Babies, knitting names, and used book sites!

Hello Knitters!

As seems to be the case lately my week was a tad crazy! My sister Karra's week however has been quite a lot more crazy! She had her perfect baby boys last week, and after getting her permission I get to show off their sweet baby faces! Are they not the sweetest little things! I may be a tad biased on the whole situation, but oh my goodness I just want to kiss them!

Born at 35 weeks, she unfortunately has not been able to take a little loves home just yet. Something I imagine to be one tough situation. While her biggest baby, Grant, is doing perfectly well and is no longer in NICU, her smallest, Bennett, is having a little bit tougher time adjusting to the outside world.

He had finally gotten to the point where he didn't need a heater to help regulate his body temperature when the little man stopped breathing for 20 seconds. That doesn't sound like a very long time in the gist of things, but last night as I lay in bed worrying, as I do, I realized that 20 seconds is a very long time to go without breathing even for an adult, and I presume that it would be even worse for a tiny not even 5 pound baby. This little stunt of his understandably booked him another week at least stay in the hospital.

Karra is one of the strongest people I know. It makes me teary eyed a bit to think about how much I admire my sister. She is my best friend, and a younger sister all rolled into one. We joke about how we are like each others mother as well. We take care of each other. It's what we do.

Any way you may be asking, what Kyla does this have to do with knitting? I swear it does. My sister brought something to my attention while we were talking over the phone.  Apparently in the NICU they provide knitted or crocheted hats to the babies, but there is a clear shortage of hats and blankets for boys!

While I don't see anything wrong with a little pink on a boys hat, if you think about it, even babies have personalities at birth, and some times you just want a little blue hat for your little one. So I felt like I should bring this to the attention to all you charity knitters out there. While yes it's a lot of fun to knit little girl items and boy does it sometimes feel like there are more knitting patterns for girls than boys, lets not forget the boys too! I know I'll be knitting up some boy hats and sending them up there as soon as I can!

Speaking of little hats, my sisters boys are identical and after seeing this picture I was inspired to knit them little hats with their names on them!

Now this is not something I've done before so after some research and a lot of time spent trying to graph out different letters on plain paper.

It quickly became clear I needed some sort of graph paper, so I ran to Joann's and found graph paper that quilters use. It was exactly what I needed.

Let me tell you, It's not always easy to think in squares! It took me quite some time to get it right! However I finally got to a place where I was pleased with the end result. I actually plan on making quite a few more patterns this way. 

As you can see Bennett is missing the last two Ts, I promise they are there, they just had to be added to another piece. While I could have just popped the two Ts above, I'm a very visual person and needed to make sure that everything matched up.


After all that work I was terrified that it wouldn't work out once I actually applied it to real knitting, so I quickly cast on my stitches made a brim and knit Grant's name into it.

Oh my gosh I was so relived when it came out the way it did! I only just got the name and brim done this morning and I'm so excited to finish the hat and go on to Bennett's! I plan on getting these done by next week! So hopefully next week's post will show them finished and done!

Before I end this post, I wanted to bring another awesome site to your attention. It's not exclusively a knitting site, in fact it's a book site. A used book site in fact.

Thrift Books is a wonderful place to find inexpensive knitting books! I swear I have nothing to do with them in anyway, I just wanted to share the good news!

I was able to get five knitting books this last week shipped to me and it only cost me $18. That's amazing! Yes the books are used, however I've never gotten a book from Thrift books in bad shape, and if you love knitting books the way I do, you know that $18 is usually around the cost of just one!

Most of the books I bought were under $4, with one under $5! I think that's an amazing deal, especially if you're like me and love having a book splayed across your lap while you knit away. I have a feeling my knitting library is going to grow by leaps and bounds because of this site!

Until next time! Happy knitting!

  

Newborn Hat Pattern

Hello Knitters!

I had promised you finished baby sock, but unfortunately a small little dog decided that my yarn was a play thing and traipsed around the house and pulled it all apart. As you can see he didn't seem to care a lick that he had done it. Though in all honestly he tried to pretend he didn't do a thing, though it's difficult to hide the evidence when it's attached to you!

So instead of finished socks I have a finished hat! My sister is due with twin boys in the next few weeks, give or take one or two, and she is also a photographer, so she begged me to provide her with hats that she could take pictures in before they were born. Well I can't lie, I'm a bit of a procrastinator, and it wasn't until I realized these babies could come at any moment did I realize I needed to get my behind, or um hands, into gear and whip the hats up!

The hat she showed me that she wanted especially was crocheted and I'm a TERRIBLE crocheter if it has anything to do with something other then a strait line, so after scouring the internet and all my many many knitting books, I couldn't find a pattern to what I was looking for.

I pondered if I should just ask my Step-Mom who is a fantastic crocheter if she could do it, or if I could somehow come up with my morning. So over my morning coffee, I finally decided to whip up my own!

I spent a few days trying a few different things and I finally came up with a pattern that works for what I'm looking for! I like it so much I've decided to provide it here for anyone who wants to use it!

