is already kicking noticeably sometimes and the last ultrasound confirmed that he or she is healthy and well.

We’ve decided not to find out the gender since neither of us really cares if it’s a boy or a girl. We’ll be happy either way and I imagine it will be so nice to find out after the birth. Apparently hardly anyone waits anymore to find out and people have been acting surprised by our decision.

I started showing really early (like, if you knew me well and had seen me in a bikini at 9 weeks you’d have noticed) and it has been quite a challenge to keep it hidden until I felt comfortable sharing the news. I’ve been pretty cautious about it and strangely not at all eager to shout it from the rooftops. Pregnancy somehow feels very private to me. We told family and close friends and my team at work at around 12 weeks and our larger circle at 16 weeks (I mean, it was preeetty obvious by then anyway).

Pregnancy has been a lesson in letting go – you are suddenly faced with something you can’t control and have to make the decision to either worry constantly what could go wrong or just embrace not knowing and trusting all will be well and as it should be.

In between the slew of appointments that come with pregnancy plus the many many things we need to organise and learn and discuss for the house it’s been hard to make time for anything else, but I do try to get a bit of knitting in here and there on weekends. Thankfully tiny baby things knit up fast!

Knitting for baby means some serious stash busting! With so much yarn left over from previous projects I can’t really justify splurging on more so this first cardigan (the popular Baby Sophisticate pattern) is knit with leftover Cascade Eco yarn from my Ramona cardigan.
I’ve always imagined any baby of mine would be drowning in hand knits and handmade outfits but with the house taking priority right now – we’ll see how much I can get done before this little person arrives 🙂