My favourite make

So at 23:48 on 27/01/15 my son Rohan was born! 

It wasn't an easy birth, but he was ok which was the main thing. I can honestly say I haven't made anything since he's been born as I'm too contented staring at him in the spare moments between feeds, nappy changes and general entertaining of him. I did, however, get some bits made before he made his belated appearance. He was a week late and I was going a bit nutty to say the least!

I made a knitted hat for baby and a matching headband complete with bow for me and another for my niece

The hat is knitted from a Ravelry pattern in organic cotton and because I had lots left over I made myself this bow band which is also on Ravelry, both are free patterns.

This one was made at the request of my niece in her second most favourite colour

The light is awful on this picture I now realise. Sorry about that.

A good round bump picture methinks! A fab shelf for projects it was!

I also made these leg warmers, but haven't put them on him as my husband thinks leg warmers are too girly and part of me agrees but I am disappointed to have made something and it not be used. I also knitted a cocoon for him but misjudged the size so he went in it once just so I could get a photo and that's been it as it was so snug a fit! I think one of my nieces will end up with it for a bear or dolly.

As you can see he was well and truly straight jacketed! 

Moving away from knitting to sewing, but with felt. I made a giant mobile to hang above his cot. 

I'm really chuffed with how this turned out. I'd seen a couple of different versions available and thought 'I can do that!' So I did! I drew directly onto the felt and then used the first cloud and raindrop as templates for the others. They're stuffed with toy stuffing and have used normal cotton thread to attach the raindrops to the clouds. I was hoping to use invisible thread but couldn't find mine and wasn't about to go rushing out to buy any, so thought white cotton was the next best option. 

And now we're up to date with my projects. I'm hoping to make some things when he's a bit older and more settled into a routine, but for now when he sleeps I either sleep, eat, or do housework, or if I'm really lucky a bit of all three! It's a good job he's cute or I might have to complain!

He's so cheeky!

Multi crafting

I've been keeping myself occupied since my last post making things for the sprout and the sprout's room. My latest project is a quilt made from some Cloud 9 fat quarters I won a couple of years ago. It was hard to cut into these fabric pieces because they'd been in my stash for so long they'd become almost 'too good' to cut into. Have you ever found that? I've made a makeshift quilt wall with a bedsheet hung against the wall from guitar hooks and pinned the hexies to it.

It's going to stay like that for a day or so as I'm not sure of the placement. I'm going to machine sew it because otherwise the sprout will be leaving home before it's finished if I hand sew it! 

I've knitted one blanket and am halfway through knitting another.

I knitted this in two sections as it was going to be too wide for my needles otherwise. The wool is self striping, I think I used about six balls of yarn for this. It's a Sirdar chunky but I've forgotten the name.

This is the second blanket that I'm knitting in moss stitch, it's addling my poor pregnancy brain sometimes and have had to unpick a few rows as got the pattern wrong and it was turning into a rib knit! I know, it's a simple stitch to do but I think it shows how bad my brain has gotten with disturbed sleep and worrying! It's Debbie Bliss Paloma alpaca and will be using two balls in yellow and two in green.

Back to sewing, I've made a gum drop pillow from an Amy Butler pattern that I've used many times before. I went through all my cushions and pillows and those that were too flat to use anymore got cannibalised to stuff this pouffe. It's stuffed within an inch of its life as I want to use it to prop my feet on when I'm nursing the sprout.

I've still got plenty of this fabric left so am considering making a matching pillow to go behind my back, possibly with a pompom trim because I can. So naaaaaa.

Oh, here's the latest scan of the sprout

I think it looks like the sprout is about to suck it's thumb or fist. I just hope it likes all the nesting I've been doing!

These past few months I've been mostly making...

This little person!

We're really excited and scared and hopeful and overwhelmed by the whole thing! I've decided that I will try and make some of the soft furnishes for the baby's room but I'm not going to sweat it if I don't get it all done. I'm super busy in work as got a temporary promotion so everything has all come at once as it usually does. 

I'm just moving into my 17th week tomorrow, the baby will be due in January so I've knitted a hat in super soft baby alpaca as it's not hairy so there's no loose fibres to worry about. I'm going on a sock knitting course next month so will be able to put what I've learnt into practice and knit baby socks. I've already taught myself how to knit booties thanks to Ravelry but am still stumped on how to knit a baby cardigan as have no idea how to use circular needles and when I've tried I end up in a mess! The rest of the clothes will be bought because I'm not super woman and I've decided to cut myself some slack. 

As for maternity clothes, thankfully my three sisters had pooled their maternity wear together so my sister and I got to share it as one of my sisters is pregnant too! Our mum is having kittens as were only three months apart for giving birth! Our dad is just keeping calm as usual and making sure we're both getting enough to eat and drink and taking all the right supplements! Even mum was impressed he knew about such things! But back to the clothes, I've yet to make anything for myself, I'm considering a simple jersey dress as it's my new best friend along with leggings and free flowing tops! I know! Leggings! I always swore after being a child in the 90s leggings were firmly going to stay in my past but they are sooooo comfortable as I can pull them up past my bump! 

We won't be finding out the sex of the baby before it's born as think it will spoil some of the magic for us so anything I make will either be in a soft grey or bright colours.  So if anyone has any recommendations of simple maternity wear patterns or simple knitted baby cardigans or anything non gendered I can make then I'd be most grateful. 

My first patchwork blanket

My sister is heavily pregnant and went into early labour the day before new year's eve, so I've been on tenter hooks and panicking wildly as wanted to make the new baby a patchwork blanket.  Thankfully, it's slow labour that she's gone into apparently and it seems to have gone quiet for the minute, which is really good as until today the baby would be classed as premature and my sister and the baby would have to stay in hospital for at least 72 hours.  Not fun.  Added to that is the fact that on her first baby she had pre-eclampsia and was forced to have an emergency caesarian, so I'm keeping everything crossed that it all turns out ok.  Anyway...I wanted to get the blanket done in time for the new arrival so it's a bit rustic...and it is my first attempt so do be kind!

The fat quarter's I used were bought from Ray Stitch, I substituted two Amy Butler fat quarter's for two more child related patterned ones I had of mice and chickens.  I suddenly realised at 11pm New Years Day that as I rounded the third corner with the white binding that I didn't have any more, so I had to improvise and use yellow on the fourth side.  I know it doesn't match and ordinarily I would have gone out and bought enough to finish it all in the same colour but what with the time constrictions I thought it was better if I just finished it.  I'm thinking that it might be my 'design quirk' for any patchwork blankets I make in the future will have one side of binding in a different colour! 

And now for a close up:

The back isn't perfect, and I cheated there too.  I didn't go for batting and cotton backing but instead got a plain white thin fleecy blanket and used that as the back.  It's soft and warm and cuddly snuggly.  I really like the patterns on the fat quarters, especially the little mushrooms!  I tried to keep the pattern as simple as possible and straight lines only, well they were straight until I started cutting and sewing! haha! 

In the words of narcoleptic in a cupboard there were a few 'puck ups' in the fleecy blanket as shown here:

It looks a bit worse here as I had no little helper to hold it for me and had to improvise with the bannister and some pegs.  Overall I'm really happy with the result and I've got patchwork left over as didn't want to make it too big so thinking of making some sort of bag to keep a few nappies, wipes and a change of clothes in for the baby.  At least it's one thing ticked off my new year sewing list already!  Yay!  I would have posted about this earlier but had some technical difficulties with the laptop, mainly that the 'enter' key wasn't working so needed a new keyboard...anyway difficulty over so lots of things to tell you all about in the next post!