Newborn Hat with a Tail and Pom-Pom

Cast on 28 with size 11 double pointed needles using a bulky yarn of your choice

Knit 2 purl 2 for 6 rounds 

Stocking net stitch for 2 1/2 inches 

Next round-knit two together, knit 7 knit 2 together (2 times), knit 8

Knit 1 round 

Knit 2 together, knit 6 ( 2 times) knit 7 

Knit 1 round 

Knit 2 together, knit 5 (2 times) knit 6 

Knit 1 round 

Knit 2 together, knit 2 to end of round, knit 1 

Knit one round 

Knit 2 together to end of round (7 stitches should be left on needles)

Knit in round to desired length, mine is approximately 14 inches

Knit one then knit 2 together to end of round 

Pull yarn through remaining stitches, pull tight and secure.  

Make Pom-Pom ( I make mine with a Pom-Pom maker I bought from a craft store years ago) 

Secure to end of tail. 

Sew in all yarn tails and you have your hat!

I had a lot of fun making this hat and since I used thick yarn it actually knitted up pretty quick once I got the pattern down. I'm going to whip up the second one in another color later today hopefully if the baby lets me, and if a small little dog will leave my knitting alone that is. Then get them out to my sister and soon I will have cute little pictures of two tiny boys in them!

I'd love to see your finished projects and as always feel free to ask if you have any questions!

Happy knitting!

Knitted Hats

Today we will talk about knitting hats! One of my favorite things to knit!

It's a safe bet that if you knit for boys, you have knitted a hat. You can't go wrong with a hat, most boys or men for that matter will wear a hat at some point in their lives. Plus it's a rather easy place to start. A hat can be so versatile as well, once you have a basic pattern, it's pretty easy to change it up and you can let your creativity run wild. Hats are also something you can experiment with as well. So if you want to learn a new stitch, a hat is a great place to start!

As the mother of a very active young man, Jack, who is seven, and also a young man who is nine, Logan, who HATES scratchy things, as well as a four month old Violet, who is already a little mess maker, I try and find soft yet durable and let us not forget washable yarns!

I love Carson Simply soft. I am not affiliated with Carson or any yarn company for that matter, I just love how the yarn washes well and how soft it is.

It also knits up really nicely! This hat with the mittens is knit in Simply Soft, I can not tell you how much I love those colors.

The pattern for both the hat and mittens are unfortunately not free. However if you want any knitting book for babies and toddlers, The Big book of Kid's knits, by Zoe Mellor is one to own!

Seriously I have gone to this book more than any other, and was very sad when my older grew out of the sizing. However I now go to it a lot for my newest and this time I get to knit the girl patterns! It's also a book I go to for gifts for friends and family. Almost everything is made on two needles, so if knitting in a round makes you nervous, but you still want to knit, hats and mittens, booties, sweaters, and jumpers, this honestly is the book for you. Again I am not affiliated with anyone other than myself, but I can not rave about this book enough. Everything in it is not too complicated, however a lot of it looks as though it was.

Now if you are looking for a more sturdy yarn, and one that also knits super quick, I highly recommend a Lion Brand's Thick and Quick Wool Ease. I seriously love this yarn more than any other. It's one Logan doesn't complain about and it knits up incredibly fast. I use a 10.5 US needles and it's usually my go to for quick gifts I need fast,  as well as the first of the season hats for my kids. it usually takes me a day to knit one up if my day is pretty busy, or a couple hours to knit it if I just sit and knit.

I found this pattern on Raverly, Her picture shows it on a women, however you can use any color, or more than one color, and I have, and it's perfect for any person.

http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/big-chunky-comfy-hat

This pattern if for adults, but for my boys, I just used my smaller needles, the 10.5 US and it was perfect for them. Plus the thick and quick is stretchy, so it works for a lot of sizes. In fact I think I have made more of these for my kids and family than I have anything else. I have so many hats that soon I'm going to have to start just handing them out to strangers on the street. It's a simple and easy pattern, and a perfect knit for someone that would like to start knitting hats. It's also the perfect basic hat pattern that you can change up very easily, which I have also done a lot!

I would recommend finding a circular needle you like. I use a bamboo 16 inch set that works wonders. I think I purchased it on amazon, but you can find them almost anywhere. It just makes things easier if you are new to knitting in a round, When I first started hats, and socks, I got so frustrated with run on stitches that I gave up! I came back eventually and figured it out, but I always like people to want to knit, not want to throw it across the room and stomp on it!

 

 All the hats in the pictures except the grey pompom one are knitted in some way from this pattern. I wish I had better pictures, especially of the blue and grey, but it was such a hit with my sisters, yup all those girls accept the smallest one, are my sisters, that it's now owned by sister two, so I don't have a better one. However that is the point of knitting if you ask me. Giving it away, having people want your projects. Though if I'm honest I love to keep some of my projects that I fall in love with.





Over both the patterns I have included today are pretty easy and a perfect addition to your pattern collection. If you knit them up, I'd love to see your finished project and hear what you have to think about it. I hope you have as much fun knitting them up as I did!