A few yarn projects

One of the "resolutions" I mentioned in my last post was to do something creative every day. It gives me a chance to learn new skills and techniques, as well as find a little relief and "me time" in the course of a busy day.

Lately, my focus has been on knitting & crochet. It's much easier to put a yarn project in a Ziploc bag and pop it into my work bag than to gather all of the paper crafting supplies I typically need to make a card. And once I start making a card, its much harder to stop midway. With knitting or crochet, I can just finish one line of a pattern and wrap it up. That's not to say that I won't be making cards but it's been nice to take a break.

So on to a few of my yarn projects:

I made a hat & tried cable knitting for the first time! A cable needle could be useful down the road, but I just used an extra dpn here.

I'm working on my first baby cardigan as a gift for a friend. I love this yarn, which is some of the beautiful yarn my grandmother passed on to me!

Abby turned my ghetto yarn bowl into an impromptu swimming pool for her Monster High dolls. :) I should get a proper yarn bowl some time...I truly hate when my yarn rolls off my lap! This little box is working for now, though I wonder how it will look in the middle of the summer with snowflakes all over it. Etsy has some beautiful bowls, like this one or this one.

Here's a closeup of the chevron pattern on the bottom half. Pretty, no?

A view of the back of the cardigan. A few more repeats of the chevron pattern, sleeves and some finish work and it will be done!

Decided to try out another cable pattern, this time a pair of mittens! Still no cable needle, and yes, it would have been even more helpful this time since I was knitting in a smaller round than my hat. But I managed!

These bad boys are long! No worries that a draft will give me goosebumps! :)

I love them - they are so thick and warm thanks to the bulky weight yarn I used. I didn't have enough of the same colorway in my stash so I had to go to the store and pick up new yarn for these. I finished these on Saturday, when it suddenly went up to 50 degrees! In Michigan, 50 degrees in January is not glove weather! But in true Michigan weather yo yo tradition, we have a high of 25 degrees today, so they were perfect for the drive to work this morning!

Another thing that I like about them? They prevent me from checking my phone at a red light on the drive. I don't text and drive - no way! But it's become super tempting to take a peek at Facebook or Instagram while I'm waiting at a light. Not a habit I want to get into!

I made these on Sunday. My last attempt at baby booties was a disaster so I was a little gun shy about trying again, but one of the things I love about crochet is that I can rip it out to the point I need and start again. Which I had to do a couple times with these, but in the end they turned out very cute! As you can see on the right bootie, they have button holes and the flap wraps around the ankle. They are destined for a baby girl, and mom isn't a huge fan of traditional pinks (I can sympathise, I felt the same way when Abby was born. She came home from the hospital in a lovely blue outfit. But pink is her favorite color now, so that didn't last long! lol). But I have to make these a little girlie, so I'm hoping to find some sparkly buttons for the cuff. I honestly think pink rhinestone would be really cute with this soft gray, but we'll see what I can find.

I'm thinking of making a pair of baby mitts to go with these booties and perhaps a little hat too. I have plenty of this gray yarn from my stash to work with so it wouldn't be a problem to add that to the gift. Maybe add a bit of pink ribbon to the mitt cuffs or a tiny pink bow on the hat? Just a touch so they all tie in together? I guess it all depends on what I find for the booties.

All of these pics came from my Instagram account, so if you're interested in following along with the progress of these and other random bits & pieces, feel free to follow me!