I mentioned that I've been knitting for Vinnie, Stim's (Stephanie and Tim's) younger son. He's allergic to all synthetic fibers (which is fine, since I'm sensitive to at least acrylic, too), as well as cotton and other plant-based fibers, and some animal fibers, including alpaca. (He has some food allergies, too.) Poor babe breaks out in horribly painful rashes, especially in the diaper area, which is why Steph dresses him in mostly 100% wool, along with some silk and cashmere. This makes for an expensive toddler to dress. Since I have a pretty decent-sized stash of some excellent wools, as well as wool-silk-cashmere blends, many of which I stashed without a purpose in mind, and since I also adore knitting itty-bitty-sized things, I've taken it upon myself to clothe the child for the upcoming Summer season and, hopefully then, into the Fall and Winter. I do plan to take some time off to knit a sweater for each of my kids for Christmas, since it does get a little cooler here in the Winter months, but for the time-being, it's All Vinnie, All the Time. Here's what I've made so far:
I loved knitting this heavily-cabled vest for Vinnie, although at first I did not like the colorway. I'm usually not a fan of such crazy colorways, either, but I think I got this at a steep discount and figured somewhere, some way I'd find a use for it. Well, I'm glad I did, because when I finished and seamed it all up, I absolutely loved it! It reminds me of a mix of hot peppers. The pattern was super-fun to knit up, too, and went very quickly. I made it a little big so he'd have room to grow. The only problem with this pattern in this colorway is that, unless you're actually holding the thing in your hands, you can't see the cables and ribs! Certainly not in pictures. But that's okay, because there's the element of surprise if you're lucky enough (ha!) to behold it in person. Anyway, Vinnie looks great in these colors, and Steph likes it, so I'm happy with it all the way around.
Since I had enough yarn left over, I made Vinnie a pair of socks, too! Steph said he only had a few, and these fit perfectly. Win!
After that, I started a 64-different-square afghan for Vinnie, since the only one he has is the "Bandaid Blanket" I'd given to his older brother, Lucas, three years or so earlier! It's also cabled, but it accidentally got felted, and either way, it's much too small to cover the babe. So I'm making that, too. I'm about 8 squares in and having lots of fun with that, but I'll hold off on posting pictures until they're all finished. The fun part is, Steph has some yarn from other projects for Vinnie (and maybe Luke, too; I forget), and also, I have some yarn left from the NYC trip we (Steph, me, and my three kids from before she had bebes) went on in 1998. She helped me pick out some of that yarn, and it's purple (her favorite color), so it works.
Next, I made another vest. Smaller, this time, it turns out, but this time, it fit just right. The collar looks a little wonky in this picture, but I think it's partly because it hadn't been blocked yet, and partly because of the odd position in which I caught him. The fun part about this one is that, though it's again hard to see in the pictures, there are owls on the front! I never knit owly cables before, but they turned out so cute. What a fun motif. Look, you can see it better here:
You see it, right? Isn't that cute? So twee.
I had some yarn left over from this yarn, too, so I knit another pair of socks. Well, first, I started to knit a hat and got well into it before it became clear that I was going to run out of yarn. And since this was a discontinued yarn, I had no hope of getting more to finish the project, so I had to frog it. (If you're not a yarn enthusiast, you might be wondering what in the world that means. What do frogs say? Ribbit. When you frog something, you rip it. Get it? Rip it = ribbit. Hey, I didn't make it up!)
I couldn't find another pattern for a sock that fit the thickness and amount of yarn that remained, except for the same one as the last yarn, so I made it again. Appropriately enough, the pattern called for exactly this yarn! I made it a little longer in the foot, so he could have some room to grow. I like this less-crazy colorway, too; so pretty!
Lastly for now, I made Vinnie another owly knit, this time an earflap hat for him to wear next year. It was supposed to have long i-cord ties for under the chin, but I ran out of yarn, so I had to adapt the pattern to make it button instead. And I added embellished eyes, in the form of embroidered French knots, to go with the blue button. I nearly died when I got the hat on Vinnie; he looked so stinkin' adorable in it!! The boy was made for hats. Hats were made for Vinnie.
That's it for now, but there will be many more to come, as well as an Eastery post later. Cheers!
Fin.
Recent Comments