Baby, It’s You

Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to introduce Emily Kathryn! My friends Liz and Jay welcomed her into the world about five weeks ago, and already she is a gifted knitwear model. Just look at that saucy expression, and her studied casual pose!

Look how gracefully she reclines! Liz was gracious enough to take pictures of little Emily modeling the dress and booties that I knit this summer in anticipation of her arrival. As you can see here, the dress is still a little big, which was my intention — I was hoping that it would fit her more or less perfectly when spring comes.

My favorite part of these shots is seeing that the dress seems to match her eyes perfectly. I understand that babies’ eyes change color and tend to darken over time, but for now the matchingness is pretty adorable.

My knitting life lately has been consumed by my Leitmotif cardigan. This shot is really washed out from the bright sun today, but it’ll give you an idea of how it’s coming along:

I’m done with half of the body, and I’ve picked up the stitches at the provisional cast-on in the middle of the back to start the other half of the body. This cardigan has an intensely weird construction, but once you get your mind around it, it makes a certain amount of sense. I continue to be madly in love with this project and convinced that it’s going to be my best cardigan yet.

I’ve also been spinning:

That multicolor Targhee top from Mountain Colors is looking pretty exciting! This is about as full as I managed to get this spindle, and here it is wound up for plying:

This is about half the Targhee fiber. My first batch of handspun yarn — the “Brickhouse” yarn that I showed you a few weeks ago — was very overspun, and in this batch I think I’ve overcorrected and it’s a bit underspun. But this is how you learn, I suppose, and when I spin the second half of both batches of fiber I hope to hit the sweet spot. I’m currently in the process of plying this yarn here, and should have pictures for you in just a few days!

On Sunday, some knitting friends and I are planning to hit up the Southern California Handweaver’s Guild’s Weaving and Fiber Festival in Torrance, CA. It will be my first fiber festival, and I’m super excited! Izznit, other SoCal knitters, if you’d like to meet up there, let me know and we’ll figure it out!