My Castonitis has gone critical.

Here’s my latest symptom:

Mitered mittens; pattern by Elizabeth Zimmerman; yarn is Malabrigo.  What can I say?  My hands were cold Friday and Saturday.  By Sunday all arguments that I at least finish my scarf first–because I could use the leftover yarn and have matching accessories, a thing unheard of in this house–were broken down by my stronger self and I even took the DPNs away from the entrelac (they are happy on straights so there’s no project abuse going on here).

The project I was going to write about next that was trumped by mittens:

An entrelac scarf for moi using yarn my brother gave me for my birthday.  As Matt said, “It looks like that yarn was made to do that.”  By “that” he means “entrelac,” I’m pretty sure.

But since this is a post about my Castonitis, we’ll move on to the next symptom:

Yes, in fact, that is the same photo from last post.  Because that was probably the last time I touched these. Uh… Out of sight, out of mind?  I have no excuse.  I am weak.

Then there’s this beauty of an excuse to buy yarn for a project that was begun to bust stash:

I do actually pull this out and work on it a bit here and there because, turns out, the only thing more mindless than stockinette is shell stitch.

It breaks down from here because I cannot find all these pictures again….they’re too old…hah… So I direct you to pictures on my Flickr page.  I’m sure I could embed them somehow.  (Resolution #491: learn how to do technical stuff on your blog.)

An overdue gift and socks I started one year ago to this day:

Lace Ribbon and Jaywalkers

And this, my birthday gift:

Hourglass Stole

So that is … seven unfinished projects I am copping to.  And I am dying to start my Ribby Cardi.  Gulp.

What is this?

Crochet?!  Not just crochet but a giant granny square.

Not just a giant crocheted granny square but I am watching Elizabeth Zimmermann’s PBS series Knitting Workshop while I work on this!  The granddame of knitting - ha!

Oh and I am breaking my no-TV resolution to boot!  Ha HA!

And what happened to the Lace Ribbon?  Oh yeah, there it is, next to the oft-neglected Jaywalker…

Enough with the sins, now for the graces: I am putting a dent into my basket of Wool-Ease!  In addition to this new project, I have also given away a couple of skeins to a friend.  Abbey is not just any friend but a crocheter whom I have recently brought over to the knit-side.  That was a few weeks ago.  Fast forward to today: Charlotte and I were knitting and chatting and I showed her this pattern (scroll down to see a few examples), deciding on the spot that I would make this blanket per pattern, but I would challenge myself to only get yarn for it by trading or buying inexpensively via Ravelry.  No going to the store, not even for a sale.

Charlotte then left and I was alone with these threads of ideas swimming around in my head.  In a flash, the basket was out and yarn was lining up on the table.  It all happened so fast, almost of its own accord.  I quickly perceived that I had a veritable rainbow of partial skeins.  I made one or two adjustments and then, simply, began.  I won’t lie; it may only be a granny square, which I have made before, but it was slow-going for a few rounds because I had to relearn how to double crochet and how to create a granny square.

Granny square: NOT like a bicycle.  But still not so hard at all.  Just as happened gradually with knitting, I find I am able to “read” my crochet better now that I have been playing with it for a few years (two, I think).  That’s exciting.  It’s progress.  It gives me hope that I may someday have a decent grasp of this.  But I can never be brilliant at crochet because that is my sister’s domain, you understand.

My other grace?  After much hawing and heming, the zipper has been ordered for the Urban Aran Cardi.

And to close with wise words from EZ herself: “This just goes to show you…people will wear anything on their heads!”

(Matthew in his ubiquitous Greek fisherman’s cap and Elinor in a cotton cap knit by grandma with yarn she dyed herself.  This is a much cuter picture than the one I considered of Zander wearing his underwear on his head.)

Elinor’s blankie has occupied much of my knitting time this winter past.  It was an awesome take-anywhere project although that came back to kick me in the butt when all the blocks finally needed to be put together.  But once I decided on the crochet seaming, it took only 1-2 evenings with Masterpiece Theatre (Oliver Twist, I believe).

I ended up naming this blanket pattern Squeaky because, well, this baby is.  She makes a lot of noise!  From day one when she grunted and squeaked and moaned throughout her first 7-hour postpartum nap up to today (2 weeks old), she is a noisy little squeaker.  We don’t recall any other baby being this noisy, including our firstborn.  We speculate that maybe she makes noise because that’s what we sound like to her.  Maybe she will be an early talker.  We’ll see!

The pattern for Squeaky can be found on its own static page here at Entangled but don’t forget to add it to your Ravelry notebook when you cast on!

FREE PATTERN: Squeaky

Ravel it!

Baby #2’s Patchwork Blanket is done.

Lion Brand Wool-Ease in 13 colors, held doubled.  Squares are crocheted together and the whole thing is finished off with a simple crochet border.  See the project’s Ravelry page for more details.

What are you waiting for?

We have a bed for you, a dresser full of clothes, and an enthusiastic big brother.  What more could a girl ask for?

Okay, I will go look for the booties again.  I understand the need for stylish footwear.

I am still alive and well … and nine-months pregnant.  Days to go to the official due date and we believe the baby has dropped so we are definitely in the home stretch.  Waiting, waiting, waiting.  Washing baby clothes and packing bags and waiting some more.

Oh and the knitting.  It’s all baby knitting all the time these days.  The Argentine sweater is still in progress although I am now up to the second sleeve.  I made a pair of Saartje’s booties with some handdyed yarn leftovers and then the booties went missing.  They are somewhere in the house.  I keep looking and it makes me quite sad.  They knit up fast but half the work is sewing which I loathe so I just want to find this pair and put on the buttons and be done.  Grump!

