My boys... er... MEN!

Dude, how cute are these boys?!?! I'm so lucky to be their mom. Yeah, being their mom may have its ups and downs but I'm still blessed!! Thank you, God, for blessing me with them and for picking me to raise them to be men that follow You!! And here's another cutie I love.....



Yes, I made Cade's sweater. I'll post again with that info and more pics!

Froggy for Cade

Cade is really into frogs lately so I started and finished this little guy today...



See? He really likes it!!

Baby Quinn has arrived!

I had such a wonderful birth experience... even though Jason couldn't be there. My very good friend, Katy, helped me out all that day and even spent the night at the hospital with me! How awesome is that?! Well, now Quinn is almost 2 months old and I have a lot to post as far as what I've been knitting lately. So, count on several blogs coming soon!

Waiting for baby to arrive...

My due date was yesterday and that has come and gone. Still no baby. So, this is what I've been doing to keep my mind off things. I knit 2 little baby cardigans from the book "One Skein Wonders". I used Lion Brand Homespun yarn from my stash and adjusted the pattern to be a little smaller for a newborn size. I also ditched the collar. I thought they looked cuter without it. Here they are on the table:



And then being modeled by Digits, the monkey:


And here we have Beth's Little Star Afghan from this pattern: http://www.angelfire.com/va3/heartfeltangels/littlestarafghan.html
The middle part is a little weird because I was kinda doing it wrong but I fixed the problem in the outer parts. I've decided not to go back and fix the middle. It'll have to just have "character". This was a "stash buster" crochet project using random acrylic yarns.



Here's to hoping the baby comes soon so he can enjoy these handmade projects (before he outgrows them in like 3 months!).

Self-Designed Cardigan

Well, this is something I'm very proud of. I designed my own top-down raglan cardigan! I used 3 different stitch patterns from my Reader's Digest Stitch Pattern book and incorporated them into the back, sleeves, front panel, and front edge! I'm really excited by how it turned out. So, here are the specs and pics...

Yarn: Berocco Ultra Alpaca (I forgot the name of the 2 different colors I used)
Needles: Size US 9, 29" circulars
Pattern: Top-Down Raglan with panel inserts from my book (previously named)





(yes, I'm 8 1/2 mos prego and dying to get this kid out!!!)





And here are the close-ups of the panel patterns...







I think this is one of the first sweaters I've made that I will be wearing quite a bit. I'm planning on adding more buttons once I give birth so it can be closed all the way up the front. It's pretty much pointless right now, though. Thanks for looking!

I'm knitting a sweater(s)...

Yeah, I've been catching up on the 2nd season of Grey's Anatomy and cracked up when it got to the part where Meredith was "knitting a sweater" and signing off on men. That's NOT why I'm knitting sweaters. I'm married so I'm signed off on all men besides my husband already. But yeah, I've knit some shrugs and smaller sweaters but just tackled the top-down-raglan that you can make to your own measurements. I used this pattern: http://www.woolworks.org/patterns/raglan.html. It really wasn't as hard as I thought. In fact, it's quite fun and easy! So much that I started another one and then ANOTHER one! Crazy, eh? So, since I'm 8 months pregnant, I'm not going to model the first one for you. I'll have to wait till the baby is born to have it look the way I want it. But here's a pic and the specs.

Yarn: Caron Simply Soft
Needles: Size US 8, 29" circulars and 8 DPN's (for sleeves)
Changes to pattern: I added waist, sleeve, and boob shaping




The next sweater I started is from the newest edition of Vogue Knitting Mag. I had this thick/thin yarn for forever and had started a sweater but never finished because I didn't like how it was turning out. I wasn't sure what I was going to use the yarn for. And then I saw this pattern for thick/thin yarn in VK recently and said to myself, "yes! this is it!". It's a top-down-raglan type of pattern with a random lace pattern. However, I think I'm going to make it longer and long sleeved. I stopped where I'm at right now because I want to try it on after I have the baby for the perfect fit. So, it probably won't get finished for another couple months. But here's what I've started on...




And an up-close of the random lace pattern...


FINALLY, I'm currently working on this from the same pattern as the navy sweater but I'm making it into a cardigan. I had this yarn in my stash for another sweater I was going to make for a gift (it's half-crocheted and I'm not going to finish it). So, here's my progress so far...



You can't really tell how it's going to turn out yet but it's a soft boucle yarn that's mostly grey flecked with tan. More pics to come as the work progresses....

And that's it for now! **PHEW**!

My ALL-TIME favorite slippers

I made like 8 or 9 of these for gifts for Christmas and everyone seems to love them. They are felted slippers (a pattern by Fiber Trends). I recently made another pair... originally for myself but they may end up being a gift for someone else after all. Since I didn't take any pics of the ones I made for Christmas, I decided to post these. Here's a pic before the felting process...



For those of you who don't know, "felting" is a process in which a knitted item (knitted in 100 percent wool or other animal fiber) is agitated in hot water for a period of time until it has shrunk and "felted" to what you want the finished product to look like. It produces a fabric that is sturdy and a bit fuzzy. So, you knit what you want real big and then throw it in the wash (only using the agitating cycle) for a bit and WALAH... you've got a felted product! Here's the finished slippers...



These took me about 6-8 hours to knit and felt. And it's so worth it! It makes such a great gift! And they keep my feet nice and snuggly warm. Like I said, they are my ALL-TIME favorite slippers.