KARABOUTS

Baby Sweater

I made this sweater for our friends Lisa and Jesse who are expecting a baby girl in a couple of weeks.  

I bought the yarn and buttons at Purl Soho and used their baby girl fair isle cardigan pattern.

While the sweater was blocking Mike got busy and designed a card. He printed out a bunch of different color combos to see which one matched the sweater the best.

We didn't have any wrapping paper but the roll of paper we've been using to cover the floors during construction was the perfect shade of pink.  
We used it to wrap the gift.  
(Jesse is a Red Sox fan so we made a little pink Boston "B" - for baby - to seal the tissue paper).

We also used the pink paper to fold up an envelope for the card.  I sewed one of the extra buttons from the sweater onto the card to tie the whole thing together.

I hope the sweet new baby enjoys wearing her sweater as much as I enjoyed making it.

 

UPDATE:

Baby Ella is here!!!!!  Her wonderful parents sent me this photo of the beautiful baby wearing her sweater. Could this baby be any cuter?

What I'd look like in a knit bikini

Okay, well maybe not EXACTLY, but it would be hard not to look great in these fabulous summer knits designed by my super-talented friend Heather Dixon (aka Army of Knitters).

Heather left her job as a knitwear designer for Urban Outfitters to launch her own line.  You can find Heather's beautiful summer collection here.   

If you'd like to see the collection knitted up, go to Annie and Company on the upper east side (1323 Madison Avenue).  Heather's collection is currently on display in their windows.

(I swiped this photo from Jenn's lovely Yarn 365 blog.)

Hop on over and buy Heather's patterns and find out what YOU look like in a knit bikini!!!

Cats and Felt

It's a fact that cats like felted wool.  I first learned this a few years ago when I made this felted tote bag.

(The pattern for this bag is in the book Holiday Knits.)

I loved this tote and so did my cat Trinky, who often used it for her afternoon cat naps.

I made a couple of felted cat beds to try to keep Trinky out of my purse, but my cat beds didn't compare to these amazing felted Katzenhohle (cat caves) by German artist Dornroeschen Filzunikate. 

You can see other Katzenhohle designs here.

 
 

I've Been Sick

About a month ago I went to the ER with what I thought was appendicitis.  Turned out not to be my appendix but a nasty abdominal infection.  Antibiotics cleared up the infection, but while I was in the hospital I got pneumonia.  The pneumonia cleared up but not without leaving behind a "loculated empyema" in my right Iung that has to be removed surgically.  What can I say - it's been a tough couple of weeks.

There were quite a few people who brightened up my life during this dismal period.  First is my wonderful client Bernie who flew from Kansas City to NY to surprise me in the hospital.  What a guy!!!  He brought me some great Andy Warhol-themed gifts including Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup refrigerator magnets (so clever).  Thanks Bernie!

Next, my family went out of their way to make me feel better.  My parents, my brother and his wife, and my sister called or e-mailed every few days.  My nieces got busy and drew me some beautiful get well pictures.

And my wonderful mom knitted me this AMAZING wrap to keep me warm while I recover.  (For those of you who knit, the pattern Mom used is the Hemlock Ring Blanket by Jared Flood.)  

 

 

And then there is my FANTASTIC husband Mike, who shuttled me back and forth to far too many doctor's appointments, kept my spirits up, and took care of all of the shopping, cooking, cleaning and everything else that had to be done in life.  He also arranged for a beautiful bouquet of 50 lilies to show up one day when I was feeling particularly down.  I couldn't ask for a better husband!!!!!  

And I don't want to forget my many wonderful friends who kept in touch and kept me smiling in spite of my illness.  You're the best.

Thanks everyone.  Hopefully after this surgery next month I'll have a full recovery and get back to working on this guy.  He's going to be a New England fisherman - but still needs buttons for his rain coat, a beard, pipe, lobster, and assorted details.

 
 
 

The Talents of Others

A while back I wrote a knitting pattern for a pair of skull and crossbones wrist warmers.  You can get the pattern as a free pdf download here.  The pattern is also listed on "Ravelry."   Ravelry is an online community for those of us who knit, crochet, spin and dye.  If you're not a member, you should join (it's free!).  One of the great things about Ravelry is that if you're thinking of making something from a particular knitting or crochet pattern, you can look up the pattern on Ravelry and see pictures of the finished item as made by other Ravelry members (there are currently 7,127!!!! versions of Elizabeth Zimmermann's Baby Surprise Jacket on Ravelry - no lie). The other day I looked up my skull and crossbones wristwarmer pattern on Ravelry and here are some of the fabulous projects people have made with the pattern.

Foxhound did a great job on these - using the original B&W color scheme:

Gardengirl611 used glow-in-the-dark yarn from Bernat.  I bet these look cool in when the sun goes down!

Gtogirl13 decided to use red and black.  Very nice.

Purlpower went with a lovely halloween color scheme.

Jessafab used the chart from the pattern to make this awesome vest for her teddy bear.  She describes the vest as "business in the front and party in the back."  Hilarious!

Pilatease made this fabulous pink and black "skully" scarf.  Way to go.

Knitterholly gets the cuteness award for showing off her wonderful hat on this adorable tot!

These projects, and the many others I didn't have room to put on the blog, really brightened up my day.  Thanks everyone!

Sophie's Rainbow Scarf Pattern

I made this scarf for my lovely niece Sophie for Christmas last year. I posted photos of her scarf on Flickr and Ravelry and I've received a lot of requests for the pattern.

I learned this scarf-making technique from Susan Mills at a knitting and yoga retreat on Monhegan Island last fall. Over the weekend I managed to write out the directions so that you can make this scarf too! This is an easy and fun knit, and a great way to use up those shorter bits of yarn left over from other projects.

You can download the PDF pattern by clicking the link below:

Download sophiesrainbowscarf.pdf

Hope you enjoy making the scarf! I plan to make another one for myself sometime soon.

Skull & Crossbones Wrist Warmer Pattern

A few years ago I wrote my first knitting pattern - a pattern for a pair of skull & crossbones wristwarmers for my friend Martha. I posted a picture on the Skull-a-Day blog and started selling the pattern for a small fee on Etsy (donating all profits to KittyKind) and giving the pattern away to anyone who wrote to me. So far I've sold or given away many many patterns to many many nice people! Now that I have a blog, you can download the pattern directly.

UPDATE: FOR EXAMPLES OF HOW OTHERS HAVE USED THIS PATTERN CLICK HERE.

Download SkullWristWarmerPattern.pdf
Hope you enjoy the pattern.

Feel the love

I got the Karabouts website done last week. I posted pictures of the latest dolls on Flickr and on Ravelry and the feedback has been tremendous - especially from Ravelry members. The cool thing about Ravelry is that the people who comment on my dolls all seem to do wonderful work themselves, so I am able to connect to a creative, talented, interesting group of people just by linking up with the folks who have taken notice of my work. It really does bring like-minded people together.

Many people have expressed interest in buying my patterns so I will get to work writing them up. I'd actually prefer to do a book instead of selling patterns individually but I'm not quite sure how that works. I may do a little research and see if I can figure out what's involved in putting together an amigurumi pattern book.