The baby blanket is partially pieced - I have four strips of three squares each.  After trying a few ways to knit in strips of cream between the squares, I gave up that dream and am using single crochet to join the squares together - very fast but perhaps not the most attractive thing on the reverse side (you’ll see in the finished photos).  I will put a border around the blanket, probably also crochet because it’s fast and at this point, if you hadn’t picked up on my subtle hints, it’s all about being FAST and DONE.  Gods forbid this child is waiting for her blanket to be finished before she arrives.  Zander was five days late and his blanket was completed about 36 hours before I went into labor with him.  I certainly do have my superstitions.

Urban Aran and other lovelies are officially backburnered until the baby is born.  I’ve reached that point where I cannot think of anything else but the baby.  Which is good, really, because there were many distractions throughout this pregnancy with the result that we did very little prep.  Not that much is needed the second time around but there is something to be said for feathering one’s nest and pondering the VIP who is about to arrive.  And so, I am off for more pondering…

Third on my list of baby knits was this:

The Sweater from Argentina, or so I think of it.  The title on my rumpled paper is “Baby’s Jacket Knitted in One Piece.”  The yarn is nothing special - ball band is long gone but I believe it is sport weight Wool-Ease in a heathered purple colorway.  I went digging in the stash for something sport weight one night and there weren’t a lot of options but this is fine.  And yey, stash reduction.

I am charmed by the one-pieceness of this little jacket.  It’s done with short rows to shape the yoke and casting off and on to separate the sleeves.  Cleverly simple.  I am strangely enjoying the US 2/sportweight combo contrasted with the bulky adult sweater I’m also working on.  I’m sure it would be less fun if I were knitting an adult sweater on US 2 needles.  Has anyone seen this baby sweater pattern online?  I haven’t so I’m going to ask my friend if she would consider putting it up on Ravelry.

The Urban Aran Cardigan is not forgotten.  I am almost done with the back, which is the single largest piece so yey!  I thought I had taken a recent progress shot but no.  You’ll just have to imagine and wait with baited breath to see the back when it’s done.

The baby blanket pieces are nearly done.  The colors are weird and giving me fits as I try to figure out how to put it together.  My latest idea is to knit them together with wide border/background of some neutral such as white or black.  This is following my idea of doing 12 blocks instead of 16 so the wide border would make up the lost inches.  We’ll see.  Because of course I do believe the baby won’t come until the blanket is done and there’s no better motivation for the heavily pregnant than that!

Urban Aran Cardi quick update: I can knit about a skein per day if I focus on it, which isn’t happening although I often come close.  A skein a day doesn’t sound bad but this will take about 20 skeins.  20 days.  Except more than that.

I am about to start my third skein, sigh.  Now my mental goal is to be done with this sweater before the baby comes.  Five weeks.  35 days.

* * * * *

On to our topic of the day…

Read “Inspired by babies, part 1″ here.

By the way, these are not in order of preference at all but mostly in the order I thought of them.

Fifth: Norwegian Sweet Baby Cap which is darling without being twee, IMO.  It is the quintessential baby bonnet.  I’ve been eying my sock yarn stash for a good fit.  Something stripey, for sure.

I really do seem to have a thing for hats, don’t I?  This is new and I am still coming to terms with it.  But so far it’s only limited to knit hats.  All other hats are the realm of my hat-lovin’, ever-wearin’ hubby.  I look stupid in hats but stupid doesn’t matter when it’s COLD.

Sixth: Booties.  Don’t know which pattern since I haven’t found one yet that I love to the exclusion of all others.  Right now my preference is just to make tiny socks except that there was a dog-sock incident recently that takes the shine off making socks for children.  Anyway, I am taking pattern suggestions in the comments!

Seventh: a new Tulip.  I made one with a kit from Threadbear for my niece two years ago.  What’s not to love about Dream in Color yarn?!  Yummy.  But in an ongoing effort to enjoy the yarn I have already (which is not exactly the same as stash reduction, a term that seems a more severe and unhappy approach to this excess of riches), I am thinking of using either some of my never ending Wool-Ease (more on that in a moment) or Mission Falls 1824, bought on sale 2 years ago for the express purpose of making an unspecified stripey baby or kid sweater.  My inspiration for this project comes from the Tulips made by Sheri for which she uses Caron Simply Soft in juicy colors.

Eighth: Patchwork baby blanket - a project in progress - concludes this parade of inspiration.  Zander’s blanket was the awesome Big Bad Baby Blanket by Lisa Shobhana Mason from the book Stitch and Bitch by Debbie Stoller, knit with two strands of Wool-Ease worsted weight held together.  I was VERY happy with this as a baby blanket because it was warm, washable, and affordable. Although I wanted something similar for the next baby’s blanket, I didn’t want to knit the same pattern.  Just ’cause.

I eventually settled on a patchwork blanket, in part to use up some of the Wool-Ease I had accumulated.  But I needed 16 different colors (=skeins), of which I had slightly less than half.  So far, I have procured all the colors I will use, plus some secondary options just in case I need to swap colors out (with receipts to return what I don’t use - as if!).  I have 12 of 16 squares completed so far and it only takes me about two days to make each square.  With approximately 25g of each skein leftover (or the equivalent of 4.7 balls of Wool-Ease), I am not sure my efforts will result in a net reduction of Wool-Ease, which is both funny and sad.

And this is just what I have come up with so far…..

What baby patterns are you making?